Page 104 - Managing the Mobile Workforce

trust or Bust � 83

Mayer, Davis, and Schoorman summarized the characteristics of
trustworthiness they found in the literature and believe the most im-
portant are ability, benevolence, and integrity. We’ll examine each of

these in the paragraphs that follow.

Ability
To trust another person, you have to believe that that person can come
through with what he or she promises. A good part of that belief is
determined by your perception of that person’s skills, competencies,
and influence, which may be high in one area and low in another. One
employee may be great at making Web pages but have no skill what-
soever in writing press releases. You find him trustworthy to com-
plete the first task but not the second. Your employees may perceive
your ability to come through with promised merit bonuses to be high,
based on past performance; or low, if you were not able to produce
them last year as you’d guaranteed. The degree to how trustworthy
they find your assurances this year will vary accordingly.
Do your employees believe you have the ability to run a complex
mobile operation? Do they think you have the competence to train,
lead, and motivate workers all over the world? Would they stake their
careers on your capability to acquire the right hardware and software
and then to bring everybody throughout the organization up to speed,
including yourself? Do they believe you have the influence within the
organization to make good on your promises for compensation, pro-
motion, or the other support your organization needs for success? The
degree to how trustworthy they find your leadership abilities will vary
accordingly.

Benevolence
Benevolence is the degree to which your employees have faith that you
care about them for reasons beyond their usefulness in getting things
done. For workers, then, to think you are trustworthy they must not
only think you can come through for them but that you also, beyond
that, want to do good for them. From your viewpoint, you will find
employees trustworthy when they not only have the skills, knowledge,