Message from Your Chapter President - July 2021

thinker     President's Message
Trust is one of the important building blocks to the creation of a performing team. A performing team has a high level of trust and collaboration. We all have our part to play in building trust in a team. 

First, you can’t control how others behave but you can ensure that you are trustworthy. Trustworthiness is one of the key Behavioural Characteristics highlighted in the Underlying Competencies section of the BABOK.

 Being trustworthy has a lot to do with consistently displaying traits that promote trust. Judith E. Glaser describes these traits as a mnemonic in her TRUTH Model:
  • Transparency. Be open and transparent about what’s on your mind.
  • Relationship. Extend the olive branch, even with people you may see as a foe.
  • Understanding. We learn what is really on people’s minds by seeking to understand their needs and emotions and seeing the world through their eyes.
  • Shared Success. Create a shared vision of success with others.
  • Truth. Testing assumptions and telling the truth.    
By striving to embrace the traits that create trust we do our part to create an atmosphere of trust.

The next step is to actively and intentionally build trust among team members. Plan activities that encourage mutual respect and collaboration. There are many websites that will list trust building activities. And many of those will include this one simple activity. For centuries this one activity has been the most recognized and utilized method for building trust: break bread together.

I still think the most effective way to build trust and empathy in a team is to share a meal. In his article “A Fun Way to Build Trust and Cooperation”, Neuro Scientist and Speaker Roger Dooley talks about the importance of sharing food. He emphasizes that sharing the same food is the best way for a group to build trust. He writes “Researchers at the University of Chicago found that subjects who ate the same food were more likely to trust each other.”

You can do your part in building trust in your team by first being trustworthy and then embracing opportunities to build trust. And the easiest way to do that is to share food. So… order a pizza, invite everyone, and take a significant step to building a trusting, performing team.

https://www.inc.com/debbie-madden/why-fighting-with-your-co-worker-might-actually-be-good-for-your-companys-culture.html

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tuckman%27s_stages_of_group_development#Performing

https://www.neurosciencemarketing.com/blog/articles/build-trust-cooperation.htm

BABOK Guide version 3 pages 195-196

https://www.psychologytoday.com/nz/blog/conversational-intelligence/201606/go-the-distance-distrust-trust


Mike Jones,
President