Don McMinn

Among all the attributes of the greatest leaders of our time, one stands above the rest: They are all highly trusted. You can have a compelling vision, rock-solid strategy, excellent communication skills, innovative insight, and a skilled team, but if people don’t trust you, you will never get the results you want. David Horsager

Here are some characteristics of trust.

Trust is earned; you can’t buy it or obtain it through coercion.

It takes time for trust to develop and it doesn’t come quickly. When you assume a new position of leadership, your good reputation of being trustworthy may help jumpstart the trust factor with your new team members but inevitably they will need to see you in action and to experience, firsthand, your trustworthiness; and that takes time.

Trust is built and maintained by hundreds of small and large actions over time.

Every decision you make and every action you take either adds to or subtracts from your “trust account.”

In leadership, trust is built on two pillars: character and competence.

To be a trustworthy individual, only one is needed: character; but to be a trustworthy leader, you must exhibit both character and competence.

Character includes two areas and six attributes:

Your intentions must be:

• Caring – people don’t care how much you know until they know how much you care
• Transparent – don’t have hidden agendas or motivations
• Open – don’t withhold critical information

Your integrity is demonstrated through:

• Honesty – be truthful and straightforward; don’t lie, cheat, or steal
• Fairness – being fair is not treating everyone the same, but treating each individual as he deserves
• Authenticity – Luther Price succinctly said, “Be what you is, not what you ain’t; ’cause if you ain’t what you is, you is what you ain’t.”

Competence includes two areas and six traits:

You must demonstrate capability through:

• Skills – do you have the necessary skills for your trade?
• Knowledge – do you understand the basic principles of what makes your organization work?
• Experience – is your knowledge only theoretical or has it been proven experientially?

People will trust your results because of your:

• Reputation – the sum of all your work and leadership experience.
• Credibility – reliability; your ability to produce over time.
• Performance – do you consistently prove your ability to “Get ‘er done.”

Trust alone won’t make you a great leader, but without trust you will never be one.

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Imagine that you’re in a dark auditorium and suddenly a spotlight is turned on. It is bright and clearly illumines the area it shines on. But it is a limited area and someone is controlling where you are looking.

In life and leadership be aware of, and beware of, those times when you are, either by choice or compulsion, “following the spotlight.”

Here’s why.

A spotlight has a narrow focus.

Though a spotlight does illuminate reality, it only reveals a small part of reality—your attention is drawn to, but limited to, a narrow range. In a dark space, you’re essentially blinded to all the space other than what the spotlight’s beam shines on.

A spotlight is vulnerable to bias.

Someone (the spotlight operator or the director) has predetermined what the light will focus on; someone else has determined what you will see. In essence, you are being manipulated. When there is ample general lighting, you can choose what you want to focus on, but in a darkened room where there’s only one beam of light, your focus is determined by others.

Now let’s apply these thoughts to life outside the theatre.

Sometimes in life we’re manipulated into focusing on a particular issue.

• When you listen to a news broadcast, the topics have been decided in advance and are usually presented in a biased way.
• In a meeting that has an agenda, someone has predetermined what issues will be discussed.
• In conversations, someone may consciously or unconsciously choose the topics that are discussed.

Sometimes in life we inadvertently, and to our detriment, choose to focus on a singular issue. We may focus on one aspect of our lives to the exclusion of the bigger picture. We often do this when experiencing pain or hardship—we obsess on one part to the neglect of others. Or, we may become preoccupied with a single goal, one that doesn’t deserve our exclusive attention.

Leaders, understand the power of this principle and use it for the good of your organization; don’t abuse it or let others abuse it. Keep your eye on the entire organization which will enhance overall organizational health and maintain balance and fairness. Don’t fall prey to the spotlight syndrome or cause it.

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Have you ever wondered why negative events seem to impact us more than positive events?

• The comment “You’ve gained a lot of weight” will hurt us more than the comment “You look nice” will encourage us.
• We remember the course we failed in college more than we do the ones we excelled at.
• The feelings of anger we have toward a driver that cuts in front of us will stick with us longer than the joy we have when viewing beautiful wildflowers on the side of the road.

In their must-read book, The Net and the Butterfly, authors Cabane and Pollack explain why negative things “stick” quicker and last longer than positive events, and what we can do about it.

“Negative things produce more neural activity than equally intense positive things. We are quicker to recognize the negative in our world. The amygdala, the fire alarm of your brain, uses two-thirds of its neurons to look for the negative. These negative things get stored into memory almost immediately. Positive things need to be held in awareness for twelve seconds to transfer to longer-term memory. This is why gratitude, meditation, and loving-kindness are necessary: we need to focus on the good for our brain to be able to truly remember it. As Rick Hanson puts it, your ‘brain is like Velcro for negative experiences but Teflon for positive ones.’”

One good remedy for this biological predisposition toward the negative is to systematically and regularly meditate on positive thoughts (and, according to the authors, do so for at least 12 seconds). I’m going to do that right now by meditating on the following thoughts:

• Several months ago, I visited my favorite edifice in the world—St. Peter’s Basilica.
• Last week I spent an entire morning with my favorite little person—my grandson, Benjamin.
• I have so many good and faithful friends. I’ll think of a few right now: Dean, Chuck, Mike, Wayne, Jonathan.
• My fig tree is blossoming in the backyard.

The apostle Paul said it this way: “Fix your thoughts on what is true, and honorable, and right, and pure, and lovely, and admirable. Think about things that are excellent and worthy of praise.” A simple but highly effective exercise. It was good advice when it was written two thousand years ago, and it will benefit us today.

Meditation on positive thoughts.

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I enjoy cruising because it’s a win-win situation; it works for me and it works for the cruise line. I recently paid only $1,350 for a luxurious, 16-day transatlantic/European cruise (Miami to Rome) which included all meals, lodging, transportation, and entertainment. One evening, as I was munching on a filet mignon, I wondered, “How do they make this work, financially?” I don’t know, but obviously they do, or they wouldn’t be in business.

Both I and the cruise line benefited from a win-win scenario.

Often, we’re trapped in a zero-sum situation—in order for someone to “win,” someone else must “lose.” But there are also positive-sum situations in which everyone “wins.” Let’s pursue those.

How and why do we often succumb to a win-lose mentality? Perhaps through our exposure to athletics, where there’s usually an emphasis on winning or losing. Or perhaps we’ve been taught that to be successful in business, I must win and the competition must fail.

But with proper thought and structure, most experiences can be designed to be mutually beneficial.

• Employee/employer relationships should be a win-win relationship.
• Products and services should seem right and fair to both the seller and the buyer.
• Close relationships should be balanced and mutually advantageous.
• When conflicts do arise, the conflict resolution process can aim to accommodate all participants.
• Effective networking is predicated upon being mutual beneficial.

Almost all productive social behavior is based on win-win scenarios.

I’ll close with a cute story about a bet between a boyfriend and girlfriend regarding a Brazil vs. Argentina football match.
Rules:
1. If Brazil wins, the boy will kiss the girl.
2. If Brazil loses, the girl will kiss the boy.

Now that’s a win-win situation.

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