I have often considered trust to be just one of many attributes of effective leaders. After reading Chapter 14 on leadership trust by Colonel Patrick J. Sweeney, in the book titled, Leadership Lessons from West Point, I tend to look at trust in a different light. I now see trustworthiness, although certainly an attribute of leadership, as the chief or key attribute of leadership. The attribute of trust is without a doubt the earned result of living authentically all the other leadership attributes.
Colonel Sweeney defines trust as “one’s willingness to be vulnerable to the actions of another person which is based upon a sense of confidence in the other person’s competency to meet role requirements and the character to behave cooperatively.” That is a great definition! Trust certainly is the foundation that relationships are founded upon. It promotes the positive cooperative relationships whereby competent and caring leaders are able to fulfill organizational missions while taking care of their team throughout the process. Although Sweeney writes about this subject in the context of military leadership, he notes several times and I concur, that it is equally applicable to leadership within any type of organization
Colonel Sweeny list ten attributes of effective leadership that builds the foundation of trust-based leadership. They are listed below. The attribute list resulted from a questionnaire and study of the beliefs of military men and women regarding leadership attributes. The attributes are listed in order of priority as seen by these soldiers. Perhaps the order of importance may change depending upon the type of organization studied, but I think it is safe to say the same attributes would be applicable in one form or another in almost any organization.
The reason that leadership trust is such an important subject is that effective leadership is impossible without the foundation of trust. Without trust the designated leader has to rely upon positional power to lead. It is the old carrot and stick approach. It is, “I am the boss and you will do as I say do, or else.” It is based upon reward for good behaviors and punishment for bad behaviors. Certainly this is a part of leading effectively. We have to reward desired behaviors and punish of bad ones, but it should not and cannot be the foundation for leading effectively.
Positional or rank leadership authority is effective only in short-term low-risk environments where risk or sacrifice is minimal and the boss is always close by ensuring compliance. Is there a moderate to high level of risk or sacrifice in your organization? Perhaps not life and death risk, but I would venture to say there certainly are other types of risk as well as a great amount of personal sacrifice required. I am willing to bet the boss is not always there to monitor behaviors either.
Leading from a foundation of trust is so much more effective because behaviors, thought processes, attitudes, values, goals, and motivation of team members are positively modeled by a trustworthy leader and therefore more readily accepted and adopted by others. These attributes also tend to be more in alignment with those of the organization, thus more organizational effectiveness.
I am going to be writing on these ten attributes over the next few weeks. Hopefully, I will be able to shed some light on the subject of building that foundation of trust within a team, unit, or organization. I hope you will “tune in” and follow along as we learn more about building a foundation of leadership trust through the personal development of character and competency based leadership attributes.
1. Competent
2. Loyal
3. Honest/Good integrity
4. Leads by example
5. Self-control (stress management)
6. Confident
7. Courageous (physical and moral)
8. Shares information
9. Personal connection with subordinates
10. Strong sense of duty
I want to personally acknowledge that much of the information in this and the forthcoming writings on this subject are from the aforementioned book, Leadership Lessons from West Point, 2007, and particularly Chapter 14 by Colonel P. J. Sweeney.
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