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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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Establish corporate practice and structures which balance decison-making power by involving employees including the selection and hiring of managers and making them accountable to their direct reports
Hack by John Nyawo on October 4, 2011
CoP's are "a group of people organized for a specific purpose around a shared set of values; who collectively care deeply about the purpose, adhere to the shared values and are selfless in their pursu
Co-Authored By Alex Perwich
Implement a “transparent” corporate e-mail system, with anyone within the organization able to search the content of any published e-mail.
Hack by Gary Hamel on April 6, 2011
Culture change is hard.  Whatever the approach, its a long term proposition riddled with ambiguity.  If your tasked with leading a culture change initiative and are struggling with
Hack by David Graham IV on June 29, 2017
Taking responsibilities makes everyone feel important.
Hack by Alexis Nicolas on October 25, 2010
AAU4M stands for Agony Aunts & Uncles for Managers.
Hack by Madhusudan Rao on August 2, 2010
If we are to focus the work of management on a higher purpose, I contend that we need to begin by adjusting our reward systems.  To obtain the highest leverage on this lofty goal, companies shoul
Hack by Stuart Thompson on September 18, 2010
In my ten years at Red Hat (the open source software pioneer), we had a very simple little cultural trick we used everywhere we could:We defaulted to open.What does this mean?
Hack by Chris Grams on August 5, 2010
Decision-makers. Executive teams. Champions. These groups are vital to making change work. However, if you don’t include the larger group, you miss out.
Hack by Tricia Emerson on January 20, 2011

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