Whole Care Network → 09 Podcast: Developing Trustworthiness

are you suffering from staff turnover too many lost business opportunities is your reputation at risk if so you know your workplace culture needs Improvement but determining how to do so and where to start is about as fun and effective as trying to assemble a puzzle with no picture to guide you culture change in a box is a show that takes you on a compelling Deep dive into an effective real-time culture change process so you can begin to feel hopeful and re-energized about your business and now here are your hosts for culture inter change in a box Chris mclen and Judy Ryan well greetings everyone it is Chris mclen the V Tai guy for another episode of culture change in the box and if you’re hearing the joy in my voice it’s because I was dancing when that music comes on I just love I just love that music you pick for our podcast Jud Isn’t that cool I love it too it makes me want to dance Too yeah that’s my good friend Judy Ryan from Life work systems hello everybody it’s great to see you again you know we need to you know we need to do a couple of video podcast so they could I’m okay I’m gay I can I can I’ll even wear a bow to yes there you go maybe I’ll wear one too well because you know we trust each other enough to do that that’s right and that’s the topic of our show today trustworthiness yes so important isn’t it it is crucial we call it foundational it’s the basis of everything it doesn’t happen overnight though does it no no in fact most people think it sounds like a great idea but they don’t know quite what it entails and so they’re of in a murky place with it like well I want trustworthiness I can kind of feel when I don’t have it but how do I get specific on pinpointing where it’s out of whack and where it could be created really strong and that’s how you why you have developed life work systems to put these components in place so people can develop them yes it’s um it’s one of the areas that we spend a lot of time with clients we have tools and programs just around the topic of how to develop trust and how to use it whenever there’s a relationship issue how to use it in mentoring all kinds of things can you hear that that you know we’re doing live radio so so we’ve got a thunderstorm going on here in St Louis so if you hear that rumbling it’s not my your stomach it’s not my stomach okay no I’ve been feeding him all we had some good chocolate on the last show so so how do you approach this how do you know this is such a broad subject yes in the beginning it feels broad to people because I you know I teach them some component parts of it but over time I can guarantee you our clients are memorizing because of wrote you know conversations eight values that build trust can you talk a little bit about the yes I I will um I love the eight values that build trust I continually grow and understanding them in Greater depth but they’re things like honesty and straightforwardness and honesty and straightforwardness at first glance could even be thought to be the same but they’re quite different right and then disclosure well how is that different and it is and then receptivity so you know how we’re taking an information also being giving recognition that has a lot of scope to it in itself what is respect really and seeking Excellence what does that look like how do you know when you’ve achieved that what does it mean to follow through on your commitments and that one’s a little bit more obvious because it’s a specific behavior so those are the eight values that you know that create trustworthiness and if you have any relationship issues with anybody you can usually it back to this isn’t happening this isn’t happening and this isn’t happening and that’s just my side of the picture that’s not what you’re there’s always another there’s always two sides to it so it’s very helpful for people to recognize it and and have a set of tools that can go to to solve the issues that they’ve realized so there’s the specificity That Matters to the clients and that’s why our first clip is on our clients appreciation of the specificity well let’s take a listen Okay I do think trustworthiness is important in foundational I like how in life works we break it down into what it actually means and that we get very specific information on how to show up as trustworthy because if we don’t have the same definition then we can’t get anything done so it really really helps to all be speaking the same thing and we go over those eight values that build trust over and over whenever we talk about life works so it in hammers in and I just naturally talk to other friends and say oh where are you not being this or where are you not being that I talked to somebody today said oh that was so nice he was so straightforward and disclosing and it gives it gives everybody hopefully a a sense of what what trustworthiness really means I believe that’s probably one of the basic 101 things you need if you can’t trust somebody you can’t give them a job expect to get it done you don’t know whether you can take their word for it to have a good employee you need to be able to say can you do this if they say yes you don’t have to constantly go to check back up on them uh I think it’s the Baseline for all of our relationships whether it’s at work or at home or anywhere else trustworthiness is happening here I think a lot of people are a lot more particular about how they answer you now goodness more particular how they answer you more they particular yeah because you’re more self-aware I you just took the words right out of my mouth yeah I’m reading your mind today we know I do you measure trust we actually physically measure trust okay um when we first start with a client one of the surveys that we give to all employees measures three major components one is trust and in multiple ways and I’ll go into that in a minute a little bit more one of them is alignment do all of the employees have Clarity and understanding okay and approval of the company’s purpose values Visions goals procedures and roles so that’s a that’s kind of a more systemwide business-wide look look into the organization systems and how people are actually understanding all of that so that’s alignment we measure engagement levels what are the P perceptions of the employees around how many of us what percentage of us are causing trouble sabotaging actually working against right grossly underperforming all kinds of things and how many of us are C minus people that are showing up every day but we’re just going to do bare minimum and how many of us are fully engaged so those are the engagement and Alignment metrics but around the trust what we do is we describe those eight values and we ask every person and sometimes we’ll do it between teams as well because maybe in a particular two team or three team area it’s it’s how do you feel about that group over there so sometimes it’s done uh companywide and between departments but it would be like this Chris here’s what straightforwardness is how important is it to you on a scale of 1 to 10 and let’s say you give it a nine I think it’s super important that people are telling me what they want for me that they’re asking for what they want that they’re clearing their expectations to me how well is it here I don’t know i’ give it a five right so that spread is called the trust Gap so a gap is not a good thing it’s the not good thing so most of most of the organizations we work with have at least the weth of Gap that the International Community has and sometimes if they’re in crisis they might have double the Gap and sometimes if they’re pretty healthy they might have a smaller Gap but our our intent is to keep like smash down that Gap we have one organization that went from over 14o gap for all eight values down to a twoo gap that good that means that their expectation for how everything should be happening is almost equal to what is happening which is what we want to help them well they they had a culture change they’ve definitely been having a culture change and it that’s a non Roi kind of measure but it is associated with other return on investment you know uh measures that we take I’m going to jump off topic here because you just you you said Roi return on investment because it’s you know you you never really see you don’t see a line item in a spreadsheet for you know finances that measure you know what is what is the cost but you certainly see what negative behavior lack of trust what it does cost well we we see it in the non Roi but we also do measure the return on investment so what we’re with our clients is we’re building the uh performance targets that will show you uh return on investment so one of the examples I have is a friend of mine who was a client for years has taken over a position over 10 nursing homes and we factored a conservative estimate of how much um income is lost from these 10 nursing homes over a year and it’s almost 8 million just in turnover overtime and overpayment all associated with with Staffing and turnover problems and to completely train her entire organization for one year she would only have to have a 10 12% reduction in her turnover one year to be break even with the investment that she made and if we help her reduce her retention rate by 50% she’ll save close to $4 million wow so there are hard numbers and it’s just retention that’s not around billable hours or sales goals or things that are really truly measurable so we we’re doing that we’re building that well we’ve got a couple of more examples yes okay let’s uh let’s listen I know that it’s being practiced in Essa because you see people being forthright with one another with trusting one another being being completely honest and open and willing to share and hear feedback from their other employees another way we know is we do a couple um different surveys throughout the length of time that we’ve had Judy with us and we’ve gotten our scores back and you can tell that based on all of our scores we’re going up in trustworthiness and in all other areas that we measure this process has taught me to not only trust other people but to trust myself so knowing that I’m being 100% straightforward and honest with everyone that I work with and I expect that in return from them and I know that I’m getting that because they’re getting the same education so to say same practice as I’m getting I feel like everyone in our company sees one another in a totally new light that we all really get along we want to be here we want to be with one another and we want each other to succeed trustworthiness is huge for me personally that in the blueprint process it’s one of my high values that is there for me and so that’s a big thing for me I know that it’s present I’m in our team because there’s there’s less gossip for one and so whenever there’s less gossip gossip I don’t know if it was a huge part of our group before but they was definitely present and I just through the trust cap surveys that barometer has moved or that needle has moved there’s less Gosa there’s more openness amongst the teams a lot of times whenever there’s no trust right we’re not going to be open and so trustworthiness is definitely present is it perfect right now no but it’s a process and we’re heading in that direction so definitely feel that we can see that evidence we’ve got a few different sub departments within our group and it’s very beneficial that we’re all on the same page we can all speak the same language and so there’s some things that come out of this that we’ve all been able to say oh you know this is happening and we need to have disclosure conversation around that and so just knowing that we’re all speaking the same language is the best way for me to say that and are on the same page commitment level has been super super helpful you know Jud a lot of great examples there but I guess a question that really comes to my mind is what is the most obvious way that people break trust well one of them is was just mentioned which is Gossip gossip I wonder yeah yeah and the other one that’s more obvious is not falling through on commitment so those are real kind of no-brainers in a way but there are lots of ways that we break trust and and it’s mostly in ways that we don’t even realize we’re breaking trust and and probably one of the biggest ways we break it is by not being aware of how we make people into objects one of the w wow yeah one of the uh values is respect and what respect really means to us is that I are am recognizing that you’re a unique separate person with your own aspirations dreams values and wants and needs right and if as soon as I forget that you are and that you’re to be honored for that I’ve broken trust and that could be so subtle right it could just be I forgot your name or I’m not giving you eye contact or I’m not listening to you well and it’s it’s just one of eight ways that I could kind of violate that trust with you but it’s so subtle so even though there are some real obvious ways um there’s some ways that are not um not quite so obvious more through our passivity so I think we’ve got another we’ve got another signature is happening here more so than it was before and I feel it’s extremely important if I don’t feel a trust between the person that I’m working with then I constantly have that doubt in the back of my mind whether or not it’s going to get done or whether or not I have to follow up on it or be concerned with the way they carry out what I’ve asked them to um the difference that I’ve seen is knowing that I can trust someone I don’t have to spend time checking up and they have accepted that respons ability and they are accountable for that so I no longer have to worry about it actually kind of an interesting example because when somebody is not being trustworthy are we being trustworthy by addressing their lack of trustworthiness right so it’s easier for us to point the finger at them well look at how they’re not following through or they’re I have to micromanage them now right where really if we’re building trust we’re addressing that elephant in the room so it’s kind of one of those things if we’re going to point a finger at somebody around well you’re not being trustworthy you do always want to look at am I am I letting you know how I feel about that or am I just going to go around you quietly micromanaging you instead of addressing it with you that so how do how do you build trust within a culture well a lot of it is actually teaching people very direct specific tools one of them for example is just directly talking about the all the understandable reasons why people gossip and how it works against their trust and how to help them make commitments not to do that activ and to promise each other that they’re going to come to each other when they have an issue now imagine how scary that is if you don’t feel equipped right exactly so now you’ve made this promise you better get yourself equipped right and we help them be mentored and supported through that so that it’s almost like they can’t avoid it even if they want to I we’ve had people that have been die hard until just recently where now they’re saying okay I’ll drink the Kool-Aid you know and what happens is that regardless of whether they consciously think they don’t want the culture change they know the words like you you’ll hear somebody say uh do you think that’s other directed or self-directed and they’re like well I guess it could be other directed like they know what all that means they can’t not know it so part of the way we help bring trust in is we saturate the culture with the information and the support and the tools and the repetition and the practice so that people can’t not know it does that make sense it does make sense we’ve got a couple more examples we want to play yes I think trustworthiness is important as a foundational piece and now now that I know what builds trust from Life Works I know even more how important it means and what we mean when we’re talking about trustworthiness it doesn’t mean that you obey me completely and it doesn’t mean that you tell the truth and hurt somebody it means something much more broadly and more important and how I know now if it’s not being shown as if it doesn’t feel right I don’t just accept that oh that’s just the way this person is or that’s just the relationship or we just don’t get along well that’s I can go further than that now because I know it’s totally possible for anybody to have trust and I know you know how there’s there’s Diagnostics like somebody ask about the symptoms because I know the eight values that build trust I know what symptom is is being shown and I know what the treatment is to address it it’s a lot different than just having a vague sense of I’m not getting along well or I don’t they’re are assigning them some kind of motive that that might not be true they might be acting that way because I’m not showing up in some way or they might not know that I want something for more trust so having that spelled out gives gives a lot more distinct actions that I can take to build it up again so I do know immediately when it’s not working and I I see it everywhere now and I can know I can make it better I do know the trustworthiness is getting better here because I don’t have the sense of not getting along well with anybody or I don’t have a sense of tension with people and I know on my team when we Mentor I ask them what relationship is not at of 10 and I think that people are sitting there at 10 when they’re really in an eight I’ll be honest I think the bar is kind of low but nobody is at a two or a three and if they are they’re they’re willing to do something because they know what to do and it’s very it’s very very helpful to be able to walk through that and everybody can feel a tension when they’re not getting along well or when you don’t want to make eye contact or when you think oh my God so always was in that meeting or in that room and I don’t want to go in there that means that trustworthiness is not present this process has taught me to not only trust other people but to trust myself so knowing that I’m being 100% straightforward and honest with everyone that I work with um and I expect that in return from them and I know that I’m getting that because they’re getting the same education so to say same practice as I’m getting I feel like everyone in our company sees one another in a totally new light that we all really get along we want to be here we want to be with one another and we want each other to succeed so with my direct supervisor Aaron I feel more able to come to her with any issues that I have without fear of being struck down or being judged by my questions or my concerns with my peers Kristen and Jared I feel more comfortable with them I feel like we’re the team and and leading this company to the culture change that we’re trying to thrust into our society goodness there’s a lot there yeah yeah I love that statement where she said I just don’t write people off anymore I know I can learn how to get along with anyone that is a side benefit when you do this culture change is that people start realizing what I thought was hopeless with somebody no longer feels like there’s that barrier and there’s something else that she said that U it really it just stuck right out I mean there’s no gender variance when it comes to those no no there’s no age barrier it’s all conjecture in our head that we just can’t get along with certain people it’s not real and we’ve talked earlier in the show about the eight values how you know how does how does this all apply part of it is just people really deeply understanding what each one is there’s a comment coming up here that I love it’s a little story about recognition so recognition isn’t just giving people approval like compliments and appreciations although it includes that and that’s example has some of that in it but it’s also recognizing how our differences are valuable how we need everybody in the room because you know if we don’t have this group we’re missing something if we don’t have this group we’re missing someone and it might be that we’re very varied but if we don’t have that appreciation for those differences we’re not truly giving recognition right we’re denying yeah so respect not making people an object doing recognition and this next story is Stellar around recognition I was not getting along while with another apartment my heart was not in the right place and there was a lot of blame and putting down and I used one of the principles in life works and got some people rallied up and we did a secret Santa for them because they did such they did do they do do wonderful work and just because my mindset isn’t right doesn’t mean they don’t deserve it so we did a secret Santa and then the next year they gave us a secret santa totally totally surprised and I remember we were all sitting there afterward thinking if you had told us that we would be exchanging this kind of recognition and appreciation for each other we we would have bet against you we could have never imagined it and it’s it it’s never perfect nothing’s ever perfect but there’s a lot more hope that things can always get better and that it’s a lot more comfortable to think the best of other people and work toward that than to just write them off as oh they’re just so and so or they’re just such and such it’s a lot more inspiring to be surrounded by a culture where we’re trying to figure out what they really want and what we’re we’re not giving and what we need to do as part of the secret santa we gave them a list of affirmations of things that we appreciated about them and they later on they told us that they had framed it and put it up and told their Department about I had I didn’t know that until like a year later so it’s it was really powerful I bet you it was very powerful yes yes and that was an example where she was examining the relationship and was looking first at where she was breaking down in her trust and one of the ways she saw was I’m not ready recognizing their value I’m only seeing where I don’t like them I’m not looking for where I do like them and that’s what prompted her to take action in recognition which has completely turned things around she looked internally she looked internally first but she very specifically pinpointed that particular value and then then were was able to motivate herself to move into action on it and those two things together awareness and action together are truly game changers it’s quite a benefit to the whole process absolutely yeah do you want to go ahead and hear a little bit more because I think the thing that I want people to know is that when there’s trust there’s that place where we can enter into vulnerability which to many people feels like a dirty word but Renee Brown who’s well known in in the world of vulnerability and shame talks about how deeply Joy comes through being ourselves and being authentic and yet we’re terrified to do it because we’re afraid people aren’t going to like us right so here’s just a couple people talking I think the most challenging thing for me personally has been learning that it was safe to share I would have probably been a little bit more hesitant to maybe talk about my uh not necessarily feelings but maybe challenges or some insecurities that I had with job related things and now I feel like I’m in a safe environment to be able to share with people and say I need some help with this and also at the same time to offer help when I hear somebody else struggling I don’t believe prior to Life Works that people really trusted each other I I think that we lost some people maybe good people didn’t stay because they didn’t feel maybe they were being heard or maybe people just weren’t able to get through to them I I don’t know but I don’t think because I I think because we didn’t have the communications tools that we now have people couldn’t communicate they didn’t know how they couldn’t get their ideas across and there was a level of frustration I think also because people weren’t forthright and they didn’t talk openly with each other that that made you guarded and it made people not trust somebody you can’t work in an environment where you don’t trust people it’s not that anybody here was untrustworthy in the in the past I just think that people now know that I can be honest and I can tell the truth in any organization you have to have trustworthiness if you if you don’t have trustworthiness then there’s going to be a guardedness among the employees um I know we have trustworthiness here because everybody’s so open people are open to share knowledge and when people share knowledge that says to me I’m not worried you’re going to learn or know more than I do um people are okay to ask questions because it’s indicating previously I think people might be afraid to ask questions because they might think others might think I don’t know as much and my job might not be safe but I think because people do have this open relationship with each other with knowledge that it it’s just a great two-way street it’s vital to the life of any person or organization it makes me think of when you leave home and your parents say you always know you can go back there and you’re safe when you build a an environment that’s trustworthy you know that there are situations that you get into that you can open up and know that it’s not going to be used against you or it’s a negative that it’s okay to speak your mind because if somebody else is maybe a little hesitant it allows them to say well they they are comfortable open up I can do the same thing and so when you do that you get the best out of your people I’ve been in situations where I’ve shared my ideas um if I say to somebody don’t repeat this because it’s something I’m trying to do and I maybe I it’s not something I want to put out there just yet because I want to figure out maybe some different approaches or I get their feedback there isn’t any mistrust I I don’t feel like that at all I feel like when they talk about trust that they allow me to be trustful and they are trust trustworthy with me goodness you can’t really underscore how important yep having trust in the workplace is y can you imagine I mean we we had so much trust in this group that 15 people volunteered to do this interview and answer 12 questions because they feel so excited about what we’re doing and part of it is because they have the trust some of them are shy some of them were people that didn’t feel well that day you know but they have really grown in being more more vulnerable taking their walls down being able to work together as a team and it’s really been about them doing the work and what a competitive advantage that is for organizations yeah I don’t think people really realize how much they’re losing you know like that one woman said I think we lost people before yeah yeah so just being able to even have the reputation as a trustworthy company or the feeling people have when they walk in the department and they and they feel the trust that has been built yeah it’s it’s an amazing advantage and I don’t think people realize it well we’ve just got one short clip to to play before we before we uh before we go so I firmly believe trust is the foundation of any relationship that’s what I’ve always um that’s what I’ve learned and that’s what I really embraced and it’s really apparent that trust has been built um from when I started working to Essa or with Essa until now really people feel more comfortable talking with one another about situations that might have been more uncomfortable before and also just myself I’m able to um communicate um special things with my superiors things that I would have found more challenging before trustworthiness should be a basis of you know any relationship whether it’s work relationships or personal I think most people are trustworthy I think there’s good relationship between people but if anything this you know life works is just kind of bringing it up more and you know is actively focusing on it I guess we just can’t emphasize the importance of developing trust in all components of our life just not in the workplace but in our personal personal lives and our families siblings yes it it doesn’t happen overnight well and the interesting Paradox of it is we think it’s all about trusting others but in reality it’s becoming a trustworthy person that builds a strong core in us which allows us to have fortitude and courage and determination to face life and to do well in life so it’s such a weird thing that we are always thinking it’s out there that the danger is and in reality it’s just really shaping up our own core and being a trustworthy person it’s got to come from within yes and it then is reflected in the relationships that you’re in I’m reminded of a quote from Mother Teresa there could be no more hurt only more love yes and I think that is exactly what uh you’re con here through your terrific work at life work systems Dy it’s it’s just great to be a part of this I’m learning so much yes thank you yeah I was kind of Blown Away I’m so glad we’ve had a chance to share some of these comments with the audience because I think it speaks louder to hear about their life and their experiences and what they’re going through very much ni and tell our listeners how they can find you you can find me on our website you can find all of us on our our website at Lifeworks systems.com and you can also check out some of our of training on get mytraining specials.com and you can give us a call at 34239 4727 we’d really like to hear you and talk with you and maybe sit down with you if we can and get to know you and we are creating culture change in a box we are well Judy this is we just need to keep doing this more I’m up for it well that does it for this episode of culture change in AB aution I’m Chrystal PL the bow tie guy I’m creating a life to Love by with awesome people like Judy Ryan from Life work systems culture change in a box is a part of the wholecare network check us out online at Hare network.com we’ll see you for another episode real soon bye-bye