From the book: The Five Dysfunctions of a Team: A Leadership Fable. The foundation of a functional team and an organization is Trust.
Trust is instilled. It doesn’t happen naturally. It’s by Design, and not by Chance. As the leader of a team or an organization, values flow from the leader (good and bad). So how do we instill the environment of Trust?
According to Andy Stanley, a leader should promise two things;
1) I promise to Trust
2) I promise to be Trustworthy
To trust is to offer trust without others having to do anything. Regardless whether they have proved themselves or not. To be trustworthy is about the leader themselves; to be worthy of your trust. A common misunderstanding of trustworthiness or integrity is that one has to be perfect/flawless. No. To be trustworthy means that ‘I will do what I say, and I’ll say what I do. When I fall short, I will be the first one to let you know, will own it, and will learn from it for future to prevent it from happening again.
We’ve all had encounter with leaders who didn’t trust us. How did that make us feel? I seriously doubt that if we made a mistake, we’d want to openly tell them. So that we can get punished? In such case, information flow stops. Productivity drops. Instead of propelling the team or organization forward, people begin blaming everything but themselves, organizations implement processes and systems to ensure people can’t make mistakes (or punished quickly) simply out of the mistrust attitude.
Where to start?
It starts with you, the leader. Offer trust first. And be trustworthy.
Filed under: Business, Startup , how to create trust, integrity, the 5 dysfunctions of a team, the five dysfunctions of a team, trust, trustworthy
We are more powerful individually than we think. For example, when you shop at a supermarket, you are voting for:
- Organic vs Non-organic
- Local vs Mass distribution
- In season vs Out of season
- Meat vs Vegetable
Likewise, how about investment? Much about stock market investment has been focusing on ROI. Is there a way to have value based investment as well? I am not talking about just blue chip stocks. But you put your money were the values of the company aligns with your personal values. I’d like to think that a company which has good values and abides by them, would certainly turn good profit. May not be as big as a shady company down the street. Or is that just fairy tale?
Would you go into doing business with someone whose values you don’t agree with?
Is that too difficult and naive thinking that one should hold up their values? Have we got so used to compromising that there is no absolute-ism?
Coming back to think of the power we have with our choice, perhaps we can make this world a better place if individually made full use of our voice.
Filed under: Business, Inspirations, Life
Often I think being an entrepreneur is a lonely place to be. Add to that being a Christian, just makes it even lonelier. The tough spot is that, you can have lots of entrepreneurs, but yet they don’t share the same values and motivations by the faith. Then you have Christians who often thinks entrepreneurs are just driven by money, unless of course, you do non-profit business. It’s sad.
I see a gap.
I see the benefits of Christian accountability/community group to foster the community, help each other to grow in faith, to encourage each other on this race. But it’s pretty often grouped by gender, life stages or geography. Not very relevant to entrepreneurs.
I also see the benefits of peer to peer learning group for business people to learn from others experience in business, in life, in family and help each other along building their business and life. But because the lack of faith, the advices and focus are not always the right way.
I yearn for both! So I am going to start one.
A Christian Entrepreneur Peer to Peer Learning Group (wordy)
- Completely confidential
- Open to Christians entrepreneurs who are determined to live a life with purpose
- No ‘should’s, but we share our own experiences/lessons.
- Punctual attendance, penalty for being late, for cell phone going off, for missing
- Opportunity to have guest speakers for Q&A
- A peer to peer learning group. Not a networking and no sales
Oh…when shall this start?
Filed under: Business, Christianity, Startup , aspiring entrepreneurs, can christians start business, christian entrepreneurs, christians in the business world, doing business god's way, peer to peer learning group
recent comments