How do you gain faster results, deeper relationships, and a stronger bottom line? David Horsager, M.A., C.S.P., business strategist, entrepreneur, professor, and author, states that having a strong sense of trust is what will get you them. To David Horsager, there are 8 pillars of trust (clarity, compassion, character, competency, commitment, connection, contribution, and consistency) and that all are required to get you to where you want to be faster. Here are some of the points to the book:
1. Trust is the underlying root cause of why you do business with someone or at some place or have the relationships that you do. If you didn’t trust the business or the person, you’d most likely stay away from him/her/them. Having trust is so vital to an organization or relationship. “Trust has always been fundamental to genuine success of any kind. However, it has not been labeled as such. People seldom talk about trust as a competency to learn fraud in business to scandals in politics and athletics, the headlines point to a persistent problem of modern life and business—we’re lacking in trust. Meanwhile, the world is ‘flattening’ in many respects. Cultures are meeting and expanding in ways that weren’t possible even a decade ago. But globalization isn’t a free ride. The mega-mergers and open markets have aroused new suspicions and misunderstandings. We can reach across borders, but we don’t know how to be trusted by the people we find on the other side. In the twenty-first century, trust has become the world’s most precious resource. Trust can accelerate and mistrust can destroy any business, organization, or relationship. The lower the trust, the more time everything takes, the more everything costs, and the lower the loyalty of everyone involved. By contrast, greater trust brings superior innovation, creativity, freedom, morale, and productivity.“ He then states, “When I come home from work, my kids often greet me at the door. It is my young son who runs up to me and pulls on my pants leg. He has excited eyes and a great big smile. He shouts, ‘Daddy, Daddy, throw me up in the air really high .’ He loves to get tossed up in the air. ‘Daddy, throw me up in the air really high !’ And so I do. time—and I do! This is trust in its purest form. It is similar to the transactions of business and life. Without trust, the transactions cannot occur. Without trust, influence is destroyed. Without trust, leaders lose teams. Without trust, people lose sales. Without trust, organizations lose productivity, relationships, reputation, talented people, customer loyalty, creativity, morale, revenue, and results. They lose in their brand and in their bottom line. John O. Whitney, director of the Deming Center for Quality Management at the Columbia Business School, found, ‘Mistrust doubles the cost of doing business.’”
2. A lack of trust can cost you big time on a personal level. For example, when you apply to the bank for a mortgage, they’ll look at your credit rating. Your credit rating is essentially your trust score on your ability to pay back loans. The more you’re trusted (the better your score) the less it costs you to borrow money. “Your credit score is really a trust score. If a bank trusts you on the basis of your past financial responsibility, then you will get a higher score and pay less for a loan. In fact, I just asked my mortgage broker what the cost of a loan is today using different credit (trust) scores. She said if you have a score of 720, which is not terribly high, you can get a thirty-year mortgage at 4.75 percent. However, if your credit score is 640, which is not terribly low, the best loan you can get would be at 7.25 percent. That means the less-trusted buyer will pay over $115,000 more on the same $200,000 mortgage. If you were to buy a $500,000 house and had the lower credit score you would pay nearly $300,000 more over the course of the loan—and that does not account for the higher payments for insurance because of the lower credit score. The more you are trusted, the less you pay!“
3. Whether or not you run a business, have a mission statement or purpose. By having a mission statement, you’ll not only have greater clarity in your life and on success but you’ll also increase your happiness levels as having a purpose in life is a huge factor of happiness. In the book The 100 Simple Secrets of Happy People, David Niven states that having a purpose is one of the main reasons why you’re happy. In addition, in the book The Happiness Advantage, happiness precedes success, not vice versa. My personal mission statement is to share knowledge with the world to make it a better place. “A simple mission statement gives clarity of purpose. I have one for my company, my family, and my personal life. In each case the mission statement gives me direction and helps guide my priorities. Early on in the life of our business, my wife and I sat down and composed our first mission statement. Our mission— To share life-changing truth in a unique and influential way —became a guide for every decision. This simple vision has helped guide booking decisions, hiring decisions, and the generation of new material. It keeps us focused on doing ‘best’ activities rather than just ‘good’ things. It is very easy to get caught up in doing things that are good but not necessarily the best use of our time or talents. My writing, consulting, speaking, and resources are all aimed at making an impact in my area of expertise. With a clear focus, a bigger difference is made. Our family has developed a mission statement along with twelve tenets that guide our operations. What happens? We know who we are and have become more unified and intentional. I also have a personal mission statement above my desk—as do my wife and all the members of my staff. Why create a personal mission statement? You will become more accountable, more focused, and more motivated.“
4. It’s a fact that people like to be acknowledged or praised for their hard work; sometimes it’s a greater motivator than financial rewards. I’ve personally experienced working a job where I felt like I mattered and was making a difference. I’ve also experienced working a job where I didn’t feel like I mattered or wasn’t acknowledged for what I did. It’s a day and night feeling. At the job where my work was praised, it fueled me to work even harder. For those of you who run businesses and have employees, treat them with respect and praise their work and I’m positive you’ll see a lower turn over rate. “Time and again, workers have shown that they are more apt to stay put when they feel their company cares for them. A study conducted by the Saratoga Institute in California, considered by many to be the leader in exit-interview surveying, revealed that 89 percent of managers believed that most employees who left did so for better pay. Yet when the researchers polled employees who had left their companies voluntarily, they found that nearly the same proportion (88 percent) cited something other than salary as the main motivation for the switch. A Gallup report found that ’employees don’t leave companies, they leave managers and supervisors.’ People leave because they are not respected, listened to, appreciated, or cared about. People who are cared for have a hard time leaving, even for more money. Not only is caring the right thing to do, but attrition caused by reckless lack of concern is costly. Increasing retention of both customers and employees is one of the best ways to boost the bottom line. The gold standard of business in this area of retention is Starbucks. By providing benefits like health care and retirement options to the majority of its employees, even part-timers, it has created a culture of loyalty within the organization that is largely unmatched by its competitors. The giant coffee chain employs more than 80,000 in the United States alone, and currently spends more on benefits than on coffee beans and other raw materials. At the same time, Starbucks has a low turnover rate of around 16 percent for full-time employees, compared with a 300 percent (each position is replaced three times in a given year) average within the fast-food industry. 7 By showing employees that it cares, it doesn’t just get better efforts; it saves millions on training and recruitment.“
5. Everyone makes mistakes, we’re all human. However, when you do make a mistake, own up to it. It’s much easier to forgive those who have made a mistake and came forth about it than those who made a mistake and tries to deny it. By denying it, you lose trust from others. “This lesson is hard for many to learn. Major League Baseball buried itself more deeply under a scandal surrounding the use of illegal steroids. As the media dug in their claws, an interesting trend emerged: the players who have been forthright about their wrongdoing have, by and large, been forgiven. In fact, a few have been praised for their integrity and candor. In other words, a group of icons, shown to have broken the rules, has been vindicated simply by coming clean. On the other hand, some players have been unwavering in their denials, even in the face of overwhelming evidence and testimony. Some may even face criminal charges and obstruction of justice. While everyone has the right to clear his or her name if wrongly accused, being honest in the first place is the right thing to do.“
6. Give more than you take. In essentially every book on developing great relationships, one common theme that I notice amongst them is that to develop deeper connections with others, you need to be a bit vulnerable and give to others first. Will there be people who just take? Sure, but that’s just the minority of people. Most people will reciprocate in one form or another sooner or later. Contribution is what will help you build trust. “Some people are takers and some people are givers. Takers are in relationships only to receive. Givers invest in others. They offer finances, time, and resources to charities, ministries, and nonprofits. Givers understand the fundamental truths ‘The more you give, the more you receive’ and ‘You reap what you sow,’ but they don’t hold their breath waiting to receive. Natural givers are the happiest people I know. Consider how you can be a giver of the following. 1. Attention: Can you notice or acknowledge people more? 2. Resources: Can you set a plan to give away a larger percentage of your income every year? I know a man who gives 90 percent of his income to impoverished people whom he will never meet. 3. Time: Can you spend more time making a positive difference? 4. Opportunity: Can you give someone a chance or an opportunity? 5. Help: Can you help someone in a practical way?“
By Ryan Timothy Lee
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