The SPEED of Trust: The One Thing that Changes Everything

by Stephen M. R. Covey

  —BILL GATES, FOUNDER, MICROSOFT

  HOW TO INCREASE YOUR CAPABILITIES

  In working with clients, I’ve come across some excellent ideas to enhance credibility by increasing capabilities, but the three accelerators that make the greatest difference are the following:

  1. Run with Your Strengths (and with Your Purpose)

  The idea here is simply to identify your strengths (whether they be Talents, Attitudes, Skills, Knowledge, or Style), and then focus on engaging, developing, and leveraging what’s distinctly yours.

  Peter Drucker encouraged leaders to “feed opportunities and starve problems.” In the same vein, I contend that we need to “feed strengths and starve weaknesses.” It’s not that we ignore our weaknesses; rather, we make our weaknesses irrelevant by working effectively with others so that we compensate for our weaknesses through their strengths and they compensate for their weaknesses through our strengths. That’s making sure that everyone is on the right seat on the bus.

  One well-known example of running with one’s strengths is the amazing athlete Michael Jordan. At one point, he decided to retire from his highly successful basketball career to play baseball, a sport he had always loved and wanted to prove he could play at a high level. However, in leaving basketball for baseball, he moved from “best in the world” to “mediocre.” So Jordan decided to go back to basketball, where he won three additional championships on top of the three he had previously won. He ran with his strengths. As a result, not only was his own career more successful and enjoyable, he was able to make a unique and much appreciated contribution to basketball and to the world of sports at large.

  For a business example, I once had a salesperson who was the “Michael Jordan” of salespeople. He was fantastic—extraordinary at sales and great with clients. He was truly world-class. But this man didn’t want to be a salesperson; he wanted to be a general manager. Finally, he persuaded me to let him try—despite the fact that he had tried the same thing in two prior companies and had failed. He was mediocre at best—Michael Jordan playing baseball—and I offered to put him back into sales. But he didn’t want to go there. This man became a powerful example to me of the personal and organizational loss created when people don’t run with their strengths.

  It’s important to realize that there are times when the importance of running with whatever personal strengths we may have is outweighed by another kind of strength—strength of purpose. It may be something that’s conscience-driven or some purpose we feel compelled to pursue. And we may not yet have developed the TASKS strengths we need to do it.

  In my own life, I have found great satisfaction in pursuing education and opportunities to work and contribute in fields in which I feel I have natural strengths. But I have also felt a sense of excitement and pleasure in responding to an inner voice that has urged me at times into undeveloped territory, forcing me—sometimes even uncomfortably—to discover new strengths or to build new skills to face the task at hand.

  2. Keep Yourself Relevant

  For years, people have recognized the value of a four-year degree, but to succeed in today’s economy, you really need a forty-year degree. In other words, you need to be engaged in lifelong learning. The four-year degree may teach you how to read, write, think, and reason, but its main purpose is to set you up for ongoing learning.

  I know of one extraordinary person who for years would get up very early every morning and read for two hours. His goal was to learn everything possible about organizational behavior and development, human behavior, management, and leadership. And he did. I watched him become extremely competent. Each time he was given more responsibility, he raised his competence to the level of his promotion—what I call the Reverse Peter Principle in action.

  Going back to the Netflix example of keeping themselves relevant, it would have been easy for Netflix to have stayed with their original DVD-by-mail model rather than adapt to a streaming model, as the change would likely cannibalize what was then their core business. After all, the company was already eminently successful and the clear market leader. But instead they were driven to relentlessly improve, adapt, and stay relevant. They disrupted themselves before someone else did. Not only did this result in their increasing their market relevance; it enabled them to dramatically increase subscribers and improve performance.

  I am always learning and working at the margin of my ignorance.

  —HARVEY GOLUB, FORMER CEO OF AMERICAN EXPRESS

  3. Know Where You’re Going

  In a conversation with strategist and marketing expert Jack Trout, I asked him what, in his view, was the key to leadership. I’ll never forget his simple and resounding response: “At the end of the day, people follow those who know where they’re going.”

  It is a terrible thing to look over your shoulder when you are trying to lead and find nobody there.

  —FRANKLIN DELANO ROOSEVELT

  I remember years ago when my father decided to give up his teaching position at the university to form his own training and consulting company at the age of 50. Many of his friends thought he was crazy to do so and advised against it. He had a good life at the university. He was contributing, and he could always consult on the side. But my father had a clear, distinct vision of where he was going—a vision of a different-in-kind contribution that he believed he could make only by having an organization behind him. So he took the leap . . . and others followed. And together, they ultimately built the Covey Leadership Center—and later FranklinCovey—into one of the largest and most influential leadership development companies in the world.

  To know where you’re going and to have the capabilities to get there is another way of demonstrating competence. And that competence, coupled with character, creates a credible leader whom others will follow—not because they’re forced, but because they’re inspired to do so.

  The people you lead want to know where they’re going.

  —CHRISTOPHER GALVIN, FORMER CHAIRMAN AND CEO, MOTOROLA

  TRUST ABILITIES

  As I mentioned earlier, while character is constant, competence—at least most competence—is situational. It depends on what the circumstance requires.

  However, there are a few areas of competence that are vital in every situation, and what I call “trust abilities” are at the top of the list. This is basically what this book is all about—your ability to establish, grow, extend, and restore trust. I would go so far as to say that your technical capabilities are either diminished or multiplied dramatically in direct relation to your trust abilities. And because of this, I once again affirm that the ability to create and sustain trust is the number one leadership competency of the new collaborative economy, and the single most critical skill for any leader today.

  Even considering how important technical abilities are with regard to trust, I am convinced that the most important thing you can get out of this chapter is the awareness of the supreme importance of trust abilities. To get a better grip on these abilities, you could once again overlay the template of TASKS—talent, attitude, skills, knowledge, and style—and assess where you can work to create the most effective improvement in your trust abilities. You might ask yourself:

  • To what degree do I have some degree of natural talent in the area of trust abilities? Do things such as integrity and good intent come naturally to me? Do I naturally seek for mutual benefit? Do I inherently know and do things that inspire trust?

  • What are my attitudes in this area? Do I recognize and respect the need for trust? Do I approach issues and try to get things done in ways that build trust?

  • Do I have trust-building skills? Do I interact with others in ways that build trust?

  • What knowledge and understanding do I have about establishing, growing, extending, and restoring trust?

  • Is my style of action and interaction one that inspires trust? Is my style one that extends trust to others?

  The best “accelerator” I can think of to improve yo
ur trust abilities is to immerse yourself in the content of this book. As you learn to establish, grow, extend, and restore trust from the inside out, you will be amazed at the credibility this will give you, the confidence you will feel, and the results you will get in every dimension of life.I

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  I. To access a video detailing why trust is the #1 Leadership Competency today, go to www.speedoftrust.com/book-promises.

  CORE 4—RESULTS

  WHAT’S YOUR TRACK RECORD?

  You can’t create a high-trust culture unless people perform.

  —CRAIG WEATHERUP, FORMER CEO, PEPSICO

  In December of 1994, I was asked to step in as president and CEO of the Covey Leadership Center. Within the first week, I had a difficult meeting with the bank. The good news was that the company had been creating value for clients quite well, as was evidenced by our growth. The bad news was that we hadn’t yet figured out our own business model, as was evidenced by our lack of profit and cash.

  Despite the great intellectual capital, some terrific people, and amazing growth, the company was in dire straits. We’d had 11 straight years of negative cash flow. We had no outside capital, poor margins, and nothing in the bank. We were totally extended on our accounts payable and our credit lines were maxed out. Our “total liabilities to tangible net worth” ratio was 223 to 1. Basically, we were growing ourselves out of business, and the bank’s confidence and trust was practically nil. They demanded that we go back on personal guarantees, and they were in the process of deciding whether or not to pull the plug.

  Fortunately for us, and for our clients, they didn’t.

  Within two and a half years of that meeting, we established a sustainable business model that made it possible for us to increase the value of the company from $2.4 million to $160 million. We increased profit by 1,200 percent. We decreased day’s receivables from 87 to 48. We decreased the “total liabilities to tangible net worth” ratio from 223 to 1 to less than 2 to 1. Not only were we high growth; we were also high profit.

  One of the most interesting things about this whole experience was seeing the effect those results had on our relationship with our bankers. As they saw us reaching milestone after milestone during those two and a half years—producing, hitting the numbers, increasing the margins, and increasing the cash as we had committed to do—we could see their confidence in us grow. They began to see us as a good risk. They significantly increased our credit line—again and again and again. They wanted to give us more business.

  What made them want to extend more trust? Results!

  RESULTS MATTER!

  Results matter! They matter to your credibility. They matter to your ability to establish and maintain trust with others. They give you clout. They give you influence. They classify you as a producer, as a performer. Without the results, you simply don’t have that same kind of clout.

  Returning once again to the metaphor of the tree, results are the fruits—the tangible, measurable end purpose and product of the roots, trunk, and branches. To have the other three cores without results is like having a barren tree. It won’t create credibility, no matter how strong the other three cores may be. And it won’t inspire confidence because the tree doesn’t produce what it was intended to produce.

  Let’s come back to the idea of establishing the credibility of an expert witness in a court of law. A witness may be seen as an honest person with no hidden agenda and plenty of credentials. But if she doesn’t have a good track record—a solid history of results—her credibility will be called into question and her testimony significantly discounted.

  Bottom line, without results, you don’t have credibility. It’s like the old Texas saying “All hat, no cattle” or the California racing phrase “All show and no go.” People don’t trust you because you don’t get things done. And there’s no place to hide here—either you produce or you don’t. You may have excuses. You may even have good reasons. But at the end of the day, if the results aren’t there, neither is the credibility and neither is the trust. It’s just that simple; it’s just that harsh.

  On the other hand, if you are getting results but you’re violating one of the other three cores—say you get the numbers in a way that violates integrity, or creates a “lose” for others—your production will not be sustainable, nor will the fruit be good. It will taste bad. It will smell bad. Even if it looks good on the outside, it will be rotten inside, and it won’t create long-term credibility and trust. You simply can’t get a sustainable yield of good fruit if the results are severed from the character roots.

  This creates a huge issue for organizations today. What do you do with someone who gets the results, but in ways that violate company values? The Performance-Values Matrix, originally popularized by GE, recognizes four possibilities that illustrate the dynamic between “getting results” and “living the values.” It’s fairly easy to know what to do with the first category of people, who both deliver results and live the values. They should be retained and promoted. It’s also fairly easy to know what to do with the second category, who neither deliver results nor live the values. They should be let go.

  The other two categories, however, are tougher to deal with. Those who live the values but achieve low results can often be trained, coached, or moved to another role. If they don’t improve, they may need to be let go. The hardest of all to deal with are those who have high results but are poor in living the values. They achieve the end that everybody wants, but they do it in a way that blatantly defies organizational values. People in this category need to learn to operate within the company’s values—or be let go, despite their results. To keep them on as they are is not only unsustainable, it is damaging to the organization and destroys credibility and trust.

  Peter Aceto, former CEO of Tangerine—a Canadian direct banking company—put it this way:

  I agree in principle with the adage “Hire slowly and fire quickly.” I’ve made both of those mistakes, hired too quickly and fired too slowly, partly because I believe that people want to be great, and given the opportunity they will improve. There’s an easier way to look at it—by breaking everything down into two qualities: being good at your job and being good at fitting into the culture. People who perform well in both will thrive. People who are high performers but don’t care about the culture will eventually pollute your workplace. Low performers who get the culture can be trained to grow. And low-performing culturally incompatible types must be let go with urgency.

  There’s no doubt that results will cover a multitude of shortcomings. If you’re a top producer, for example, management will likely be more lenient in dealing with expense reports that don’t make it in on time. We’ve all seen the equivalent of this in our companies—where it sometimes creates a double standard that produces its own cynicism. But in the long run, even top results will not offset a lack of integrity.

  On the other hand, strength in integrity will also not offset an absence of results. Again, all four cores are vital to personal and organizational credibility, which is the basis for establishing trust.

  As we prepare to explore this fourth core, you may want to ask yourself:

  • What kind of results am I currently producing? Do those results increase or diminish my personal credibility?

  • If I were considering hiring someone, to what extent would that person’s track record and current performance influence my decision?

  • How good is my own track record? How likely would someone be to hire me based on it?

  • How good am I at identifying desired results and executing effectively to accomplish those results? Does my performance inspire confidence and trust?

  RESULTS—PAST, PRESENT, AND FUTURE

  I have worked briefly on Wall Street and been an executive in a public company, and it’s clear to me that there are three key indicators by which people evaluate results. One is past performance—your track record, your reputation, the things you’ve done, and the results you’ve a
lready achieved. Another is current performance—how you are performing today. And the third is anticipated performance—how people think you will perform in the future.

  You see these three dimensions come into play clearly when outside entities place a value on a company. They look at historical earnings (past performance). They may put a multiple on that and come up with a value. Or they look at current, real-time data and results (present performance), and they may put a multiple on that and come up with a value. Or (as is effectively the case with Wall Street) they take the anticipated, expected results (future performance) and then discount them back to arrive at a present value. All three dimensions of results—past, present, and future—are important in considering a company’s worth.

  These three dimensions also come into play with each of us as individuals. Our credibility comes not only from our past results and our present results, but also from the degree of confidence others have in our ability to produce results in the future.

  At one time I worked with a person who was honest, had great intent, and was extremely talented, but for the life of him, he couldn’t seem to make anything happen. We were part of a team that was working on a rotation system to follow through on leads. When a big opportunity came along and it was time for this person to get it, I was hesitant—in fact, everyone on the team was hesitant—to give it to this person because he hadn’t produced results. As we projected his past track record on his future anticipated performance, we didn’t feel we could trust him to come through for the team. Over time, in spite of his talents, he became increasingly irrelevant and left the company.