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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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This story features Hero Arts, a 38-year old design company that manufactures decorative stamp products for the global craft market.   A family business, Hero Arts is recognized by customers
Story by Aaron Leventhal on May 11, 2012
The story here does not begin with "once upon a time..." here,  goes more like: "Hey pals! Let´s do a company which works in a different way.
Story by Daniel Pérez Pérez on April 14, 2012
We celebrate failure. Everyone says that but we really mean it. We really celebrate failure - we cheer, shout, applaud and stamp our feet when people in our company make mistakes.
Story by Pete Burden on January 18, 2011
How do you make a big company’s culture more innovative and entrepreneurial? Start with a corridor and work your way out.
Story by Christos Tsolkas on February 11, 2016
Enterpreneur of the first generation- self made man. Long time succesful in operational path of his business.
Story by Grzegorz Sobiecki on February 21, 2014
Over-thinking is what I have done as a first line manager for my career. My main concerns were for our customer care, employee understanding, and department effectiveness.
Story by Jim McGriff, Jr. on January 23, 2016
This is the story of a group of students at Universidad EAN that belong to the humanistic management youth researchers group, that have been working for the last 5 months in a Colombian company in ord
Story by Konocenos Human on May 26, 2015
None of us is as smart as all of us - a safe, confidential and trusting peer group can be a powerful process for innovation, helping with opportunities, problems, challenges and issues of
Story by Mike Richardson on December 29, 2010
A well-known consulting firm in urban and rural planning was losing momentum as many of its consultants were approaching retirement. Based on a tailored customer survey, ValueMetrix provided the
Story by Anders Magnusson on October 6, 2010

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