Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Welcome to Starcares, a weekly program that delves into the
issues that impact you and your family. This program is
the public affairs feature of this radio station. Now here's
your host, Michael Leach.
Speaker 2 (00:14):
Every problem we deal with is ultimately a trust issue.
Trust it's the cornerstone of connection and community, and for
us as individuals, for businesses, organizations, it is the determining
factor for success or failure. Let's talk about it. My
guest today is doctor David Horsager, CEO of Trust Edge
Leadership Institute. Doctor David, thank you for joining me today
(00:35):
and welcome to the show.
Speaker 3 (00:36):
Thank you, Michael, it's great to be here.
Speaker 2 (00:38):
You've written a resource entitled Trust Matters More than Ever?
How are you defining trust?
Speaker 3 (00:43):
Trust is a confident belief in a person, a product,
and organization. When I can confidently believe in you, everything changes.
While lack of trust is the biggest expense in a company,
in a government, in a family, in a church, it's
not a leadership issue. The reason you follow leaders trusts
on a sales issue. The reason people buy people don't
trust each other. They want share ideas. In a classroom,
learning will only go up when I trust the content.
(01:04):
The teacher, or the psychological safety or trust of the room.
So you have to deal with trust. The big problem
is people want to solve other issues. They want to
call it some big word they can't solve, and if
they don't deal with trust, they don't deal with the
real issue. It doesn't matter if your church, a family.
A lack of trust is the biggest cost you have.
I mean it's it really is. You think of someone
you don't trust. Like, think of a lock. The only
(01:26):
reason I put a lock on anything, a door, a bicycle,
or a home is because they don't trust. So what's
the cost. Well, I got to buy the lock, that's money,
But the biggest cost is time. Now I get to
open it every time I go through the gate. What
if it's a combination lock, right, Or you've got teenagers
like I do. They're going out with friends you trust.
Oh that feels great. They're going out Friday night with
friends you don't trust. It's the biggest stress you have
as a parent at work. In your church, you got
(01:48):
people that got your back, you trust them. You got
someone who doesn't have your back you don't trust. That's
the biggest stress you have at work. So there's massive costs,
in attrition, in resources.
Speaker 2 (01:57):
How do you actually then build trust?
Speaker 3 (02:00):
Always comes back to these eight research funnels, and they're
defined by C words, but don't think of them as
some pastoralists think of them as like they each represent
a very important funnel. So these are the eight. There's
lots more to each of these, but I'll try to
do a quick overview because context matters. So number one
is clarity. People trust the clear, and they mistrust or
distrust the ambiguous or the overly complex. When I was
(02:22):
a professor tried to be complex and look smart, I
lose clarity, I lose trust. Clarity wins. So many organizations
and leader, even branding experts, marketing experts think they're clear,
and today in this world they're not. Clarity takes work.
Think of a leader that's clear about vision. I might trust.
A salesperson that's clear about the benefits of the product
that might buy front. Usually they're clear about how cool
(02:43):
they are the benefits of the product. A teacher that's
clear about the assignments, I'll trust. So clarity Number two
is compassion. We trust those that care beyond themselves. That's intent.
If someone doesn't have intent beyond themselves. I don't tend
to follow them or don't want to be accountable to
them to trust them. Number three is character. We knew
that would be important people. We trust those that do
what's right over what's easy, but it's not everything. Because
(03:05):
I might trust Michael right, I might trust you to
take my kids to the ballgame because of your character,
but not trust you to give me a root canal
because of competency, which is the next pillar. You gotta
be confident if I'm going to trust you in that thing,
like are you competent to do that plumbing job or
lead that Bible study. The next pillar's commitment. We trust
those that stay committed in the face of adversity. Under
(03:26):
this pillar is the process for how you rebuild trust
if you lost it. The next pillar is connection. We
found that people trust those that are willing to connect
and collaborate with others. If we see siloing in an organization,
we know that's a counter force to connection and they're
losing on trust. The seventh pillars contribution, and the number
one word that came out of this research funnel was results.
(03:46):
We trust results. We can't just be compassionate and have
character and not deliver results. If I go in for
amputation of a leg and they cut off the wrong leg,
we got a problem. They might be compassionate, but you know,
we got to get the right results. And finally, the
queen and King of the pillars is consistency. Whatever you
do consistently, I will trust The only way to build
a reputation. The only way to build a brand is sameness,
(04:06):
for good or bad. If someone is consistently late, I
will trust them to be late. So these eight we
have tools and strategies and ways to build them so
that you can have the most trusted brand, organization, church.
And it's also biblically true. And I can point that
out too. Think about this, first of all, if you
think of Moses, Je's what to Moses, Hey, quit doing
it all on your own. Find for yourself those that
(04:28):
are trustworthy. Put those over the thousands and hundreds and tens.
And then in Meiami Ah thirteen, like, hey, take those
away from the storehouses. Put the ones that are trustworthy,
and charity of the storehouses. I believe the way of
leaders that follow Jesus is trustworthiness. Hebrews twelve twenty two.
The Lord delights in the trustworthy. He wants trustworthiness, So
what does that look like? You see it over and
(04:49):
over in scripture you see the clarity without vision, people perish,
And in Proud twenty nine you see compassion. In classons
three twelve like clothe yourself to compassion, you should look
like we should look like we're closed in compassion? Are
we looking like that? Are we looking clothed in compassion?
Number three is character, He walks in integrity, walks securely.
And the next one is competency, and all kinds of
(05:10):
things there, but probably you know the number one counterforce
to competency is actually arrogance. And I think our country
is even opposed in some ways right now, because over
and over and over in scripture, at least five times
I know of God opposes the proud and gives grace
to the humble. And I'm shocked at how proud and sad,
(05:30):
and myself included, how proud we can be as Christians
because God gives grace to the humble. And you think
of anybody that's overly proud. When you were a kid
on a playground, you did not like. That did not
warm you up. And so people that don't stay fresh
and relevant and competent. They usually think they know it already.
Their competency commitment pillar you see how you know stand
(05:51):
firm and the faith or Paul to Timothy, Hey, finish
the race. You gotta finish this race. You gotta keep
on doing it and over and over and over. So
I could go through all of them consistency and rejoice, always, prey,
continually in all circumstances, and you can just see. I
started to see how God was speaking about this years
thousands of years ahead of me. But of course corporations
(06:11):
became interested when they started seeing results on this truth
that actually God was talking about but came out of
secular research.
Speaker 2 (06:17):
Also, yes, so many people feel inadequate when managing another scene,
and that really is conflict. We have all these wonderful attributes,
but even the best of us, we're going to encounter conflict,
and many of us just feel like we're just not
prepared really to do that. So how can we maintain
or what helps us maintain trust even during conflict.
Speaker 3 (06:40):
The one thing we're good at here, I think, is
really taking research. We don't want to be kind of light,
but we take it and simplify so everybody can use
it tomorrow morning. So there's a tool in the book,
simple tool that goes into this pause he is posture.
How do I show up in that conflict. There's a
way to come into conflict with a c and posture
(07:00):
that tends to open people up. It's kind of this
open hands, palms up, more open stance even compared to
certain stances in conflict. So so pause, active listening, how
do you actually active listen? How what does that look like?
It's a discipline to learn that w is wake up
and be present with that person is? How do I
(07:21):
how do I show that I'm awake and aware and
kind of not manipulating but kind of mirroring what they're doing.
And this process just softens people and opens people up
to get to the solution. And that's the sen pause, posture,
active listening and your actions w is wake up and
be present to them and SS solution centered. One of
the biggest problems people have in conflict is staying on
(07:43):
the solution and instead of getting off on all kinds
of other things. So there's there's some tools under that
tool of how you can do those things, even some phrases.
But if you can kind of follow that like, hey,
I'm stepping into conflict. If people in marriage counseling or
in life counseling could get good at pause, they solve
way more and they could actually even increase trust. Your
(08:06):
fastest opportunity to increase trust actually is not in first
interaction with someone. It is in conflict. How you show
up in conflict, which is inevitable. You will have conflict
no matter what how you respond in conflict, you have
an incredible opportunity to build trust faster than any other time.
George W. Bush was most trusted, had the highest ratings
the week after nine to eleven. How he showed up
(08:29):
in a crisis is how he built the highest level
of trust.
Speaker 2 (08:32):
What advice do you have for leaders who want to
build like team trusts across diverse generations?
Speaker 3 (08:39):
Interesting one of our studies found that, you know, we
all want to say, our generations are so different and
a couple interesting points. All across generations, people will do more,
they'll work harder, they'll be more focused if they could
trust their leader. So all these eight pillars have ways
to be more trusted, But one across generations would be
(09:00):
a simple one that I can just give you right now.
Would be in your messaging leader. You have to step
up a different level of clarity. And I'll give you
one tool for it, a simple one and getting a
little acronymy here today, but it's m r A. You
have a message, You're gonna make a pivot. You have values,
you have a mission? Is it m r A. Is
(09:20):
it memorable? Is it repeatable? And is it actionable? And
most like values, for instance, aren't actionable. Like they'll have
a value of integrity. It's like, what's that If you
don't have that, you know, you go to jail. It's like,
what's that look like? Like in our office, it's being
the same on stage and off and we all have
a stage. You got to pivot. Oh we had a
you know, a pandemic. We got to change all these things. Okay,
(09:42):
give them a new message. Is it memorable, is it
repeatable they can share with their team, and is it
actionable they can actually act on it. That's one way
we build trust in the midst of not just stormy times,
but the midst of change. That is pretty much always
in our world. And there you know, there's several other ways,
but there's one idea.
Speaker 2 (10:00):
The person who feels like they started off really well
building trust, whether that was in their family or amongst
friends or even at work, and they just really blew it.
I mean they really blew it. What are some first
steps that they can actually begin now to rebuild Like
people are really not receptive to them at this point,
where do they begin?
Speaker 3 (10:19):
Yeah, well, that's a good question. We deal with this
a lot, and let me start by saying this, There's
only one way. There's ten step process in the book
of how you Rebuild Trust, and I'm going to give
you a couple of things to speak to that specifically.
But first let me remind everybody the only way at
the end of the day to rebuild trust, if you
(10:40):
ever get the chance, only way you will ever rebuild
trust is not the apology. People think, I'm sorry, I'm late. No,
you're late every time, like we don't rebuild trust at
the apology. That doesn't mean you shouldn't apologize, be humble
a load of other things. But the only way at
the end of the day to rebuild trust is to
make and keep a new commitment. People have to see
(11:02):
a new commitment made and kept, and so what that
person can do if no one's buying it at all.
They do need to humbly apologize, they do need to
saving things. But let's say no, but they don't even
have a chance yet and say, what I would do
is something like this, Hey, I blew it. I am
so sorry, this hurt you, this blah blah blah, And
(11:23):
then I would say, I know you probably don't trust me,
like I've done this multiple times. I know this, this
is too much to expect, but I just want it
for you and for me. I'm going to do this
this week. I'm going to do this this month, so
you can see I'm going to do those this thing.
I've blown it morally, I'm gonna never travel alone with
(11:45):
someone now, and you're gonna see I've blown it this way.
I'm never gonna whatever. Because to rebuild trust if you've
blown it, we all want to talk about grace a
lot in my Christian faith, but there is accountability, and
the bigger you've blown it, the more accountability that is
public you have earned. So, for instance, if someone blows it,
(12:05):
let's say morally on their own somewhere flying out, they
cannot expect others to just yeah, but see, I've stayed
this way for this long I've stayed this. Nope, you
have earned maybe for life, that you will have an
accountability person fly with you always. You may have earned that,
and you may have to do that consistently. That doesn't
(12:25):
mean people will give grace. That doesn't mean you can't
be retrusted over time. But we all know there are
consequences to doing wrong. So I would say you have
to make some sort of commitments. So if that's a
different thing, you have to make some commitment and keep
that commitment, take it incrementally. Don't make a commitment you
can't keep it, because that will just lose trust. So
(12:46):
you know, I'm gonna start exercising. Don't say that if
you're not really because you lose trust in yourself when
you make commitments you don't keep too. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (12:53):
Absolutely, so we're out of time. How can we learn
more about what we've discussed today?
Speaker 3 (13:00):
Resources even free ones at trust edge dot com, trust
edge dot com, trust edge dot com or if you
can spell my name David Horsager dot com that'll get
you there as well. And then the resources for the
book are trust edge dot com, trust edge dot com.
Trust Edge gets you to the Leadership Institute, get research.
If you buy the book, Trust matters more than ever.
(13:21):
There's a study guide with questions. They're free to download
and use the study guides. There's videos you can share
with your family or church or office. We help people
too and love doing that. There are several free options
right there.
Speaker 2 (13:33):
Trust edge dot com, trust edge dot com, Doctor David Horsager,
thank you so much for joining.
Speaker 3 (13:39):
Me today, Michael, thank you, and thank you for listening.
Speaker 2 (13:42):
Won't you join me again. I'm your host, Michael Leech,
and I am praying for you and praying that the
rest of your day is wonderful.