I have been thinking
about one's ability to trust and being trustworthy for quite a long time now! I
could not go with the argument that if your ability to trust others is a good indicator of your own trust-worthiness! It can also be an indicator of ignorance
or stupidity!! I sure recognise the fact that those who are not trustworthy
will have tough time trusting others. If untrustable people understand /
ascertain that the other person is trustable or ignorant or too magnanimous,
they seem to trust them and take it to their advantage. Their own trust-worthiness
or the lack of it alone does not seem to determine their ability to trust!!! I
also have seen people who try hard to be trustworthy having tough time trusting
others. So I am not sure if it is that simplistic to say if you are able to
trust, it means that you are also trustworthy.
So the key
question many times in life is how do we improve our ability to trust!! As a
coach, frequently I end up helping the team members start trusting each other.
I use a couple of techniques - the first one is explaining possible reason(s) -
the positive ones - for someone's behaviour and asking the team to see if there
is a possibility for any more such reasons.
Usually such coaching sessions start at a very low energy level but the
positive energy gets generated in them is amazing! Teams feel so very excited
and/or grateful at the end of the session! The next technique is challenging
the assumptions that lead to not trusting others. Though, sometimes this
conversation gets tougher to handle, it is essential to break the habit of
assuming. It gets tougher when the coach is also responsible for teaching them
risk management and techniques like Failure Mode Effect Analysis, SWOT, Threat
Model analysis etc. :-) Not only that, the coach may be hated for challenging
their belief system! Coaches do not feel afraid to be hated anyways :-) Or put
it differently, one can be a coach only if he/she is not afraid of being
hated!!
Biggest challenge a
coach goes thru is to make the team unlearn! Teaching something all new is a
lot easier than making them unlearn what they already know or what they have
experienced! If they have had a untrustworthy team member, anybody playing that
role becomes untrustable easily only because of their earlier experience!
Because they assume this way, they behave overly cautiously. Of course, the
other member can understand this - even if they do not understand the reasons,
they understand that there is something wrong with the relationship and as a
result they behave even more cautiously! With this, they get into a vicious
cycle! Remember, statements like, all sales people are liars, all accountants
are rude etc., they all stem from the assumption cycle! It gets tougher to get
the team out of that habit. Challenging the assumption works better in that
case.
As mentioned in many
of my earlier articles, applying most of these techniques is easier in
professional set up. When it comes to personal environment, anyone who tries to
build trust between two / a few other people can be seen as manipulative or
intruder or a controller! It is better for the individual to look for ways to
break away from the usual thinking, find positive reasons and challenge their
own assumptions. It is tough though!! Unlearning is too difficult! It takes
considerable effort to unlearn the negativity towards a role in professional
environment itself! It can look almost impossible in personal life! Moreover, a
lot of generalisations will also happen like in the case of professional life….
The statements like "All women/men are….", "All
Indians/Europeans are…", "All
cooks/drivers are…", "All
neighbours in this neighbourhood are… " etc. are a result of such
assumptions, negativity towards one person who represented that role / country!
But then, it is all the more important to trust people in personal life! If
not, life can be miserable if not hell. I am sure none of us want hell!
How do we make this world feel like heaven? How do we improve trust overall - both being trustworthy and being able to trust?
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