How well do your team members trust you?

Transcription

1 This set of Tutor Notes relates to the PowerPoint presentation and handout for learners on QCF Levels 2 & 3 (SCQF Levels 5 & 6) programmes There is a Word document that can be used as a handout in conjunction with the presentation What is trust L3&3 Handout.doc The research has now been carried out twice, in the summers of 2009 (The Index of Leadership Trust 2009) and 2010 (The Index of Leadership Trust 2010). The fieldwork for the research was carried out in the June of each year and over 5,000 respondents took part each time, making this one of the most substantial and robust pieces of research ever into trust amongst UK employers. Copies of the report are available from the ILM website, at: l m.com/research and comment/6615.aspx (2009 report) and l m.com/research and comment/8787.aspx (2010 report) This presentation is designed for use with learners on Team Leader and First Line Manager programmes. It should take about 30 minutes to an hour, depending on how much discussion you encourage. There is a separate handout which can also be given out, which explores some of the ideas about trust and its relevance for leaders and managers.

2 How well do your team members trust you? What is trust? In your groups, each identify someone you know who you trust and someone you don t trust Talk about the effect that trust or an absence of trust has on your relationship with that person Use this discussion to see if you can agree a simple definition of trust OED definition: Trust is the firm belief in the reliability, truth or ability of someone or something How does trust affect you what are you more likely to do if you trust someone? What causes people to trust others? In your groups, discuss what is it about how someone behaves that makes you trust or distrust them List these dimensions of trust in order of importance This slide is designed to get team leaders and first line managers thinking about trust Use small groups (say 4 6 people) working on their definition of trust compare their answers and then reveal the Oxford English Dictionary definition Follow this with a whole group discussion about the effect that trust has on people (you may want to capture thoughts on a flipchart or whiteboard) Then, in groups, get them thinking about what makes them trust someone and generate their own dimensions of trust. Encourage them to sort these into order of importance (using Post it notes, perhaps). Then move to the next slide

3 How did ILM measure leadership trust? 6 dimensions of trust: Leaders ability to do their job Leaders understanding of their employees roles and responsibilities Leaders fairness and concern for the welfare of employees Leaders openness to employees ideas and opinions Leaders integrity their values, honesty and fairness in decision making Leaders consistency the reliability and consistency of their behaviour KNOWING DOING BEING These six dimensions were derived from a substantial body of academic research into the factors determining trust (see the ILM document What is trust, why is it important and how can it be measured?). You can see that the first two dimensions (ability and understanding) both relate to the leaders knowledge about leadership and management and also about the people they lead, their jobs and their relationships with each other and the organisation. This links into one element of the ILM tryadic model of leadership Knowing. The second two, fairness and openness reflect core aspects of leadership behaviour treating people fairly and equitably, and inviting people s contribution and really listening to what they say. This relates to the second element of the triad Doing. The final pair reflect more personal qualities of living up to personal values and standards in a consistent way, what ILM describes as Being. ILM uses the triadic model of Knowing Doing Beingto categorise the nature of the leadership and management role, believing that effective leaders and managers: Know and understand appropriate theories and principles, best practice and (at higher levels especially) emerging ideas and approaches to the role Apply what they know to the best of their ability, in line with the values, policies and procedures of the organisation (=Doing) Are able to articulate their values, beliefs and attitudes, understand how these shape their behaviour and live up to the standards that they espouse (=Being)

4 How important are the six dimensions of trust? CEOs Line Managers Integrity Integrity Ability Ability Fairness Fairness Consistency Consistency Openness Openness Understanding Understanding Overall Overall Trust Index Score Trust Index Score Key Key For CEOs, Ability and Integrity dominate even more so in 2010 than 2009 For line managers, all six are quite similar in importance, although ability is still first - if you are judged to be not very good at your job, your team won t trust you As well as respondents rating their Line Manager and their CEO, using a ten point scale, on each of the six dimensions, the research tool also had a slider that respondents could use to rate the relative importance of each dimension. The result was a set of weights that were applied to their ratings of CEOs and Line Managers to arrive at the overall Index. Although we asked respondents to rate their CEO on all six dimensions, they chose two of them (by using the weightings) as the most significant ability and integrity. CEOs are expected to be able in their role and to act with integrity, as their employees judge them. This is important many CEOs of large organisations are likely to feel that the judgement of their shareholders or board on their performance is what really matters, but when it comes to trust, how their employees judge their performance is critical.

5 The results 2009 and survey established the benchmark for leadership trust, at the height of the recession: Line managers 69 CEOs 59 One year on, with the economy slowly recovering: Line managers trust is unchanged 69 CEOs trust has improved 63 With two years data to look at, it is now clear that trust in the managers of UK organisations remains pretty static, with the Line Manager Index unchanged at 69. The CEO Index has improved, by four points, which is a pretty good outcome during a very traumatic year

6 How has trust changed? 80 CEO 2009 Line Manager 2009 CEO 2010 Line Manager < >1000 Larger organisations see a consistent drop in CEO scores across all measures CEO trust is up with strongest increases in mid-sized organisations Size also matters for line manager scores, but the drop is less pronounced There are two main factors shaping trust in Line Managers and CEOs the size of the business (the greater the distance from the people being led) and the length of time they have been in post. This graph illustrates the effect of size, which is particularly significant for CEOs (who don t have the opportunities to meet employees, compared to Line Managers). What this chart also shows is how CEO trust has improved between 2009 and 2010 in mid sized to larger organisations, the main factor causing the overall Index to rise four points. By comparison, the movements in the Line Manager Index cancel each other out, leading to the unchanged overall Index.

7 The results: How well do you trust your CEO? How big is your organisation? How visible and accessible is your CEO? How long have your CEO and your Line Manager been in post? Reflect on your answers and what impact that has on your own level of trust in your CEO and Line Manager. ILM has a simplified version of the tool used to calculate the Index of Leadership Index on its website. You can encourage learners to rate their own CEO or Line Manager and compare their rating with the national results. This would provide a useful basis for a discussion of the behaviour of their CEO and Line Manager, and how this affects their rating. You can also look at their organisation s size to see if the pattern on this slide is apparent.

8 What do female CEOs do so well? Female CEOs score two or three points higher than male CEOs on most dimensions Female Male Ability and integrity are still the most important characteristics for driving trust for both male and female CEOs Key difference for female CEOs is their superior understanding of employees roles (a score of 59 compared to 52, a seven point differential) Male CEOs Female CEOs The results for 2010 (more so that in 2009) showed a distinct difference in the ratings of male and female CEOs (There is no significant difference between the Trust Index for male and female Line Managers). Furthermore, this difference is even more pronounced for male respondents than female respondents. Although female CEOs do better than males on all six dimensions, they score particularly highly on their understanding of their employees roles, an area which has a low weighting. This may be a useful opportunity to ask if female CEOs bring something to their role that is gender based (eg better empathy and interest in others), and whether or not that contributes to their career success. (NB: These differences are not evident in female Line Managers, so could be a factor in determining how the small number of female CEOs rise to the top.) Male CEOs 63 Female CEOs 66 from women and 68 from men

9 Surviving the recession As the scale of the impact that the recession had on jobs increased, so CEO trust levels declined No change Tight control on spending Recruitment freeze Flexible working or reduced hours Departmental/team restructure Voluntary redundancies Involuntary redundancies Closure of offices/factories/sites Bars all appear automatically after second click. After last bar, a third click will reveal the overall index and the bottom three bars flash on and off. The broken red line shows the overall Trust Index. The three lower bars (with scores below the overall Trust Index) show what happens to trust when jobs get lost, whilst the higher bars (above 63) show how trust has increased in CEOs who were able to avoid losing people, often by strategies like cutting hours or wages, in order to hold onto people. There is nothing like the same impact on Line Manager Trust. This reflects the fact that CEOs are seen to have the power to make decisions about responses to the recession, whereas Line Managers simply implement those decisions.

10 Warning signs for public sector CEOs Line managers in the public sector score two points higher than private sector counterparts 70 compared to 68 For 2 years running public sector CEOs have had a small trust deficit compared to the private sector 62 compared to 64 Significant job cuts have caused many private sector CEOs to lose trust the public sector can learn from this Creative approaches to employment can save jobs and build trust Line managers last year 69 (public) to 68 (private) Size of many public sector organisations is a significant contributory factor (last year 57 (public) to 61 (private)) But those who were innovative in their responses improved trust Techniques like wage cuts, flexible working, job share, part time and fractional appointments

11 Sectoral patterns have changed slightly HIGHEST LOWEST Line Managers 1. Education (72) 2. Charity (71) 2. Media, PR & Marketing (71) CEOs 1. Charity (67) 2. Military/defence (66) 2. Professional services (66) Line Managers CEOs 12. Leisure (66) 12. Health (60) 12. Utilities, post 12. Utilities, post & telecoms (66) & telecoms (60) 14. Wholesale, 14. Local/Nat dist., travel & Gov t (57) trans. (64) Charities are one of the highest trust sectors for both line managers and CEOs, for the second year running Public sector organisations in Health and Local/National Government rank amongst lowest for CEO trust The table shows the top and bottom three sectors for Line Manager and CEO trust. The relatively small changes amongst the positions of sectors on Line Managers trust is in line with the unchanged overall Index. The more volatile CEO Index reflects the way that CEOs are held responsible for the impact of external forces on the organisation. BOTTOM Line Managers Leisure unchanged Utilities up one place Wholesale down one place CEOs Health down from 5 th place last year Utilities down from 7 th place last year Local/Nat Gov down from 6 th place last year TOP Line Managers Education up from 3 rd place Charity unchanged Media up from 10 th place CEOs Charity up from 4 th place Military up from 7 th place Prof Services up from 5 th place First bullet on 2 second time delay, second on click

12 How can you ensure that people trust you, as their Line Manager? In your groups, review the six dimensions that determine trust: 1. Ability 2. Understanding 3. Integrity 4. Fairness 5. Openness 6. Consistency What aspects of your behaviour do you think most influences team members in deciding if you are able, understand them, show integrity, are fair, open and consistent? Draw up a list of best practice behaviour to help create trust in you. The activity here is designed to get managers thinking about What can I do to be trusted?. Get them to work through the six dimensions and decide what they would have to do to make team members feel that they are able, understanding, etc. Go through their lists after about minutes and create a checklist of key behaviours. A follow up exercise could be to get them to ask their team to give them feedback on each of these, or to carry out a self assessment, from which they could prepare a personal development plan to help them improve their performance.

13 Trust: The firm belief in the reliability, truth or ability of someone or something