A topic my clients regularly discuss with me is, “what is trust?”

I usually reply by asking what trust means to them and, as you would probably expect, the variety of the answers is staggering. For instance:

• not doing the wrong thing
• fidelity
• not being made vulnerable

In my experience all the great and successful teams that I have worked with enjoy high levels of TRUST and this absolute trust allows them to fly, free from limiting behaviours.

A very wise friend, a highly qualified and experienced psychologist, shared this experience with me. She had been invited to work with some of America’s top scientists when the question of trust came up. My friend, as one of the facilitators of the group posed the question to this very distinguished group, “How would you describe trust in one word?”

This debate became long and untidy so they changed the rules from a one word definition to a few more and gradually they arrived at the following model:

TRUST comprises three elements:

Competence – the ability, skills and experience to deliver

Reliability – Doing what you say you are going to do, to a high standard, on time

Sincerity – acting with genuine feelings; free from guile, deceit or artifice.

The very good news is that if you have the potential, coaching and mentoring can improve competence and reliability.

The bad news is that you either are sincere or not, it cannot be coached, but may be developed through, calamity, epiphany or clinical processes.

Interestingly, Aristotle, long before these other wise men, formed a similar view. Trust is:

. competence, spirited personal integrity (aretê)

· Intelligent good sense, practical wisdom (phronêsis)

· Good will and respect for the troops (eúnoiâ)

Trust is something that has been debated and defined for millenia. Why is it so important?