Two Ways to Show Employees You Trust Them

John Krautzel
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A key complaint in the workplace today comes from employees who feel their bosses do not trust them with key information or tasks. Employees want to know what is coming down the road, especially when rumors of bad news are circulating. Too many bosses operate out of fear during the bad times and act too controlling otherwise. Here are a couple of ways for bosses to make it known that they trust their employees.

Tell the Truth

All too often, bosses and managers lack the courage they need to tell their employees the full truth about changes occurring within the workplace. Employees are always aware when the boss is withholding something important, and their faith in their bosses withers when this occurs. Trusting employees with difficult information is not easy, but it is the best way to breed loyalty.

Along the same lines, when a manager has a hidden agenda, employees can feel betrayed and even outraged when they discover the truth. A boss loses all credibility when he asks employees to focus on the team and the company's best interests only to have it come out that he was just looking out for himself. Bosses who are self-centered in this way lose the trust of employees who know that no one is making a priority of their interests.

The solution to this problem is for bosses to be transparent in their communications with employees. If a piece of information truly cannot be shared in the workplace, it helps to gain the trust of employees just to share that fact. No leader should expect his employees to be honest with him if he cannot first be honest with them.

Take a Hands-off Approach

No matter how often managers agree that delegating responsibilities is a good idea, there are still those bosses who just can't help but micromanage. Sometimes managers feel that it is just easier to do certain tasks themselves, and they wrench their employees' work away from them, leaving the employees feeling unappreciated and unwanted.

Trusting employees enough to delegate authority to them is a way to help develop their job skills. Adding progressively greater responsibilities to their workload allows managers to test individual employees and see if they can handle what is being asked of them without jeopardizing the company's goals and priorities. Delegating authority to trusted employees also clears the desk of the manager himself, letting him focus on big-picture issues and think creatively about the challenges facing his department and the company.

Trusting employees lets them feel appreciated and places a high value on their contributions to the company. When managers set their own agendas aside to focus on telling the truth to their staff and giving their employees a chance to shine, it only makes the bosses look good as well.

Photo courtesy of patrisyu at FreeDigitalPhotos.net.

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