4 Proven Ways To Build The Leadership Foundation That Drives Peak Performance

When it comes to leadership and trust, the focus is naturally on what leaders need to do to foster trust amongst those they lead. But what should leaders do when that trust is broken? Some lessons can be found in the on-going saga of Uber’s transformation.

In 2017, Uber was suffering from several crises, from fallout due to public exposure of their toxic culture, to questionable business tactics being used to drive business outcomes. This was the reality Dara Khosrowshahi faced when he became Uber’s new CEO following the departure of Uber’s co-founder and past CEO, Travis Kalanick.

To turn things around, Khosrowshahi implemented the typical measures an organization puts forth after suffering a public crisis – things like instituting stronger accountability processes and creating a new ethics and compliance team. But he also did something unexpected – something that was far more effective in rebuilding trust at Uber.

He spent the first few months listening to employees from every department, acknowledging the impact the toxic culture and leadership failures had on them.

As Uber global director Jessica Bryndza described it, “He didn’t come in guns blazing. He came in listening.”

Khosrowshahi’s example reveals how trust can be rebuilt if we acknowledge past failures, and commit to concrete changes for how we will address these changes in order to do better going forward.

Most importantly, we must show our employees that when we fail in our leadership, our actions going forward are not simply about damage control.

Rather, our focus is on how we can do better, driven by a renewed desire to make something stronger, more durable, and meaningful for all involved.

Rethinking the Relationship Between Trust and Accountability

Of course, no discussion of trust is complete without addressing accountability. For most of us, our understanding about trust and accountability is that trust is something you earn and accountability is something you have to enforce.

But here’s the truth we need to understand about trust and accountability – they’re two sides of the same coin.

After all, for me to trust you, I need to know I can count on you. And that means holding yourself accountable – not only to what you say you’ll do, but what you say we stand for as an organization.

That’s why command and control approaches to leadership lead to low levels of organizational trust – the focus is more on controlling what people do than on what you as a leader are encouraging and supporting.

Having trust as your leadership foundation influences how you treat people – of what you expect from them not just today, but in the future because of who you can see them becoming.

When someone sees and believes in your potential to be more than you are today, how can you not want to be accountable in making that possibility a reality?

This is how successful leaders encourage employees take it upon themselves to be accountable. They don’t mandate it because it’s self-reinforced by employees invested in the collective efforts of the team and organization.

So don’t treat accountability like a dirty word. Recognize it as the flip side of trust, and use them together to empower your employees to bring their best efforts to the work they do.

Building Trust As Your Leadership Foundation

On my “Leadership Biz Cafe” podcast, I’ve had the pleasure of speaking twice with Stephen MR Covey about how successful leaders foster trust in their organizations.

In one of our conversations, Stephen shared a powerful insight about trust and leadership:

When it comes to leadership and trust, our focus is on how leaders can be more trustworthy, but not on why they need to extend trust.

How do we extend trust? By recognizing that our role as leaders is to understand, develop, and unleash the hidden potential in each of our employees.

As I share in my keynotes that address trust and leadership, to succeed at leadership, we need to discover what ignites our employees’ internal motivational drive to contribute their talents, creativity, and insights to our shared purpose.

So here are four practices to build trust as your leadership foundation:

Be transparent in sharing your reasoning behind decisions. This fosters clarity and reinforces your employees playing an active role in the team.

Foster psychological safety by welcoming divergent/opposing viewpoints. Show your employees they’re supported and encouraged to share their divergent viewpoints and concerns. You want them to feel that potential you see in them to be more than they are today.

Honour your word and do what you say you’ll do. Being trusting is not about how we see ourselves, but how others see us.

Finally, don’t treat these as one-time efforts. This is something you need to practice intentionally and regularly.

Applying these practices will make trust the foundation of your leadership, creating conditions that not only drive peak performance, but empower employees to achieve their true potential.