A visual representation of trust-building in a team environment, featuring diverse employees engaged in collaboration, demonstrating vulnerability, and sharing ideas. The image highlights the importance of authenticity, shared intent, and accountability in enhancing performance and productivity.

Accelerating to the Speed of Trust

October 15, 20242 min read

Accelerating to the Speed of Trust

4 Fundamentals to Create High Performance Through Vulnerability

October 15, 2024; By: Lillian Korkontzelos
Edited By: Justin Teeuwen

 “Trusting people is too risky…you can’t teach trust…once lost, trust cannot be restored”.¹ Do these comments sound familiar? There are many preconceived notions that we’ve learned about trust throughout the years. But what is trust?

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Trust is the one thing that we all have in common. Its absence can be catastrophic, but its presence can lead to exceptional success. Knowing this, it is important to build trust into your team to create vulnerability and, as a result, drive performance. People tend to trust you when they believe you are being authentic, when they believe in your judgment and competence, and when they believe that you care about them.²

In order to start instilling trust with others, there are four cores to trust that you have to keep in mind:

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  1. Be Authentic. To be trusted requires you to be honest, be yourself, and not be afraid to act out your beliefs and values.

PRO TIP: Demonstrate integrity by telling the truth, or “talking straight”.

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  1. Share Intent. Trust grows when your motivations are clear, rooted in mutual gain, and it’s easy to see that you genuinely care for people other than yourself.

PRO TIP: Show your team that you genuinely care for and respect them through kind actions.

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  1. Show Capacity. Being able to instill confidence in your abilities to deliver a final outcome is paramount to building trust.

PRO TIP: Be accountable for your outcomes and give constructive feedback to others.

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  1. Present Results. Your track record speaks for itself! If you’re known to perform well and pull through on your commitments, it’ll be that much easier for others to trust you.

PRO TIP: Take responsibility when you make mistakes and strive to do the right thing.

At Meta Excellence, we hire and select clients based on our core values (authentic). We are committed to helping teams reach higher levels of performance (intent). Our cutting-edge work is proven to get you results – just ask any who attend our events and programs (capacity and results)!

Think about you and your team – how can you live by the four cores of trust today? Once you do, you’ll find that you won’t just get results, but your team and clients will be inspired to tackle anything, together!  

Curious about other steps you can take to cultivate, build, and maintain trust with your team? Set up a free consultation with a Meta Coach!


1 Covey, Stephen M. & Merrill, Rebecca R. The Speed of Trust: The One Thing That Changes Everything. Simon & Schuster, 2008.

2 Frei, X., and Morriss, Anne. Everything starts with trust. Harvard Business Review. August 31, 2021, https://hbr.org/2020/05/begin-with-trust.

3 Castrillon, Caroline. 5 Powerful strategies to build trust in the workplace. Forbes. December 18, 2023, https://www.forbes.com/sites/carolinecastrillon/2023/12/17/5-powerful-ways-to-build-trust-in-the-workplace/.

Lillian is currently enrolled in the Master of Music in Music Theory program at Michigan State University. She grew up in the Greater Toronto Area and obtained her Bachelor of Music in Jazz Vocal Performance from the University of Windsor in 2020. While in school, she taught piano and voice lessons and worked as an audio engineering assistant in local recording studios. Her research interests include recording arts and the intersection between pedagogy and industry, music cognition, the implications of timbre and texture on musical narrative, and the impact of language on the understanding of musical materials.

Lillian Korkontzelos

Lillian is currently enrolled in the Master of Music in Music Theory program at Michigan State University. She grew up in the Greater Toronto Area and obtained her Bachelor of Music in Jazz Vocal Performance from the University of Windsor in 2020. While in school, she taught piano and voice lessons and worked as an audio engineering assistant in local recording studios. Her research interests include recording arts and the intersection between pedagogy and industry, music cognition, the implications of timbre and texture on musical narrative, and the impact of language on the understanding of musical materials.

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