Did you know you have a Trust and Respect account?  I didn’t until this last week when a discussion with HR and an employee brought it into my mind. We were discussing being a team instead of a working group and the difficulties of dealing with different people.  Our actions affect the accounts we hold with others.  Their actions affect our account for them.  The key to maintain workable levels in our accounts is to be open and honest in our communication.  Don’t hide our feelings for others.  If someone annoys us and we have to work with them on a regular basis, it’s not up to our managers to solve the problem. It’s up to us.  Besides when managers step in they often screw things up.  They don’t know the inner workings of the people having conflict. The people having the conflict project onto the manager and don’t have the interaction with the person they need to.  Even if managers help, the individuals with differences are accountable for their own transactions into their respective trust and respect accounts.

The key to maintaining and increasing the funds in our trust and respect accounts with others is to take the focus off of ourselves.  Listen to ourselves from the other’s point of view.  Imagine what we sound like in their minds.  When we don’t consider the effects of our actions and words on others, our account balances fall.  We become work associates or just acquaintances.  We keep our interactions to a minimum and only speak when spoken to. When we think about our words and their effects on others, our interactions begin to change. Our intention shifts.  We consider how others may respond to us instead of just telling them about ourselves and our own problems.  The next step is to find something about the difficult people in our lives that we find interesting.  By seeking what we like in others, we connect more readily.  By asking them questions and getting them to share, our account balances rise.  Before long the division in the relationship characterized by interchanges of “me,” “me,” “me” become “we,” “we,” we.”  The relationship builds trust and respect.

What’s the balance of your trust and respect account with others?