I still remember the words of a U.S. Army major who worked for me: “Sir, you are tearing this team apart.”

The time was January 2000. The location was Lithuania. I was an Army colonel.

At that point, I had served just over 20 years in the Army on active duty and in the Pennsylvania Army National Guard. I had success as a unit commander and staff officer. I had recently left the command of a National Guard infantry battalion of about 850 soldiers. Because of past success, I thought I knew everything there was to know about leading people. I was mistaken.

Wake-Up Call

The major had the personal courage to give me a wake-up call. This started me on a journey to study how a leader can best cultivate trust. I use the phrase “cultivate trust” deliberately, because I have learned that it takes time to establish trust in an organization, just as it takes a long time to grow a plant. Similarly, it takes only seconds to break trust, just as it takes only seconds to trample a plant, leading to its demise.

I was leading a small team in Lithuania that consisted of three other American military personnel and several Lithuanian civilians. I succeeded in breaking trust with the team in a matter of about three weeks because I made some basic leadership mistakes.

A leader can break trust by real or perceived actions. As I listened to what the major had to say, I learned that the team believed I did not trust them.

I asked them to change the way they were working without taking the time to ask why they were performing the work the way they were doing it. I gave them tasks to do and neglected to explain “why.” Furthermore, I displayed a lack of respect by tasking them by leaving small slips of paper on their desks rather than showing them the respect of having a face-to-face conversation, even though we shared a small workspace.

Bad Start

These actions of mine, which I will call “rookie mistakes,” left them with several impressions. They believed I thought they were all screwed up, and/or I thought they had too much time on their hands. They believed I had no confidence in them to do their jobs correctly. The outcome was their perception that I did not trust them, and because of this, they did not trust me.

After the conversation with the major, I thanked him for having the personal courage to talk to me about my behavior. Then, I thought long and hard about what I had to do to repair the trust I had broken. I had never really developed a trust relationship with my team to begin with. I knew I had to take immediate steps to salvage the situation, or we would fail as a team.

This is what I did. I called the team together the next morning and explained to them that it was brought to my attention that due to my behavior, I had given the team the impression that I did not trust them. I admitted my mistakes. I apologized for my behavior. I explained to them how I was going to correct the situation.

These are some of the actions I took to right the wrongs I committed:

1. I began to ask their opinions. I would ask them why they were conducting their work the way they were. Once I understood the situation, we then would decide together if there was a reason to change the way they were doing things.

2. I brought the team together, and we created a shared purpose for the mission we were engaged in.

3. I made sure I followed through on any promise I made to them.

4. I adhered to the same standards I expected the team to follow.

 5. I rolled up my sleeves and shared more of the team workload. This was necessary since we were a small team with a great deal of work to accomplish.

 6. I looked for opportunities to remove barriers and provide resources so the team members could do their jobs more effectively.

 7. I worked extra hard to prove to the team that I was tactically and technically competent, and that I had the ability to provide the leadership necessary for our team to accomplish its mission.

It took some time, but I was able to grow trust with the team. This led to high morale, high productivity and mission accomplishment. From that time forward, I continued to focus on learning more about how to grow trust as a leader.

Best Practices

Through this study and research, as well as my operational experience, I have developed seven best practices for cultivating trust in a team or organization:

1. Trust others first. Leaders must trust their followers before they can expect to be trusted. Have you ever had a leader or boss who you felt did not trust you? If that is the case, were you able to trust that leader? Leaders could demonstrate trust in their followers by asking them for their opinions and asking them to share their views. Leaders also demonstrate trust in their followers by empowering them to demonstrate initiative and make decisions.

2. Provide a purpose. Leaders must work with their followers to create a shared purpose, and leaders must consistently communicate that purpose. Those within an organization must understand their overarching purpose and have a reason to get out of bed in the morning.

3. Display integrity. It is essential that leaders always demonstrate integrity. Leaders must follow through on promises. Leaders must not use their position for personal gain, and they must not promote their own agenda.

4. Lead by example. Leaders must share difficulties and risks with the rest of the team. Leaders must adhere to the same standards they expect their followers to abide by.

5. Care. Leaders must get to know the people they lead on a personal level. Leaders must remove barriers from the paths of followers and provide the resources followers need so followers can do their jobs more effectively. Leaders must place the welfare of their followers ahead of their own welfare.

6. Enforce standards. Leaders should only create standards and rules that make sense. Leaders should not create rules that are impossible to enforce. When leaders fail to enforce standards, low performers will stay, and high performers will fade away. Either way, followers will lose respect and lose trust for any leader who does not enforce standards.

7. Know your job. A leader must not grow complacent and must continue to train and educate themselves to be tactically and technically proficient in their job and duties so they can lead the team to accomplish their task.

I also learned a simple method for repairing trust if it is broken. Any leader who hopes to repair broken trust must acknowledge that they broke trust. They also must apologize for the infraction, and explain to those they broke trust with how they will make changes so the infraction does not occur again.

The key here is that the acknowledgment and the apology must happen quickly. The longer a leader takes to acknowledge that they broke trust and apologize, the harder it will be to repair that trust. If it takes too long to acknowledge and apologize, trust likely will never be repaired.

Character, Competence

Through my operational experience, I have learned that it takes both character and competence to grow trust. Stephen Covey created a useful model in his 2006 book, The Speed of Trust: The One Thing That Changes Everything.

Character includes integrity and intent. This means a leader must be honest and beyond reproach, and their intent or agenda must be focused on organizational or team success rather than on the leader’s own success.

Competence has to do with training and a leader’s ability to get results. Every leader must have the requisite education, training and skills necessary to do their job. A leader also must have a reputation for getting results and leading teams successfully across the finish line to grow trust.

There is an age-old question. Which is more important for good leadership: Is it character or competence? The schoolbook answer is that character is more important. My answer is a good leader must have both. Someone who lacks either character or competence will not be a good leader.

With that said, I believe in the following quote from then-Gen. H. Norman Schwarzkopf: “Leadership is a potent combination of strategy and character. But if you must be without one, be without the strategy.”

Trust is the power behind an organization’s great culture. It is like the oil in a machine that keeps everything functioning effectively and efficiently. It begins with a leader’s humility and ends with teamwork. Take the time to grow trust, then guard that trust so it continues to flourish.

Maj. Gen. John Gronski, U.S. Army retired, served over 40 years in the Regular Army and the Pennsylvania Army National Guard, with his final assignment as deputy commanding general, Army National Guard, U.S. Army Europe. He is a leadership consultant and author based in Englewood, Florida. He deployed to Iraq. He has two master’s degrees: an MBA from Pennsylvania State University, and a master’s in strategic studies from the U.S. Army War College. He is the author of three books, including Iron-Sharpened Leadership: Transforming Hard Fought Lessons Into Action.