Tweet This
One software company needed to dramatically cut their product time-to-market since it had been releasing new product versions once every two years. In today’s fast-paced marketplace, once every two years is not fast enough to keep up with market demands and ahead of the competition. This company collaborated across all product disciplines to identify and implement specific actions that cut their new product release cycle in half.
This is a significant reduction considering that there were 700 people working on this product. Everyone agrees that the one thing they did that made the biggest difference was transforming their culture from a command and control/micro-management culture to one based on high trust.
What are the price tags of not having a high trust culture? You will begin to see a lot of turnover and uncertainty that slows effort. People are afraid to act without permission – even when their actions are the right things to do. Decisions are made too far back from the front lines. People shy away from innovation because innovation is too risky. Ideas are not shared for how to make things better.
If a culture of trust is worth having, how do you go about getting one? Culture change is hard. It takes effort and commitment. While people may see the benefits of changing the culture, resistance arrives and is not always rational. Based on this company’s change effort and others, here are a few things you should know about creating a culture of trust.
Engage Teams And Leaders In The Culture Change
As Peter Senge says, “People don’t resist change, they resist being changed.” And the people in your organization are the culture. They know what needs to change and how to change it. When the software company wanted to move away from the micromanaged culture, senior leadership realized that they had no idea how to make the change happen. Leaders carefully explained the “what” and the “why” of the change that was needed. And asked their delivery teams to figure out the “how” and leaders carefully did not give them the solution but asked questions. For example, when leaders were asked how they wanted a problem solved, their reply was, “How do you want to solve it?”
Decisions and decision-making was no longer stalled because no one had to wait on a leader to make the many decisions. Bottlenecks were no longer bottlenecks. People in the organization began to understand they could change the processes that burdened them from delivering in effective ways. People realized they could change the way they worked. The organization was in the “how” business. They understood what was broken and how to fix it. They began to change their culture because they owned it.
But, don’t make the mistake of thinking that a change culture process will do the trick. Simply by adding such a process you tell the organization that you don’t trust them to find the methods they need to change in their own culture. You are now back in the “how” business.
You must stay out of the “how” business. Asking questions instead of giving solutions. A good question to ask is, “What would you like me to do?” Other questions might be “What direction do you think our company should take?” or “What are we hearing from our customers?” or “Why not ask the customers?” Leaders should never problem solve in the “how” area.
And before you do or say anything, ask yourself, “Will what I am about to do or say help improve trust?”
Decide If Fixing Broken Trust Is Worth It
In this organization, broken trust existed among leaders, among managers, among teams – broken trust was rampant. The company took a close look and identified cases where there was truly broken trust as opposed to trust not built. (Yes, this does take time because it is not always obvious.) There is no magic wand or method to do this kind of discovery. However, if you listen, the organization will tell you where the broken trust exists.
What can you do about the broken trust in your organization? Broken trust is like a cut rope. A rope consists of many strands wound together that give the rope its strength. Once cut, repairing the rope requires matching and stitching together each piece, strand for strand. Not only does this take time, but the rope will never be the same and will not have the same strength as the original rope. Broken trust takes time and effort to repair. Leaders must make the decision on whether or not to keep a person in their organization that has broken trust with the organization or with other people in the organization because keeping that person requiring matching and stitching together each piece of broken trust. Is the time you need to rebuild and repair broken trust worth it? This is never an easy call and often times leaders wait too long to deal with this issue.
Some People Like Being Micromanaged
Because a culture of micromanagement breeds micro-managers, one group was rampant with leaders telling everyone what to do and how to do it. Leaders wondered why their people didn’t deliver fast enough, didn’t work overtime and why their work was of such poor quality when it was the leaders’ behavior that slowed down, discouraged and demoralized the teams. Simply put, the people working for the micromanagers didn’t care about their work. They did what they were told to do and went home even if they felt that what they were doing was of little or no value. In such a culture people are afraid to say anything or do anything except what they are told to do for fear of losing their jobs.
As the leaders started to trust people to find their own solutions, most, while hesitant at first, began enjoying work again. But there were a few outliers who questioned the culture shift. Their comments were, “Why do we have to change?” and “We are working just fine together.” and “Its working fine as is.” At first, it seems some people look like they are resisting change. However, upon closer look it seems some people really do want to be micromanaged.
As shocking as this may sound, you can find it in many organizations. It appears that some people just don’t want to be held accountable. In a low-trust culture, there is low accountability. If you tell people what to do and how to do it, if they fail, it’s your fault. You told them how to do it. They didn’t fail, you did and as long as it is not their failure, they will stay out of trouble.
Trust First
One thing the senior leader in this company did was to trust first. With that example, the managers trusted their reports. As Marcus Buckingham says, “Suspicion is a permanent condition.” When it comes to building a culture of trust, you have two choices. You can be suspicious and require that everyone prove that they are trustworthy before you give them ownership. Or you can assume that everyone is trustworthy and let them perform at their highest level immediately. Ask yourself, what does a person have to do in order to earn your trust? Think of the time, effort and trouble you will save if you operate from a perspective of trust rather than suspicion.
When you don’t trust someone, they know it and feel it and this makes communication and collaboration difficult. Should you always trust first? You might make a mistake but communication and collaboration is much easier when you trust first.
Summary
Due to market needs and customer demands, the organization who made the shift to a trust culture knew it had to change. At first there was chaos and confusion. But it suddenly smoothed out. Today, customers are getting value they love, faster and with higher quality. The people are thriving in this organization. As one person said, “I have gotten more done in the last three months than I have in all the time I have been here.” When asked how long that was, he replied, “Three and a half years.”
A culture of trust works at a large scale and a small scale. Empower your organization to make the change happen and stay out of their way while they do it. Become an enabler for the changes they want to make.
