Jun

24

David Maister on the Four Dimensions of Trust

Filed Under Leadership Practices 

Anecdote posted on David Maister’s podcast on earning trust and it’s importance to business. The fact is that leaders cannot lead without trust. Maister identifies four dimensions to trust, the first three can cause trust to increase:

  • Credibility - about words - I can trust what he says. This is about tangible, professional expertise.
  • Reliability - about actions - I can trust her to do something. Are you dependable and behave in certain ways?
  • Intimacy - about emotions - I feel comfortable discussing this with that person. This is about the ability to relate to people one to one. It is the dimension that people fail on most often - it has high consequences if we get it wrong. 

The fourth component, self orientation, reduces trust:

  • Self-Orientation - about motives - the extent to which we can trust that someone cares about certain things. This relates to the extent to which we can focus on the other person in the relationship rather than ourselves. Selfishness, self-consciousness, need to appear on top of things or to appear intelligent, a long to-do list that distracts us from focusing in the moment etc are all things that keep us focused on ourselves rather than the other person.

These four dimensions are a useful way to assess our own behaviour. Are we instilling trust? Do we have integrity in our words, actions, emotions and motives?

 

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One Response to “David Maister on the Four Dimensions of Trust”

  1. Newt Bailey on June 25th, 2008 22:22

    This post highlights the fact that the so-called “soft skills” are far from soft, since they affect trust, hence leadership, hence bottom line.

    Recently I heard from a very successful hi-tech sales person, already out-performing the rest of his team after a short time with his company. He was about ready to leave the job, however, because, I would say, his bosses lacked “the ability to relate to people one to one” and the ability to “focus on the other person in the relationship rather than [them]selves.”

    It seems clear that if you’re leading human beings you’d do well to take an interest in understanding and communicating with them in a way that works for all concerned. This can be learned, in spite of the still pervasive and damaging idea that you either have “people skills” or you don’t.

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