Cracking the Code of Trust: How a Simple Word Can Transform a Leadership Team Part 2

Not sure if your team is experiencing conflict? Here’s how to diagnose any issues.

I worked with a team that called on me to help a group of senior executives who were challenged when it came to ownership – but their leader insisted there was no issue with trust.

As I debriefed these executives to learn what could be done differently to empower them, I heard from them that they were concerned about putting themselves out there to take action, ask for help or admit mistakes.

They also felt like they couldn’t have healthy conflict in meetings.

All of this was rooted in one thing: TRUST.

While many managers say they want to have open and trusting relationships with their team, leaders’ behaviors and actions can sometimes contradict this.

For example, when a team member during our workshop found the courage to speak up about a conflict – right after I said we need to be comfortable having tough conversations – the leader became very upset and said, “Why couldn’t they say that to me one on one?”

The leader’s reaction contradicted the lesson I had just shared: creating a safe space for sharing in a group setting can prevent conflict.

The true measure of a person’s beliefs are what they do, not what they say. This team needed to define what trust means to them, and identify why they didn’t feel comfortable sharing mistakes and concerns.

When choosing the right approach for dealing with conflict, consider these questions:

• How much do I value this relationship or issue?
• What are the consequences if I do nothing?
• Do I have the time and energy to contribute?

To create ownership, your team must feel safe to make mistakes, ask questions, share concerns or push back.

How to do that? Let’s check out a simple yet effective solution –what Ted Lasso would call “KISS,” or Keep It Simple Silly.

In Part One of this two-part blog series, we used the TV series “Ted Lasso” to help illustrate some of the symptoms of conflict.

While Ted has “constant optimism,” viewers find out it is a mask for deeper personal conflict – that kept him from resolving some of his interpersonal conflict at work and at home.

Let’s look back to Ted Lasso and his wife, and the conflict they experienced in their marriage.

Ted and his wife were so resistant to sharing their true feelings that their therapist gave them this suggestion: Create a code word that when one person says it, the other “has to tell the God’s honest truth.”

For Ted and his wife, this was the word “Oklahoma.”

In Season 1, Episode 5, Ted explained to team owner Rebecca the meaning of “Oklahoma,” and almost immediately used the strategy with her.

“Oh come on now,” Ted said. “I bet deep down you kind of dig we’re getting so close, right?”

“I do,” Rebecca said.

“Oklahoma?” Ted prompted.

“I do not,” she admitted.

I recently used this strategy with the senior leadership team that experienced conflict in its ranks.

This is our KISS moment: I had my client create a code word that when one person says it, the other has to say the truth about how they feel and what’s on their mind.

That team came up with the word “pizza.” Whenever someone says “pizza,” everyone in the meeting is called on to share their true thoughts about the topic at hand, without judgment or fear.

Can you imagine the impact this could have on your team?