A recent survey of the UK employees’ trust in their business leaders shows a significant drop compared to a generation ago.
Best-selling business author Geoff Hudson-Searle conducted a survey, carried out by DataPad, establishing just how few of us trust our bosses – with 30% of respondents answering negatively to a question whether they trusted and respected their CEO and another 39% replying “a little”.
Trust is always paramount, but given current global and national events, there has never been a greater need for trust in all spheres of our lives, even more so at the workplace and in business.
The survey asked employees the same question about ‘trust and respect’ in relation to their Executive Leadership, Heads of Department and immediate line managers. The closer the manager’s role was to the respondent, the more likely the employee was to answer positively. Immediate managers were trusted “a lot” by 48%, followed by “a little” (36%), with 16% “not trusted at all”.
Geoff Hudson-Searle’s latest book, The Trust Paradigm, written in co-authorship with the American business author Mark Herbert, draws on the hard-won truths and deep personal lessons from life and business of the two authors in their efforts to distil those lessons into principles, which can transform a business and help leaders to restore trust. The book demonstrates the relationship between human communications, strategy and business development, and provides a holistic overview of the leading methods and techniques.
“Moral and ethical leadership is the key to successful business, yet it’s clear from the news that the leaders of some of our most influential corporations are making morally questionable decisions. These decisions will lose the trust of customers and employees. Trust is the foundation of high functioning relationships and can only be achieved by a meaningful dialogue, which is not happening. Instead, we’re increasingly replacing it with impersonal electronic communications,” comments Geoff.
One of the first readers of The Trust Paradigm, Shakeeb Niazi, FBCS CITP FIoEE FIET, Founder and Chair of the Society for Entrepreneurial Education and Development, shares his opinion: “Trust is critical for all businesses, especially with all the “noise” of websites, social media, and SEO copywriting. The pillars of trust, described in the book, teach leaders how to build trust in achievable steps by identifying the “Trust” element (or lack of) within a business – and developing it as a measurable and improvable objective. I was impressed with the significant benefits achieved in every key performance indicator by organisations investing in trust. We should shift away from ‘command and control’ to a ‘trust and inspire’ leadership. I not only recommend reading this book, but using it as a reference as you develop and build your business on the Trust model.’’
