By Amy Holloway
Throughout my career, I have asked myself why communities with similar attributes often have very different outcomes. On multiple occasions, I have had two clients who, on paper, almost look identical – located in the same area of the U.S., similar population demographics, infrastructure, higher education, industry diversity, for example – yet one significantly outperformed the other. Why?
Robust economic growth and transformation at the local level involves coordination of complex decisions and investments by numerous leaders. Places that thrive no longer focus on business attraction and job creation alone. Instead, they concentrate on strategic improvements that make their places holistically more competitive for businesses and talent. Doing so requires aligning numerous local partners across the government, private, nonprofit, and education sectors.
My primary objective as an economic development strategist for the past 30 years has been to help local leaders coordinate those improvements through planning. My work identifies unifying goals and tactics that ensure every player is working in step, even if they do not report to each other or even see each other on a regular basis. That involves listening to local leaders about their aspirations and challenges and then finding intersections among them and best practices that might serve as model solutions. Then presenting goals and the plan in a way where everyone can see their clear roles and reasons for working together.
Trust drives high-performing economies
So why do otherwise-similar communities have such different outcomes?
This question sparked the research I have conducted over the past two years and subsequent book, Trust Builders: The Key to Thriving Communities. Through interviews with thirty-one local leaders from cities across the country, I explored the role of trust in economic development and tactically how local leaders build, repair, and sustain trust.
Through those interviews and my own observations, I have concluded that – again and again – the most important driver of high-performing economies is trust among local leaders. Places with high levels of trust consistently achieve stronger economic growth than places where trust is weak or distrust is pervasive.
Trust-building in practice, people, and policies
Trust is a community’s most valuable competitive asset, yet it is rarely recognized as such. Or even when it is, it might feel too nebulous to address. The encouraging finding of my research is that, in practice, attaining higher degrees of trust among local leaders is entirely possible through intentional and relatively simple acts. For example, establishing a regular cadence of meetings, following through on commitments, showing up, and giving others credit. These might seem extremely basic, but they are the essence of trustful relationships and often the first misstep in eroding interpersonal trust among local leaders.
My research also revealed that local leaders who consistently foster trust with others share at least one of eight personality strengths: active listening, authenticity, competency, empathy, integrity, reliability, respecting differences, and transparency. These trust strengths influence the way various leaders approach trust-building. They may have never considered their skills through this lens, but I see a strong connection to trust in each strength. In fact, anyone who wants to more effectively help their community succeed can enhance their skills in one or more of these areas.
Finally, during my Trust Builder interviews, I heard numerous times that even when local leaders are taking proactive steps to strengthen relationships with each other, trust might be impacted by government rules and structures. Policies often dictate who is at the table, how readily information is shared, the steps for reaching a decision, and how quickly a community can move from idea to action. Acknowledging when a structure, versus other people, is creating barriers to collaboration is important to preserving trust.
My next three articles in this series will delve deeper into these three topics: trust building in practice, as leadership strengths, and in government policies.
What is intracommunity trust?
This premise requires a few definitions for context. First, I am focused on intracommunity trust – the relationship between separate organizations and individuals within a neighborhood, city, or region. My research does not examine trust within a single organization or trust within personal relationships – although I believe my findings have applications in those contexts as well.
Second, I believe that the best indicator of intracommunity trust is when local leaders consistently set aside their personal agendas for the good of the community. They take those actions without expectation of repayment. They recognize that their actions today may not be rewarded with an immediate benefit for them or their organizations, but the contribution to their community’s wellbeing will ultimately strengthen opportunities for them and many others. In his work, Dr. Robert Putnam, describes this as “generalized reciprocity.” it can become part of the culture of a community in which sharing information, collaborating, taking risks, and problem solving are normal, expected behavior.
Trust begins with individual leaders
Think about any almost any initiative to strengthen an economy – investments in workforce development, infrastructure, marketing, expanding local businesses, etc. – these initiatives require multiple parties to work together.
Based on my research and observations, a culture of intracommunity trust begins at the interpersonal level. Two local leaders who do not get along or consistently work against each other can do more damage than they might imagine. Take for instance one community I worked in around 15 years ago. Two important leaders simply didn’t get along, and their personal squabble rippled out into the community. Their organizations’ staff wouldn’t interact with each other, and business leaders didn’t think it was a safe place to invest. Mistrust grew as those investors and their allies took sides. Local county governments in the region started losing faith in the regional approach. So much time was wasted in distracting closed door meetings, that strategy fell by the wayside and opportunities were missed.
When new leadership stepped in, the interpersonal rift disappeared. Institutional and cultural trust was restored, so that today the region’s economy is growing at a much healthier clip.
Put this simply – building, repairing, and maintaining trust begins at the interpersonal level. In many cases – not all – the root cause of pervasive mistrust in a community comes down to two individuals.
Trust begets trust
Fortunately, a strong foundation of interpersonal trust can set off a flywheel effect: building trust from a few individual relationships into a full culture of trust. At the center of the wheel is a “culture of trust” – the expectation that all local leaders will act with generalized reciprocity, setting aside personal agendas for the good of the community. When new leaders emerge, they adopt the same mindset because that is the expectation of the culture.
When trust relationships exist at the intracommunity level, local leaders feel comfortable including more people in projects. It is assumed they will work with integrity and trust-building actions, so there is nothing to fear about inclusion.
Next, with the alignment of local partners, communities can coalesce resources. They aren’t mincing up money to pursue their own agendas. Rather, they combine efforts around their shared objectives.
With that, local leaders can take more decisive actions, shortening timelines. People are more willing to take risks together, so they spend less time trying to subvert another organization’s agenda. They resolve conflicts as they arise without halting progress. This results in projects coming to fruition and reinforcement that trust is paramount to success. When new opportunities arise, local leaders are confident and equipped to take even bolder action together.
This is what trustful cultures look like in action, and how trust becomes a competitive advantage in economic and community development. Places with a culture of trust can simply act faster, focus resources, and rapidly address challenges as they arise. Their wins establish a higher baseline for future efforts.
Self-reflection
As you reflect on this topic, ask yourself the following questions:
- Do you consider your community to have a trustful culture? Why or why not?
- How has trust among local leaders helped or hindered economic development?
- What about your personality enables you to foster trust with others?
- How do you and other leaders intentionally build trust with each other? Could you be doing more?
Conclusion
This is the first of four articles featuring my research around trust in economic development. The accompanying articles examine the traits of leaders who build trust, tactics local leaders employ to build trust, and how government policies can enable trust. I hope that this series provides you with clear actions to strengthen trust and, most of all, inspiration to translate trust into greater prosperity where you live.
