Who can we trust?

By Larry Ackerman on November 13th, 2011

(Our guest blogger is Larry Ackerman, President & Founder of The Identity Circle, a consulting & coaching firm based in Westport, CT. He is the author of 2 ground-breaking books on identity including Identity Is Destiny: Leadership and the Roots of Value Creation & The Identity Code:The 8 Essential Questions for Finding Your Purpose and Place in the World.)

Congratulations! You’re now the CEO! Or, maybe the new division head, or marketing, or HR VP. Welcome to the world of yes ma’am, or yes sir!

One of the classic challenges executives face – especially newly-minted execs – is how to know who’s telling you what they really think, and who’s telling you what they think you want to hear. In other words, who can you trust? In a world founded on relationships, sorting this deck is a priority for leaders.

But when it comes to conscious leadership, maybe who you can trust is only part of the challenge; the other part, even more important maybe, is who can trust you? In this day and age of fragile employment, getting workers to follow you sounds easy – follow or get fired – but it isn’t, not if you want them to invest themselves wholeheartedly in their work.

In this blog series so far, we’ve talked about how a strong personal identity contributes to conscious leadership. We’ve looked at the first 5 attributes of identity strength – autonomy, differentiation, change, stewardship, and potential. This post addresses the sixth of eight identity strength attributes, alignment – the quality, depth and resultant power of the connections you make with others.

Frankly, I found it hard to find a suitable poster child for this topic, since trust is such a personal experience and stories about this vital trait – especially as it connects with conscious leadership – aren’t that plentiful today. In my search, I wound up reaching back in time and found someone who created an extraordinary relationship with his organization that fueled his success and reputation. That person is Robert Haas, former Chairman and CEO of Levi Strauss. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bob_Haas)

As a leader, Haas began a great experiment in corporate governance by expanding on the ethical traditions of the company began by his grandfather, Walter Haas. During his tenure, Bob Haas tried to create a corporate culture in which tens of thousands of employees around the world were treated fairly and well. If not the perfect businessman, Haas’ policies and management style brought him into firm alignment with his people, earning their trust in ways that drove value creation for decades. (http://articles.sfgate.com/2005-07-24/business/17380632_1_levi-strauss-foundation-robert-haas-harry-bernard). In short, Robert Haas was a conscious leader before conscious leadership became fashionable.

The way to determine who you can trust is by taking stock of who matters and why. For executives, this means creating an inner identity circle composed of no more than a handful of people who genuinely want to contribute to the conscious qualities you have to bring to organizational life. For rank-and-file employees, it means determining just how committed you are to them as human beings, not just as hands and heads. Can we trust you? is a pressing question for everyone. As the leader, it’s up to you to make the first move.

In my next posting, we’ll look at the seventh building block of identity strength, your brand, and how to build one so it reflects the best of you as a conscious leader.