If you’ve been in business for any length of time, it’s likely you understand the detrimental effects a lack of trust and loyalty exert on your culture, the success of your company and overall happiness. You probably also possess insights into the tremendous benefits trusting and loyal team members bring to your customers and operation.
Trust supports loyalty in team members — if you have their backs, they’ll have yours. But anytime trust between you and a team member is broken, any loyalty that existed is damaged. Once seriously damaged, it can be a lengthy process to rebuild. It could be impossible.
When team members are mistreated, their trust for and loyalty to leaders and organizations are compromised. Some examples include not listening to team members, speaking in a derogatory or condescending manner, demeaning or humiliating them in front of others, not paying them what you agreed to or what they’re worth and failing to appreciate quality work and recognize solid efforts. If these actions occur repeatedly, trust and loyalty will be destroyed and replaced with resentment.
Breaking promises and lying to team members constitutes another way to undermine their loyalty. Lying doesn’t foster trust. It demonstrates you can’t be trusted. If you string someone along and make promises you don’t intend to keep to get more out of them and never deliver on your word, that will create a mindset against you and your company.
Impeccability of your word — saying what you mean and meaning what you say — goes a long way in building trust and loyalty. The wisest choice here is to not lie to team members. And when you make a promise, do everything in your power to keep it. If you can’t, make sure to let them know why so they’ll understand and see you did your best.
Taking advantage of and using people for personal gain is yet another way to damage and even destroy professional relationships. Repeatedly pressuring or demanding team member put in more and more time, perform additional tasks and go above and beyond without meaningful recognition, verbal appreciation or even financial rewards create mistrust and disloyalty. People don’t respond well to being used.
Reflect on times when you’ve been mistreated and remember how you felt, how it damaged the trust and loyalty you once had and how it changed your perspective of people and the companies they represented.
When you treat people with dignity and respect — as humans, not cogs in the wheel of your business — you nurture trust and loyalty. Just like you, your team members want to be treated fairly. When they are, in most cases they’ll return the favor.
When you value your team members, they will value you and your business to a greater degree. Most people who go to a friendly and supported work environment are appreciative. They want to be there, give more of themselves and work to preserve that which they enjoy. Creating a friendly and supportive work environment strengthens trust and loyalty.
Providing team members with opportunities to learn new skills, take on more important tasks and advance within your business instills trust and loyalty, too. This demonstrates you believe in them, recognize and appreciate their time and efforts and — most important — confirms you care.
Trust and loyalty are a two-way street, though. Sometimes you can be the most integrity based, supportive, fair and opportunity giving business owner and team members will still take actions that damage or destroy your trust and loyalty in them. This is rarely the case when you hire effectively and foster these things in them first.
Otherwise, it’s a wise decision to let those team members go who don’t lend themselves to trust and loyalty.
As the leader of your business, trust and loyalty begins with you. When your leadership fosters trust and loyalty in your people, your top performers will return the favor to you, usually to an even greater degree. This in turn creates better customer service, satisfaction, loyalty and success.
