Sometimes our days don’t turn out as originally planned.

Yesterday was one of those days!

My intentions were good. I had a big project to tackle so I woke up extra early, walked the dogs, made coffee, sat down to check incoming emails, and suddenly the day derailed.

For those who can still remember back as far as childhood, some of us were blessed with a level of intelligence to the “right of center” on the bell curve. This attribute became a curse on days when tests or exams were administered, as there was often the classmate to the left or right, or sometimes behind us with, what was then known as “wandering eyes.” Their level of audacity was only limited by the teacher’s ability (and choice) to hear and see. When the tests were graded and returned, the cheater acted as if they had earned the grade themselves. They never bothered to thank the kid sitting next to them, and certainly never apologized.

Cheating still runs rampant in schools. In fact, it’s now at epidemic levels as all those cheating kids are now adults, raising a new generation of cheaters. Just ask Don McCabe at Rutgers University who was a guest on the TAA radio show back in 2010.

So as I read through my Google alerts yesterday morning, a new article on “trust” popped up. I read it, read it again, and then read it for the third time, assuming I was missing the most important component, the credit to the original author. Someone who is, ironically, on the faculty of the same university cited above, and who until yesterday I had no reason to believe was untrustworthy or had “wandering eyes” decided that plagiarism and copyright rules only apply to other people. I think I remember that  same “guy” sitting next to me in high school english class!

For those who know me, I have never said “No” to anyone who asks to republish or repurpose anything I have written, as I am a believer in the power of collaboration, especially when tackling a complex subject such as “trust.”  But this particular person forgot to ask permission, or perhaps thought he wouldn’t get caught. Instead, he threw me a bone with a brief mention of TAA (no link), and then proceeded to lift almost his entire article from this blog post with no attribution.

If you’ve never  looked up the definition of  “plagiarism,” according to Merriam-Webster.com it is:

“The act of using another person’s words or ideas without giving credit to that person : the act of plagiarizing something”

And for those who don’t know the definition of “copyright”, also from Merriam-Webster.com:

“The exclusive legal right to reproduce, publish, sell, or distribute the matter and form of something (as a literary, musical, or artistic work)”

It’s Friday so this is a bit of a light hearted post, sharing a peek behind the curtain and into my life.

I have two sons who, without a doubt, are my proudest accomplishments. My younger son is a senior in high school and heading off to college in a year. This summer, he and has friends have been using my kitchen as a laboratory of sorts. Their goal is to master a recipe for the perfect glass of lemonade. This experiment has been ongoing for almost a month and each batch is getting better. I’ve been appointed “Chief Taste Tester,” a new title to add to my resume! (I’m also the one who mops the floor when they are done.)

Yesterday I was working from my home office, right above the kitchen and heard some quiet conversation below. I went downstairs and found four boys busy perfecting their craft. Each one had a job (washing, juicing, mixing, pouring) and the ongoing conversation had little to do with the task at hand, but instead was focused on the upcoming soccer game on TV. I could not identify a leader or boss.  The scene reminded me of a well-rehearsed Broadway show. All the actors came together naturally with no missteps and nobody shouting orders.

These boys have known each other since kindergarten and have grown up together as friends. What do they have in common?

• To start with, lots of history, similar demographics, and years to build trust
• Strong family values
• There’s not a single female among their siblings
• None are the first-born.

Perhaps these similar attributes don’t have a thing to do with their ability to work together in such a natural way, but my guess is some, or maybe all of them play a role.

Now let’s redirect this post to the time and money organizations spend on team building exercises, employee engagement programs, leadership training and culture change.

Maybe instead, they should simply make lemonade.

The next time you want to engage your team, buy a few bags of lemons, some sugar, and step back.  You have set up a powerful learning experiment in trust building and teamwork. The observations and conclusions may prove to be far more valuable than the ingredients purchased.  Compare the results to my experience. How are they similar? How do they differ? What’s working fine? What’s not? Let me know how it goes, and don’t forget to send me your recipe.

Barbara Brooks Kimmel is the Executive Director of Trust Across America-Trust Around the World whose mission is to help organizations build trust. She is also the editor of the award winning TRUST INC. book series. In 2012 Barbara was named “One of 25 Women Changing the World” by Good Business International.

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Feel free to leave a comment or drop her a note at Barbara@trustacrossamerica.com

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Copyright © 2014, Next Decade, Inc.

Yesterday I wrote about a commonly repeated expression “Trust Takes Years to Build But Can Be Lost In a Second” and why I believe that it doesn’t always hold true.  Then late in the afternoon I saw another interesting and somewhat popular statement “Character, Either You Have it Or You Don’t.”

The actual quote is credited to Anthony Bourdain.

“Skills can be taught. Character you either have or you don’t have.”

― Anthony Bourdain, Kitchen Confidential: Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly

Sorry, but again I have to disagree. Character is a learned trait. It is a skill that can be honed throughout life.  It’s built from our earliest experiences, our family values and the influence of our childhood friends. In other words, it’s mostly “nurture” not “nature.”

Michael Josephson (Josephson Institute) created a popular youth-centered program called Character Counts. His framework contains basic values called the Six Pillars of Character: trustworthiness, respect, responsibility, fairness, caring and citizenship. The program has been working effectively for decades. I like that the first pillar is trustworthiness.

So it seems that character is really a lifelong learning opportunity for those with an open mind and a motivation to elevate it. With the right mentor, the right leader, the right boss, the right spouse, the right friends, character can be learned and perfected throughout life. There is no deadline for developing character.

Imagine if C-Suite compensation was partially based on an annual character test! Would we see a sudden and positive shift in the way businesses are run? What do you think?

Barbara Brooks Kimmel is the Executive Director of Trust Across America-Trust Around the World whose mission is to help organizations build trust. She is also the editor of the award winning TRUST INC. book series. In 2012 Barbara was named “One of 25 Women Changing the World” by Good Business International.

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Yesterday at lunch my colleague made a statement I hear rather frequently.

“It takes years to build trust but it can be destroyed in a second.”

I don’t agree.

A person with high integrity, a leader with outstanding character, an organization that has committed the time to build a trust bank account will not have trust destroyed as quickly as those who haven’t.

Yes, trust building takes time.  In the long run it’s worth it. Your next misstep (and we all make them) may not be the one that brings down the house.

Why not start today?

What do you think? Leave your comments below or  send them along.

Email: barbara@trustacrossamerica.com

Barbara Brooks Kimmel is the Executive Director of Trust Across America-Trust Around the World whose mission is to help organizations build trust. She is also the editor of the award winning TRUST INC. book series. In 2012 Barbara was named “One of 25 Women Changing the World” by Good Business International.

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This morning, Seth Godin’s daily blog  “Beware the Zeitgeister” caught my attention and got me thinking.

From my bird’s eye perch, it appears that in certain circles “trust” has become quite the fashion statement in 2014. With increasing frequency, I read about the importance of trust from outside experts in leadership, teamwork, culture, innovation, engagement and many other disciplines.  But there is a very large (and perhaps the most important) stakeholder group missing from the conversation.

Can you name it? It’s senior leadership.

Last week I did an exhaustive search in an attempt to find examples of corporate leaders proactively talking about trust.

This is what I was able to find:

Lloyd’s CEO to Discuss Leadership and Rebuilding Trust

Dennis Lally of PWC on Rebuilding Trust from Value to Values

Marillyn Hewson, CEO Lockheed Martin on The First Thing a New Leader Should Do to Build Trust

and finally, IBM’s CEO Visits China for Trust Building Talks

Returning to Seth’s blog, while there are lots of examples of senior leaders “Zeitgeisting” trust after their company’s latest crisis, why do they hesitate to proactively embrace it as a way to do business?

While many of the right people are beginning to focus on the importance of trust in all aspects of business, we’ve yet to get “buy in” from those who could benefit the most.

What will it take?

Do you have more examples of senior leadership talking about trust? Please send them along.

Email: barbara@trustacrossamerica.com

Barbara Brooks Kimmel is the Executive Director of Trust Across America-Trust Around the World whose mission is to help organizations build trust. She is also the editor of the award winning TRUST INC. book series. In 2012 Barbara was named “One of 25 Women Changing the World” by Good Business International.

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How Much Does Trust Matter?

Earlier this week, in a blog post called Trust: The Direct Route to Profitability we updated our ongoing research on the Business Case for Trust. This post takes a closer look at the impact of our trust research on two companies in similar businesses.

Every year my friend and colleague Laura Rittenhouse at Rittenhouse Rankings releases her CEO Candor Survey equating candor with better stock performance. Laura’s work enhances our FACTS® Framework and has heightened my awareness of the manner in which CEOs choose to portray their companies in their annual letters to shareholders.

So on this rainy 4^th of July, I decided to take a closer look at two companies in the Business Services (Staffing) Sector. Trust Across America’s (TAA) database contains a total of seven companies in this group. Manpower Inc. received the distinction of being named the Most Trustworthy Public Company 2013 by TAA. The lowest scoring company in the sector is Resources Connection, Inc.

Should you choose, you can read the CEO letters to shareholders at the links below.  The contrast is striking in both content and candor. You can also compare the investment performance of the two companies over the past 5 years.

MANPOWER  (FACTS® Score 70)

www.manpower.ch/fileadmin/user_upload/documents/Manpower/Annual_Report_MP_Inc/ManpowerGroup_Interactive_Annual_Report_2013.pdf

RESOURCES CONNECTION (FACTS® Score 42)

files.shareholder.com/downloads/RECN/3301951960x0x691297/5E63377E-98B5-4C22-9178-DA764B98C139/2013_Annual_Report.RECN.pdf

Is there a correlation between trust, values and company performance? What role does the CEO play in building a trustworthy culture?  In which company would you rather invest? Please share your comments and suggestions!

Email: barbara@trustacrossamerica.com

Barbara Brooks Kimmel is the Executive Director of Trust Across America-Trust Around the World whose mission is to help organizations build trust. She is also the editor of the award winning TRUST INC. book series. In 2012 Barbara was named “One of 25 Women Changing the World” by Good Business International.

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Companies Ignoring the Social Fallout of Bad Customer Service

Will Find Themselves at a Competitive Disadvantage

I didn’t set out to write 3 blog posts in 24 hours, but what’s that expression about “striking while the iron is hot,” especially when the subject is trust?

This afternoon one of my sons and I headed out to run a few errands. First stop was Verizon Wireless to inquire about my data plan. There was no wait and customer service was fast and knowledgeable. Kudos to Verizon. Maybe Wednesday afternoons are the best time to visit!

Next we headed over to the home improvement store. Think The Home Depot or Lowe’s and my luck abruptly ran out. First stop was the door and window department. I needed to order a few window screens and brought the old ones with me to ensure the right purchase. Upon completion of the $70.00 order I politely asked the employee to discard the old screens. And then I heard one of my favorite lines, “Sorry our policy doesn’t permit it.”  The employee turned his back and walked away.

We proceeded to finish shopping.  I carried the screens (one was 6 feet long) while my son flat bedded 8 bags of mulch, and then off to checkout where I asked the checker whether there was a suggestion box in the store. “Suggestions? They must be made online and instructions are to be found on the back of the receipt.” She never asked if she could help me, and apparently had no interest in hearing my story, but I told her anyway.  Her response, “Customers always try to hand off all sorts of trash to store employees.” According to the checker, if the store took the garbage that all the (evil) customers brought in the door, they would have to raise their prices. She then completed the transaction, handed me the paperwork for the screens I had ordered, along with a separate sales receipt and commented that she would be happy to attach them, but the store did not provide staplers at checkout… something about a policy. As we were leaving the store, my son asked me why I had even bothered to engage the checker in a conversation.

Moral of the story… I have no loyalty to this store. My experience today was pretty typical. Next time, I’ll just shop at their competitor a few miles up the road. And all because store #1 would not discard my screens, which might  have been the right thing to do, policy aside. And finally, just a few years ago, a consumer facing a customer service issue had only a few avenues of recourse-  a letter, a phone call or a glass of wine. Now the customer has an additional opportunity  to report their story on social media, “outing” the offender should they choose to do so.

Companies recognizing that good customer service is an important component of a trustworthy organization build a competitive advantage called loyalty. They bank trust with their customers. They don’t have an intern standing by on Twitter to send a stock “I’m sorry” response when something goes wrong. They don’t need to do that. They have happy loyal customers and they have staplers.

Those interested in reading more about the history of customer service at both The Home Depot and Lowe’s, might want to read this great article from Babson.

www.babson.edu/executive-education/thought-leadership/retailing/Documents/improving-customer-experience-at-home-depot.pdf

Please share your comments and suggestions! Email: barbara@trustacrossamerica.com

Barbara Brooks Kimmel is the Executive Director of Trust Across America-Trust Around the World whose mission is to help organizations build trust. She is also the editor of the award winning TRUST INC. book series. In 2012 Barbara was named “One of 25 Women Changing the World” by Good Business International.

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Do  Trustworthy Companies Sacrifice Profitability?

Not a Chance!

Copyright © 2014 Next Decade, Inc.

Trust Across America, via its  FACTS® Framework has been tracking the performance of the most trustworthy public companies for over 5 years, and the results are nothing short of staggering. Trustworthy companies have produced an 82.9% return vs. the S&P’s 42.2% since August 2012.

But the daily headlines continue to feature countless  stories about bad corporate behavior and the ongoing distrust in business. Rarely do we hear senior management even mention the word “trust” until they are attempting to minimize the fallout from the latest crisis. And what is usually the root cause of the crisis? Low trust, and a failure of senior leadership to place trust on its agenda. If it sounds like a vicious cycle it is, and certainly no way to reverse decades of declining trust in business.

Combine the chart above with the following data and The Case for Trust  becomes increasingly difficult to ignore.

The Hard Costs of Low Trust

• Gallup’s research (2011) places 71% percent of U.S. workers as either not engaged or actively disengaged.

• The disengaged workforce (Gallup, August, 2013) is costing the US economy $450-550 billion a year, which is over 15% of payroll costs.

• The Washington Post reported that “the federal government imposed an estimated $216 billion in regulatory costs on the economy (in 2012), nearly double its previous record.”
• The cost of the tort litigation system alone in the United States is over $250 billion. – or 2% of GDP (Forbes, January 2012)

• The six biggest U.S. banks, led by JP Morgan Chase & Co. and Bank of America Corp. have piled up $103 billion in legal costs since the financial crisis (Bloomberg, August 2013)

• According to The Economist Intelligence Unit (2010), 84% of senior leaders say disengaged employees are considered one of the biggest threats facing their business. However, only 12% of them reported doing anything about this problem.

• According to Edelman globally, 50% of consumers trust businesses, but just 18% trust business leadership.

• And finally, in the United States, the statistics are similar, but the story is a bit worse for leadership. While 50% of U.S. consumers trust businesses, just 15% trust business leadership.

This trust gap negatively impacts a company’s revenue, market share, brand reputation, employee engagement and turnover, stock price, and bottom line profitability.

The Low Cost of Hard Trust

Building a trustworthy business will improve a company’s profitability and organizational sustainability.

A growing body of evidence shows increasing correlation between trustworthiness and superior financial performance. Over the past decade, a series of qualitative and quantitative studies have built a strong case for senior business leaders to place building trust among stakeholders high on their priority list. While none of these studies are perfect, over the next decade their results will be increasingly difficult to ignore.

In a Harvard Business School working paper from July 2013 called The Impact of Corporate Sustainability on Organizational Processes and Performance, Robert G. Eccles, Ioannis Ioannou, and George Serafeim provide evidence that High Sustainability companies (those integrating both environmental and social issues) significantly outperform their counterparts over the long-term, both in terms of stock market as well as accounting performance.

According to Fortune’s  “100 Best Companies to Work For”, based on Great Place to Work Employee Surveys, best companies experience as much as 50% less turnover and Great Workplaces perform more than 2X better than the general market (Source: Russell Investment Group)

Forbes and GMI Ratings have produced the “Most Trustworthy Companies” list for the past six years. They examine over 8,000 firms traded on U.S. stock exchanges using forensic accounting measures, a more limited definition of trustworthy companies than Trust Across America’s FACTS Framework but still somewhat revealing. The conclusions they draw are:

• “… the cost of capital of the most trustworthy companies is lower …”
• “… outperform their peers over the long run …”
• “… their risk of negative events is minimized …”

 In addition to the chart above, numerous indirect indicators of trust also show a direct correlation to superior financial performance.

From Deutsche Bank:

• 100% concurrence on Lower Cost of Capital (“… academic studies agree that companies with high ratings for CSR (corporate social responsibility) and ESG (environment, social responsibility, governance) factors have a lower cost of capital in terms of debt (loans and bonds) and equity.”)
• 89% concurrence on Superior Market Performance (“,,,studies indicate companies with high ratings for ESG factors outperform market-based indices”)
• 85% concurrence on Greater Performance on Accounting –Based Standards (“… studies reveal these types of company’s consistently outperform their rivals on accounting-based criteria.”)

From Global Alliance for Banking on Values, which compared values-based and sustainable banks to their big-bank rivals and found:

• 7% higher Return on Equity for values-based banks (7.1% ROE compared to 6.6% for big banks).
•  51% higher Return On Assets for sustainable banks (.50% average ROA for sustainable banks compared to big bank earning 0.33%)

These studies are bolstered by analyses from dozens of other respected sources including the American Association of Individual Investors, the Dutch University of Maastricht, Erasmus University, and Harvard Business Review.

Business leaders may choose to continue to challenge the business case for trust but the evidence is mounting. There is not only a business case but also a financial case for trust.  Trust works.

Please share your comments and suggestions! Email: barbara@trustacrossamerica.com Barbara Brooks Kimmel is the Executive Director of Trust Across America-Trust Around the World whose mission is to help organizations build trust. She is also the editor of the award winning TRUST INC. book series. In 2012 Barbara was named One of 25 Women Who are Changing the World by Good Business International.

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Copyright © 2014 Next Decade, Inc.

Leaders Often Overlook the Obvious

Remember, What You Give is Often What You Get 

The following comments are sure to reduce the level of trust among your team.

How often have you heard these?

• Who works for whom?
• Because I said so.
• Fudge it if you don’t know.
• Who do you think you are?
• Not now.
• So what? Who cares?
• Don’t make a mistake.
• Who do you think you’re talking to?
• My door is closed for a reason.
• Because I make the rules.

What would you add to this list of things trustworthy leaders should never say?

Please share your comments and suggestions! Email: barbara@trustacrossamerica.com

Barbara Kimmel is the Executive Director of Trust Across America-Trust Around the World whose mission is to help organizations build trust. She is also the editor of the award winning TRUST INC. book series.

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Are you a trustworthy leader?

What differentiates your leadership style from your peers?

While we continue to hear talk of the importance of  trust, rarely do we read about the leader who is placing trust at least somewhere near the top of his/her agenda. Trust Across America-Trust Around the World is looking for those “best in practice” leaders. We have assembled an online  questionnaire addressing trust as it relates to:

• SUCCESS
• PERFORMANCE
• COSTS
• BENEFITS
• COLLABORATION
• CULTURE
• ACTION
• LEADERSHIP
• TRANSFORMATION
• PROOF
• VISION

We want to hear your story and share it with others. Our goal is to continue to bring awareness to organizational trust as the new standard of leadership. Will you help us?

Please share your comments and suggestions! Email: barbara@trustacrossamerica.com

Barbara Kimmel is the Executive Director of Trust Across America-Trust Around the World whose mission is to help organizations build trust. She is also the editor of the award winning TRUST INC. book series.

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