By Robert J. Bies

Over the past two years—or what I refer to as the “Era of Bad News”— leaders have faced a deep erosion of trust in their leadership. Whether it be employees experiencing increasing mistrust in corporate leaders and their decisions—or citizens believing that politicians are “out of touch” with their everyday concerns—leaders from all sectors are faced with growing doubts about their ability to “right the ship” and return to better days.

But what can leaders do to rebuild the trust that they have lost? My research and work with executives suggests that leaders have to go back to “the fundamentals” of trust building. The fundamentals of everyday trust building are: Tell the truth; Listen, listen, and then listen; Share information on a regular basis; Practice Cᵌ and over-communicate.

Fundamental #1: Tell the Truth
With all due respect to Jack Nicholson in the movie, A Few Good Men, people can handle the truth. What they find difficult is handling the lies. So tell the truth.

Employees want an explanation for controversial management decisions and for leaders’ behaviors, particularly when it results in bad news. In the face of bad news, secrecy seems to be the default response of many leaders. Too often leaders say it is “on a need to know basis and YOU don’t need to know.” To rebuild trust, tell the truth and take responsibility for your actions. Don’t shift the blame or pass the buck.

Fundamental #2: Listen, Listen, and then Listen
In this era of bad news, your people are looking to you for leadership. Do you care, employees are asking themselves. Leaders are signal-senders. One of the most important signals that leaders can send to covey that they care is this: LISTEN!

Listening is the most important leadership skill. Why? Because when leaders listen, employees will tell them LOTS of stuff. And when leaders listen, and we mean really listen, employees feel valued and important. Listening is absolutely critical for (re)building trust. And as leaders listen, they should do the following: listen for the content (what are people concerned about?); listen for the emotions (what are people afraid of?); but also listen to act (are people suggesting solutions or new ideas to act on to help the organization?).

Fundamental #3: Share Information on a Regular Basis
Another important way that leaders (re)build trust is to share information with their people—early and often. Keep employees informed as to how things are going, whether it is good news or bad news. Sharing information is one of the sure ways to (re)build trust.

But, often leaders want to withhold information out of the need for control or power. Leaders operate under the mistaken belief that, by sharing the information, it will only make matters worse. But, by withholding information, it will only make matters worse for you in terms of (re)building trust. Why? The reason: in the absence of information, people will create rumors, which contributes to everyday paranoia in the workplace. What are the situational conditions that encourage rumors? Two conditions: lack of information and the existence of an important issue. What are the situational conditions that encourage paranoia in the workplace? Two conditions: lack of information and the existence of employee-status uncertainty. What do rumors and paranoia have in common? Both are fuelled by a lack of information. While rumours and paranoia are created by the landscape of bad news, leaders can lessen their negative impact on the workplace by sharing information on a regular basis.

Fundamental #4: Practice Cᵌ and Over-Communicate
In these times of turbulent change, leaders need to first practice Cᵌ: Crystal Clear Communication. Second, leaders must over-communicate their vision, their strategy, their plans, and their message. Repetition is absolutely critical. Why? First, not everybody hears you, as they are distracted if not fearful. Second, not everybody hears the message accurately if it is only said once and not everybody hears the message at the same time. Third, repetition breeds familiarity, which can lead to understanding, which can lead to trusting you and supporting your initiatives. As a rule of thumb, communicate more than feels normal. By the way, because over-communication will involve all the senior leadership team—make sure everyone stays on message!

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Robert J. Bies, Ph.D., McDonough School of Business, Georgetown University

Bob Bies holds a PhD from Stanford in organizational behavior and is a professor of management and founder of the Executive Master’s in Leadership at the McDonough School of Business at Georgetown University. He is conducting research focused on leadership, the delivery of bad news, organizational justice, and revenge and forgiveness in the workplace. Having published extensively on these topics and related issues in the leading and most respected academic journals, Professor Bies has also authored a wonderful book. In addition, he has received numerous awards as an outstanding professor at Georgetown’s business school, just as he had previously at Northwestern’s Kellogg School of Management. His popularity is for very good reason, as Professor Bies truly understands leadership, the dynamics of the workplace, and is very insightful in his teaching and in facilitating learning.