In its earlier days LinkedIn provided a unique opportunity for professional collaboration, allowing Trust Across America to build an amazing network of likeminded individuals interested in helping organizations build trust. Our Trust Alliance members individually and collectively benefitted by working together on books and contributing to our magazine, engaging in shared learning and development programs (both in person and online), and building a trust framework that has now attracted well over 200,000 global professionals. People can truly achieve extraordinary results when they embrace the power of collaboration, placing it ahead of self interest.
On a personal level, collaboration:
- Improves communication
- Stimulates critical thinking
- Enhances self esteem
- Builds confidence
- Motivates individuals to take risks
- Aids in self-control
- Allows for evaluation of personal values and goals
- Builds empathy
- Promotes better listening
- Develops conflict resolution skills
As a group, collaboration:
- Increases productivity
- Speeds up decision-making
- Encourages creativity
- Simplifies workflows
- Pools skills and resources
- Fosters diversity
- Brings balance to decision-making
- Encourages win/win situations
- And most importantly, builds trust.
Fast forward to 2026. The opportunities for collaboration on LinkedIn seem to have all but disappeared. Its algorithms appear to favor a crowded “garage sale” feel of cheap self promotion and self interest, leaving little to no space for building trust through teamwork. As people become more insular and isolated, as AI chatbots replace teamwork and social media sites place the power of personal relationships in the background, is it any wonder that trust continues to lose its relevance? Trust, after all, is always interpersonal.
Barbara Brooks Kimmel is an author, speaker, product developer and global subject matter expert on trust and trustworthiness. Founder of Trust Across America-Trust Around the World she is author of the award-winning Trust Inc., Strategies for Building Your Company’s Most Valuable Asset, Trust Inc., 52 Weeks of Activities and Inspirations for Building Workplace Trust and Trust Inc., a Guide for Boards & C-Suites. She majored in International Affairs (Lafayette College), and has an MBA (Baruch- City University of NY). Her expertise on trust has been cited in Harvard Business Review, Investor’s Business Daily, Thomson Reuters, BBC Radio, The Conference Board, The Financial Times, Global Finance Magazine, Bank Director and Forbes, among others.
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