Response to Covey’s recent remarks to ChicagoLand Business Leaders:

“The Speed of Trust is not a topic, it is a movement — one that I encourage all Chicago businesses to engage in.”

–Jerry Roper, President & CEO, ChicagoLand Chamber of Commerce

Excerpts from the recent Covey/Oz interview on Oprah and Friends:

“I love talking about trust … The Speed of Trust helps folks understand how they can start to make a difference in their lives, and it is the only way we will change it in this country.

Lack of trust has permeated the health care system.  That is the reason we do not have efficiency in the way we deliver care… Trust is a source of stress in the life of Americans.  I am convinced, lack of trust is a friction that slows down the very machinery of life, now there is much more insight to why that is so. Trust to me is a fundamental attribute – if not the most important one.”

–Dr. Mehmet Oz

Dr. Mehmet Oz Show, Oprah and Friends radio

Bestselling Author of YOU: The Owner’s Manual

“Ask Dr. Oz” on The Oprah Winfrey Show 

Think about your own experience. Who do you trust?  A friend? A work associate? Your boss? Your spouse? A customer? Why do you trust this person? What is it that inspires your confidence in this particular relationship? Ask people what they say behind your back, about you, about your company. 

Test it with your own experience: what are your conversations like with people who trust you? You can say the wrong thing, and they still get your meaning. Conversely, what are conversations like with someone when trust is low? You can be precise and measured, and they still interpret it the wrong way.

Now consider an even more provocative question: Who trusts you? People at home? At work? Someone you’ve just met? Someone who has known you for a long time? What is it in you that inspires the trust of others? 

Think about it—people trust people who make things happen. They give the new curriculum to their most competent instructors. They give the promising projects or sales leads to those who have delivered in the past. From a line leader’s perspective, results round out what trust really is and helps give trust its harder, more pragmatic edge. 

Ethics is the foundational dimension of trust, but by itself is insufficient. You can’t have trust without ethics, but you can have ethics without trust. Trust, which encompasses ethics, is the bigger idea and is career critical to you in this new “Flat World” economy.