From the course: Building Trust

Be intentional about touching base

From the course: Building Trust

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Be intentional about touching base

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- One of the simplest and most effective ways to build trust is to show you care. We show care by staying in contact with people and being tuned in to what's going on in their lives. Without distracting from the agenda, meetings are a great way to touch base. Arrive early and chit-chat as people arrive. A LinkedIn learner shared with me that her morning routine when her team worked in the office included filling up her coffee cup and then walking a lap around the office to say good morning to her colleagues. She said, without fail, just seeing people would trigger some sort of, hey how's this project coming along, or, oh I meant to ask you about- She and her team felt connected. If you're co-located with your team, take advantage of physical presence and leverage the power of daily walk arounds. If some or all of your colleagues work remotely, you'll need to be a bit more creative and intentional about staying in touch. Make a chart that includes each of your teammates, where they work, what their time zone is, and when you last talked to them, or just close your eyes and randomly point to someone on the org chart and then reach out. Between synchronous visits, try sending memes, quotes, or thinking of you messages to people just to let them know they aren't forgotten. My friend, Eric, a revenue accounting manager, described his company's use of the Donut app. For those who join in, the app randomly assigns two people from the organization to connect sometime over the next few weeks. Eric said he hadn't missed a cycle in 11 months and had met people from all over the world in all different functions of the organization. What a great way to build relationships and trust. Once you've identified some people to connect to, organize 20-minute coffee chats or virtual lunches with no agenda other than catching up. Before everyone hangs up, schedule the next get together. Encourage onsite workers to be feet on the ground for remote colleagues. Having someone who can just pop their head in a doorway to ask a quick question can keep remote colleagues from feeling sort of isolated. If the real estate motto is location, location, location, the trust motto is communicate, communicate, communicate. Be intentional and creative to stay in touch with your colleagues.

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