Guest Post: Building Teams That Trust

Since the beginning of 2025, I’ve been flying coast to coast presenting at industry conferences on creating high-performing teams. At one recent event, I asked audience members to raise their hands it they felt there was a high level of trust among the members of their team. About half of those in attendance raised their hands.

My next question was, “How do you know?”

This led to some confused glances around the conference room as everyone appeared to look to their peers for guidance. This is not unusual in my experience, as most of the teams I have been honored to work with focus mainly on the quantitative aspects of their business – measuring growth, revenue, production, and so on, which is important.

But what I want to get teams curious about is the qualitative competencies that are often unintentionally overlooked or taken for granted. That includes trust, which can be the fuel that ignites your next level of success as a team.

To help you tap into that reservoir of fuel, here are three action steps to take to your team during your next meeting.

Step 1: Define trust together

A lot of work I engage in involves helping teams understand their current culture and what they want it to look like in the future. I will ask questions like, “What are your top five values?” Trust often shows up on the list as what I like to call a “usual suspect”.

I say usual suspect because most teams will say trust is a value that’s engrained in the DNA of their team, but when I ask them to define it, I get shoulder shrugs. (Let me tell you, I have seen enough shoulder shrugs in my 10 years as a coach to last a lifetime!)

Here are some questions you can ask to begin defining trust together:

• What does trust mean to our team?
• What behaviors do we need to exhibit with each other to have a high level of trust?
• How is a high level of trust displayed with our clients, prospects, and each other?

Step 2:  Clarify behaviors and align actions

Once the team has agreed on a clear definition of trust, you can begin to inquire about how to continually enhance it on the team. This cannot be a check-the-box exercise or one-and-done conversation. We all develop different relationships to trust based on our personal experiences. That’s why it’s critical to hold regular conversations on the action steps the team is taking to create an environment where everyone feels they are trusted and can trust each other.

Here are a few questions you can use to clarify behaviors and align actions that are important to developing trust as a team:

• What specific action steps can we take to develop our trust with each other?
• What behaviors can we recognize that support our definition of trust?
• How can we provide constructive feedback to each other when we feel our actions are out of alignment?

Step 3:  Measure and review your progress

I mentioned earlier that when most teams think about success measures, they tend to focus on the quantitative because it has been engrained in their mindset for years. But there is so much more to creating a truly high-performing team that tends to be ignored. Just because trust is qualitative doesn’t mean it shouldn’t be measured.

Measuring trust obviously isn’t as straightforward as measuring AUM or revenue. But you can gauge your team’s current state and progress around trust with a simple scale – for example, a scale of 1 to 5, with 1 being low trust and 5 being a high level of trust.

Again, this is where regular communication comes in. Holding consistent conversations will provide insight into where the team feels they are and how to get to the next level in terms of trust building.

Here are a few inquiries to support the team’s continued evolution:

• What behaviors do we feel are supporting our ability to establish trust on the team?
• If our team’s trust is at a level 3, what are the specific areas we can focus on that would elevate us to a 4 or 5?
• What can we do to support each other in growing and developing our trust?

Trust can be the variable that ignites a team’s full potential. Talking about trust can result in some touchy – and tender – conversations as team members express their true feelings, possibly for the first time. The successful teams that I continue to work with have all at some point opened these discussions.

One piece of advice: As a leader and team member, withhold your judgement and approach team members’ feedback with true curiosity so that you can begin to define, clarify, align, and measure your team’s journey in enhancing trust.

Should you need any assistance, feel free to reach out to the Practice Management Team here at Janus Henderson. We can work with you to implement a plan so that the next time someone asks if your team has a high level of trust, you can enthusiastically raise your hand knowing your team put in the work together.