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Leadership Truth #10 - Great Leaders Make Large Trust Deposits

Guest post by: Robert Whipple

Article Overview: The level of trust between any two individuals is like a bank account. There is a balance, and we make continual deposits and withdrawals. Great leaders look for the opportunities to make large deposits in the trust account with people.

Leadership Truth #10 - Great Leaders Make Large Trust Deposits

Great leadersknow there are occasionally opportunities to make huge deposits in the trust account, but that these opportunities require some circumstance out of the ordinary to present itself. They seize the opportunity when it arrives. Here is an example to illustrate this point.

Aaron Feuerstein was CEO of Malden Mills, a textile manufacturing company in Lawrence, Massachusetts that burned to the ground in December of 1995. The company made a product called Polartec®, a high-performance knit fleece fabric. The insurance settlement was $300 million. Aaron, who was in his 70s at the time, might have taken the money and retired. Instead, he took the opportunity to make a huge trust deposit with his employees. He promised to rebuild the factory right there in Lawrence rather than go to China, which for most CEOs would have been the knee-jerk reaction at that time. He also promised to pay all of the employees their full salary with benefits for 30 days. When that time expired, he extended the pay for another 30 days, and then another. His rationale is that he felt a responsibility to take care of his employees. He said, "...the fundamental difference is that I consider our employees an asset, not an expense."

In return, the employees became the most loyal group of employees in the industry. It was a union shop that never had a strike because people were treated fairly. He once told his employees, "When the going gets tough, hope is there with you."

When asked what he would like printed on his tombstone he said, "Hopefully, He done his damndest. He tried to do the right thing and did not give up." In the end, the company did go through a transition to another owner, but the generosity and caring Mr. Feuerstein showed rather than the knee jerk reaction to simply maximize his wealth will forever be remembered by his workforce.

Granted, most leaders never get the chance to demonstrate the kind of character and moral fiber shown by Mr. Feuerstein, but on a smaller scale every leader has opportunities to demonstrate the same spirit. Creating large trust deposits usually involves doing something that defies logic on the surface. As in Feuerstein's case, there may be a personal sacrifice of money. It may involve doing something that is uncomfortable for the leader in order to show deference for a worker. An example of this would be a CEO who gave her first class ticket to an employee recovering from an ankle injury and sat back in the coach section so the employee would be more comfortable. The sacrifice may be of personal time. An example of this is the leader who postpones his vacation at the last minute in order to support a key program that the employees have generated. It could take the form of taking no raise for a year so the employees could each have slightly more money. The possibilities are endless.

The common thread here is that the leader sought out and grabbed the opportunity to do something outside the normal pattern, or even the expected behavior of an executive, in order to demonstrate commitment to the employees by deeds rather than words. This is the stuff of legends. A leader who finds this kind of high-profile way to build trust may suffer some personal discomfort for a brief time, but the benefits will accrue for years as people tell and retell the story. Loyalty is born out of sacrifice, andexcellent leaders relish the chance to demonstrate their fiber.

I believe it is unwise for a leader to attempt to create a situation so he or she can build trust by demonstrating commitment. Anything that is done in order to manipulate the emotions of others is phony and will do more harm than good. As a leader, you don't want to engineer an opportunity to look good. Instead, be alert to natural opportunities, because they come along often enough. When one is staring you in the face, don't take the comfortable, expedient, or profitable way out. Do the right thing for the right reason. People will remember, and the trust account will have a huge deposit.

Related Articles
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  Blind Spots
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  The First Law of Building Trust

Article Tags: Account, commitment, Deposits, Leadership, Trust, Values



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