The Trusted Leader

Rating:
Summary: Managerial Trust: Difficult to Gain, but Easy to Lose
Review: Authors Galford and Drapeau are two individuals with extensive experience in management. These two people have been involved in top corporate management for many years, working with Pepsi Co., FTD Florist, and others. They wrote this book to stress the importance of trust between all levels of management and the immediate employees.

Just how important is trust in a corporation? Well, the authors think it ranks at the very top of the list because it is through trust that all other corporate activites (in the business sense) are based. The first part of this book gives an overview of trust, followed by a section that identifies the tools of trust. Proper conduct of a trusted leader is discussed next, followed by a troubleshooting guide of sorts, that explains what to do when key individuals leave; how to handle crises involving trust; and how to repair the damage when trust is lost. There's even a self- assessment questionnaire that you can take to estimate the level of trust in your company.

I like the way the authors of this book progress from defining the issue, to demonstrating how trusted leaders behave, to identifying problems and, finally, to offering solutions. They cover most of the important areas except for one: they don't really address the fact that most managers do, indeed, tell lies. In some cases the lies told are critical to the success of the company (like in the case of not talking about a new product currently in development). In other cases, the lies told are required as part of the job (for example, pretending that the director's plan of action is great when the manager knows in his heart that it's not). These situations can affect trust in adverse ways, but the authors do not touch on these issues.

Management books are often a little bit slow to read and sometimes can be rather repetitive in nature. This book is no exception. I found certain parts rather dull, and I had to make myself determined to finish. I kept nodding off as I tried to read. After so long, I got really tired of reading the word "trust". I know that trust is the main subject of the book, but it still got repetitive after a while.

Trust in the corporate arena is very important for the success of a business. When I think back to the past few years and all the examples of corporate mismanagement, especially with Enron, it's easy to see why the authors of this book really drive home the point that trust DOES matter! Without it, a company is doomed to fail.

Rating:
Summary: Didn't work for me
Review: I spent a couple hours with this book and can honestly say that I discovered very little new or insightful information. I have modest expectations of books like these, figuring that if I can capture one new useful piece of wisdom, my time and money would be well spent. Unfortunately, I did not find anything useful here.

In addition, I found the style of the book made it hard to move through the book quickly while easily capturing the few big ideas. Do authors who write books like these really think that senior executives have the time to read 250 pages of dense text ? Get to the point, and get out. But, then I guess no one would pay ...for a 25-page book !

Rating:
Summary: weLEAD Book Review by the Editor of leadingtoday.org
Review: The Trusted Leader is a book that has long been needed. Trust is a subject that has woefully been lacking in many past books on leadership and in some respected educational institutions that should have been teaching it. The result of this neglect is evident in the daily news, which has been reporting on the indictment or conviction of numerous business executives for corruption. Our jaded generation is skeptical of most positions of leadership for good reason. For too many, the importance of trust has been clouded by personal greed. Galford and Drapeau boldly discuss this subject with clarity, common sense and research. The authors wrote this book primarily for those in senior leadership roles, but its content is certainly applicable to most anyone.

This book is composed of fourteen chapters within five parts or themes. The parts are logically presented and include...

Part One: An Overview Of Trusted Leadership

Part Two: Identifying And Applying The Tools Of Trusted Leaders

Part Three: How Trusted Leaders Work

Part Four: Defining Moments

Part Five: Building Trust In Perspective

The Trusted Leader is a comprehensive discussion of trust beginning with the definition of trusted leadership and concluding with the importance of leaving a legacy of trust when you depart the organization. As the authors state, "we feel strongly that creating a community of trusted leaders who can then help trust permeate through all levels of an organization-particularly in today's business context-is critical to every company's long-term survival and success."

Galford and Drapeau have written this book using their own research, personal observations and case examples. They offer a series of interactive exercises to determine where trust can be supplemented and improved. In addition, they also offer some diagnostic tools to help the executive rebuild trust. A remarkable "Self-Assessment" tool presented in chapter 2 is one that you will want to revisit often! ...

As a credit to its authors, this book was envisioned and started before the Enron, Global Crossing, Adelphia Cable, Tyco and WorldCom scandals broke. It is timely and its message is long overdue. If you want to study a vital yet unfrequented area of leadership, The Trusted Leader is definitely a book you will want in your personal library.

Rating:
Summary: Right on Target
Review: This book makes a lot of sense, especially with all the corporate scandals going on these days. Not thinking about trust in your organization is like not thinking about the foundation of your house, things fall apart without it. Pick up any business magazine and you can see that without trust, success is elusive.

The authors take what might be a difficult topic to write about, and make it totally engaging and accessible. The real-life stories and examples give just the right frame of reference for the concepts of the book, not to mention being entertaining.

You get the feeling that the authors have been flies on the wall at your own company because they know exactly what's going on there. How many times have I heard promises like "the customers will love this" or "this time we've got it fixed" - just some of the promises they recommend avoiding if you can't keep them. And they seem to know the people you love to hate, like "Explosive Dan," who's the worst kind of poison. It makes you trust the authors (speaking of trust) because you know that they have experienced what you're going through; they're not just doling out theoretical advice you'd never use like a lot of other business books.

This is a must-read not only for anyone who leads, but also those who are led.

Rating:
Summary: Fantastic practical advice
Review: This highly readable book is filled with examples that are grounded in reality. It reads like a conversation (excellent!), provides optimistic insight into complex problems (how refreshing), and offers practical advice that can be implemented quickly (hurray!). This book gets at the heart of the matter for businesses: we are people FIRST.

Rating:
Summary: This one is good...
Review: This is one of the few business books that I actually wanted to read, not just scan. I wish this book had been around five years ago. Not only can I see myself in a lot of the examples, I can see many of my colleagues, too. It really hits home, in a good way. I took the self-assessment test at thetrustedleader.com, it's basically like what's in the book but it adds up the score for you. It would be interesting to compare scores before and after reading the book. I'm suggesting it to my colleagues for our internal programs and would recommend it to anyone.

Rating:
Summary: A Timely, Landmark Book for All Leaders
Review: Would you like to work with and for people you trust? Would you like to have their trust in return? What level of trust do you have now in your colleagues and leaders? How does that make you feel? How would you like to feel at work, instead?

If you feel strongly about improving any of those dimensions of your work life, this is the best book I have seen on the subject for what leaders can do.

Trust is actually a little simpler than this book makes it seem. Most of us trust those who look out for our interests as well as their own, care about us, explain why they are doing whatever they are doing, and listen to our concerns. That point gets a little lost in the underbrush of analyzing trust, and how it is built, lost and reacquired from various organizational perspectives.

The book's strength comes in three areas. First, there's self-assessment in the beginning that I found very revealing about how well trust is being generated at work now. Second, the authors tackle many painful, difficult situations at work and discuss how they can be addressed in more constructive, trust-building ways (such as layoffs, surviving mergers, sudden departures of key people, teams that are failing, and emotionally out-of-control colleagues and bosses). Third, there are an impressive number of case histories that most readers will recognize as being similar to something that has happened in their own work places (like cheating to get bonuses, egomaniacs running amok, insensitive comments in public, resentment after promotions), and excellent discussions of principled ways to handle them.

The only way that this book could have been improved in what it addresses would have been by having quantitative expressions of how the participants in some of these situations reacted to what happened.

Any leader will benefit by reading these lessons and becoming more sensitive to the implications of their words, actions and inaction. I also suggest that leaders review relevant sections in the book whenever they see a touchy situation building, as well as just after having made a hash of some organizational situation for ideas to help remedy their mistakes.

If you are looking for how trust relates back out to nonorganizational stakeholders (such as customers, end users, suppliers, partners, lenders, stakeholders and the communities that the organization affects) those dimensions are mostly ignored except as isolated dimensions of some case histories (if the team is ineffective, the client usually notices and complains or gets a new supplier).

After you finish reviewing all of the interesting ideas for doing better here, think about what you can do tomorrow morning to start building more trust by trusting others more.

Donald Mitchell
Co-author of The 2,000 Percent Solution, The Irresistible Growth Enterprise and The Ultimate Competitive Advantage