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Increase trust, reduce fear

“The most critical challenge for any organization is to enlarge the circle of trust.”

Command-and-control systems reflect a deep mistrust of employees’ commitment and competence. They also tend to overemphasize sanctions as a way of forcing compliance. That’s why so many organizations are filled with anxious employees who are hesitant to take the initiative or trust their own judgment. Organizational adaptability, innovation, and employee engagement can only thrive in a high-trust, low-fear culture. In such an environment, information is widely shared, contentious opinions are freely expressed, and risk taking is encouraged. Fear paralyzes, mistrust demoralizes—they must be wrung out of our management systems.

124 Stories
236 Hacks
22 Barriers

Increase trust, reduce fear

“The most critical challenge for any organization is to enlarge the circle of trust.”

Command-and-control systems reflect a deep mistrust of employees’ commitment and competence. They also tend to overemphasize sanctions as a way of forcing compliance. That’s why so many organizations are filled with anxious employees who are hesitant to take the initiative or trust their own judgment. Organizational adaptability, innovation, and employee engagement can only thrive in a high-trust, low-fear culture. In such an environment, information is widely shared, contentious opinions are freely expressed, and risk taking is encouraged. Fear paralyzes, mistrust demoralizes—they must be wrung out of our management systems.

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No one likes annual performance reviews. Managers hate doing them and employees hate getting them. Instead of wasting time on this, I suggest totally eliminating the annual perforance review.
Hack by Marton Jojarth on June 30, 2015
Today it is easy to acquire quality Knowledge and the power job to apply Knowledge. The difficult part is making sound judgments. Ignorant diagnosis are common.
Hack by Raj Kumar on November 1, 2010
As management have remained unchanging for the last 60 years, companies continue struggling to fully “use” the best capabilities –and intentions - of their employees by eternally trusting in an organi
Hack by Cesar Malacon on October 21, 2011
Outside the world of academics popular culture splendidly captured the corporate imperative with the clarion call of “Show me the money!”   That demand is more incessant today with an ever i
Hack by János Pál NÉMETH on December 15, 2011
Decision making process relied for ages (and still does in a majority of cases) on a top-down approach, where decisions are taken by senior executives and executed by all layers below in a pre-defined
Implement a performance review mechanism that allows every employee to give themselves an "A" at the beginning of the period and then summarize what they are going to accomplish to earn that A.
Hack by Akash Sah on September 20, 2010
The assumption that employees must be hierarchically controlled has frustrated organizational innovation for decades.  We and five well-known business leaders stumbled upon the solution to this i
Hack by Bill Nobles on June 4, 2010

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