What first came to mind? Great leadership, cohesiveness, exceptional communication, or maybe mutual respect? Certainly, all of these components are necessary for a team to function optimally, but none of that is possible without TRUST.

Without a foundation of trust to build on, none of your team’s accomplishments will be as great as they could be with him. Exceptional teams start with this and build outward.

It all starts at the top of the organization, so team members must first trust their leader. Any organization that doesn’t trust its leader will underperform (and often fail outright), regardless of the amount of skill and experience of the team itself.

So, you may be wondering, how does a leader earn the trust of his team members? There is more than one way to gain the trust of those around you. However, there are many factors that tend to be present in most situations where the leader has a high level of trust.

At the top of that list would be authenticity. You have to know who you are and what you stand for, or people will see right through you. Also, you can’t preach one thing, do another, and expect people to be fooled for too long. This is called ‘walking the talk’ and there is no quicker way to engender respect than to live your life this way. I’ve seen cases where coaches or leaders blinked just once, leading to their downfall as well as their team’s. As soon as he blinks, he opens the door so everyone else on his team starts cutting corners too.

Also high on the list would be what I call heart or compassion. As the great coach John Wooden liked to say, “No one cares how much you know until they know how much you care.” People will go to the end of the world for you and others when they feel valued and cared for.

Being consistent and fair is another key component to earning the trust of others. People mistakenly think this means that I believe leaders should treat all team members the same way. What this means to me is that you treat everyone the way they deserve to be treated. Ideally, everything would be won and everyone would be held accountable for their actions. A subset of this would be the need to be honest with everyone and not dance around things. People may not always like it when you tell them the truth, but they’ll earn your respect when you do, and quickly lose it when you don’t. An added benefit of telling it like it is is that it prevents more pain in the future.

Once the leader has established that he or she is trustworthy, the next step is to get team members to trust each other. I’m going to touch on two key components here. The first is a shared vision for the team. It is imperative that everyone on the team strive towards the same goal through an agreed process. Once team members know what their responsibilities are and how their task affects other team members who trust them, bonds will begin to forge.

The second component is what I think separates the good from the truly exceptional, getting to know your teammates on a deeper human level. I can’t stress this enough! When you bond with people, you naturally see the good in them with a magnifying glass and the bad in them with reverse binoculars (which has the effect of making things look tiny). This causes team members to give each other the benefit of the doubt when things go wrong, the net effect of which is to reduce or eliminate animosity between teammates. This results in more energy and focus for the team to pursue their shared goals.

Once you develop a foundation of trust, you will be able to be a better leader, develop cohesiveness, and have exceptional communication and mutual respect. It will also make all the other things you want to do easier to accomplish.

Remember: ‘It takes time to build trust, just a few seconds to break it, and an eternity to mend it.’