Reliability and Trust

Today’s entry covers both today and tomorrow, given my family’s schedule. I have taken some time to further think about reliability and have written more about it today; I had shared a LinkedIn post from Shari Levitin on Friday that I found interesting (and also a great reminder), and the post triggered me to ruminate on reliability this weekend.

So often in life, people try to do flashy things to get someone’s attention in a relationship, or perhaps a business tries to come up with something new and innovative to improve customer relationships (and business). Innovation is always critical and important in the business world, but I think that the key — in fact, the foundation — to any great relationship, business or personal, is reliability. When you buy that product, you want it to work. When you interact with a friend, you want to trust that they will come through by listening or showing other forms of support. When you provide money for a particular outcome, you expect the agreement to be honored.

When people or organizations do not come through for the aforementioned examples (or similar scenarios one can think of or extrapolate), the relationship becomes damaged. All the flashiest stuff in the world cannot make up for the fact that you cannot trust them, and that it will take time to rebuild your trust — to buy one of their products again, engage in a transaction once more, or trust your heart with that friend.

Reliability is something I’m going to continue to be mindful of, and I think it’s something organizations (and people in general) should continue to consider, as well.

Have a great week!