Building Trust With Leadership When Doubt Creeps In
Getting things done at your church requires trust. You have to trust your leadership, and you have to be trusted as well. Any lack of trust that creeps in can ruin an organization's culture like a virus silently killing someone without them knowing. Accelerating this process of building trust is difficult, and I’m not even sure it's possible to rush it. The people I trust are people I’ve known for a long time. For example, who would I trust to raise my kids if something happened to my wife and me? I can only name a few people, and those people are people I know deeply. If I unpack the reason for trusting these people with my kids, I quickly realize that this trust didn’t happen in a few days, months, or even years. My trust in them was built over a decade of doing life with them. I know them and they know me. I genuinely trust them.
What does trusting someone look like?
The more trust you have, the more authority you’ll have, and the more you’ll be able to get things done. Remove trust, and nothing gets done. If that is your reality, it can be a sucky season, but I think you can start building trust even in tough seasons.
Henry Cloud says in his book “Trust” that trust is built in five ways:
Understanding – Feeling heard and valued.
Motivation – Knowing someone has your best interests at heart.
Ability – Having the necessary skills and competence.
Character – Showing integrity and consistency.
Track Record – Demonstrating reliability over time.
When I read about these five components of trust, my first thought was that you can’t microwave this process. I do believe you may be able to accelerate trust building. Awareness of every area's importance with every decision could speed up the trust-building timeline, but that still seems hard. For example, your leadership or yourself may be in a new season where you don’t know if you can trust each other. You can’t just say, “Hey, I understand you. Here are my motivations. I have the ability and character, and here is my track record.” Then, trust is moved to 100%. Nope. That isn’t what having trust in someone looks like. Trust is built in someone or a team with every swing at the bat. Every big and small decision builds trust. You inch your way forward, showing you are worthy of the trust. More swings result in knowing someone’s batting average, and the fewer swings, the more trust is anchored in hope versus facts. You can’t live off hope forever and pray they hit that homerun at the next at-bat. Eventually, that person delivers or gets traded. Too many baseball analogies. Sorry. I couldn’t make any basketball examples work.
The hardest part, I’ve found with building trust with leadership, is that every misstep, even when a ton of good things are happening, can feel like one step forward and two steps backward. Early on, you have minimal in the bank, and you’re trying to build momentum, but one mistake can kill all momentum, and you get hit with that overdraft fee. I’ve been figuratively slapped on the hand many times over the last decade, and it can feel like a gut punch. I start questioning what I’m doing and whether I’m even in the right role. After throwing a pity party, I reevaluate what happened and try to diagnose what went wrong. Usually, 9 out of 10 times, the slap on the hand was warranted. I messed up, apologize for my error if needed, and even became grateful for the correction. That last part takes time, though.
I tend to pour everything into something I’m doing and don’t complain. I’ll forgive and forget quickly when I’m wronged, so I take offense when someone doesn’t forgive or forget something I do. I don’t actually hear the initial feedback sometimes, but I think of all the times I’ve forgiven them. Why are they whining about this? The issue with this approach is that you really didn’t forgive them. It creates a relationship where the other person can never actually criticize you because you are “perfect”. You kind of become a ticking time bomb. Once they point something out, you throw up all the past stuff. It's not healthy. I’ve functioned this way sometimes and can default to this in seasons. This learning was something I wish I had understood in the first few years of my marriage. I would have saved a ton in counseling fees. I forgive personal wrongs without them knowing, and once they push back on me, I overreact, and all trust goes out the window.
The most significant way I’ve found to combat this from happening is by providing honest feedback to my leadership and asking for feedback about myself as well. Highly encourage you to read Radical Candor by Kim Scott to unpack this concept more. If I see a concern, I must figure out how to share it. It's essential that the timing is right. You don’t share it in a large group setting or at the end of a long day. For example, in a church context, sharing a big concern the week of Easter isn’t great timing on your part. You schedule time, you may even give your leadership a heads up that you have a big question to ask, and you process your thoughts prior. Also, frame the concern/question from a humble perspective. You may not have all the information. Come into that conversation not as an angry person trying to vent, but as someone trying to clarify why this happened or what this means. It is essential to share your lingering inner thoughts and concerns with your leadership, and you should want to know what your leadership really thinks about you. If you don’t talk about it, things will boil under the surface and spill over later.
Talking about the unsaid stuff in the right way can lead to real steps forward, which ultimately builds real trust. A general rule of thumb for discussing inner thoughts bugging you is to wait thirty days, then if the thoughts are still lingering, schedule a meeting with your boss. Also, be ready to hear something hard that you may need to hear to grow in your leadership. You may schedule that conversation and walk into a self-awareness wake-up call. I’m not saying that will happen, but if you ask your leadership a bold and direct question, be ready for some directness right back.
I think of Uzziah in 2 Chronicles 26, who came to power as a sixteen-year-old, reigned for fifty-two years, did many good things, but later in life got super arrogant. He became so prideful that he walked into the Temple without following the proper process, and God gave him leprosy to humble him. You may be like Uzziah, just strutting into that conversation with your leadership and not realizing pride has inched into your heart. I love that it didn’t happen when he was a teenager, but as an adult. We think the young are more prideful, but older folks are often more arrogant because we get too confident in ourselves. I think of this story of Uzziah frequently and hope I don’t wake up one day too arrogant to forget God’s ways.
What are some simple next steps in building trust?
It’s going to take time. Understanding, motivation, ability, character, and track record are deepened with every decision made. Know there will be missteps and mistakes. You and your leadership are human. Unless you’re reading this in the future and AI has taken over. Even AI makes mistakes, I guess? Anyways, don’t be shocked if doubt creeps in when you or your leadership makes a mistake. I will say that I’ve leaned deeply over the years into someone's character being vital in holding on during a turbulent season of trust-building. If maybe a few of these five components of trust are still TBA, but I can trust someone's character, I tend to easily just get on board and allow full trust to come later.
There is no flipping a switch to trust someone, but as you see someone make good choices over a period of time, trust will build. Be in it for the long haul. Find your moments to ask honest questions if there is a concern. Don’t just shut up and ignore those inner thoughts if they linger. Silence can build the wrong culture of trust. This is why honest candor is really important in trust-building seasons. The more you or your leadership prove to be good stewards, the more authority you’ll be given, or they will be given, and the more things will get done.
I’m praying for you if you are in a season of uncertainty. I pray you push through it and that the trust bar moves up so you can move beyond the uncertainty of this moment. The best relationships I have were built up and formed initially during uncertainty. I didn't immediately trust them. Riding through the waves of uncertain seasons with someone proves they are worth going the long haul with. This is why building up trust is essential, and time is needed to make that happen. The people I would trust to raise my kids aren’t people I always agree with 100% of the time, but I do agree with most of the time, and I’ve seen them at their best and worst. Also, they’ve seen me at my best and worst. I trust who they are at their core now because of those seasons of doing life together. It's why I trust them. I’m sorry I can’t accelerate this process, but I know you’ll be better on the other side.
I recommend reading “Getting Digital Things Done At Your Church When You’re Not In Charge” next.
