Becoming a Trusted Advisor
Becoming a Trusted Advisor
By David Hildebrandt
I would suggest that there is no activity more complex and dynamic than working with human beings in trying to improve the systems, strategies, structures, and skills that interact to form what we commonly term an organization. No, this isn’t rocket science. It is far more complicated than that! (Graham, 2003, p. 565)A Trusted Advisor
The end-state of employee advocacy is often described as being a trusted advisor to the executive team he or she supports. Yet it becomes difficult to describe just how an employee advocate moves from being viewed with uncertainty, or even suspicion, to a position of trust. Being trusted does not make one an advisor, let alone one that is trusted. May (2004) stated that “while the consultant greatly underestimates the importance of trust by assuming it comes from simply providing excellent and reliable service, the [employee advocate] knows that mistrust to any degree will undermine his or her efforts, and that extraordinary personal action is required to build and maintain trustworthiness. (p. 18)” May (2004) goes on to define trust as “the belief that those upon whom we rely will realistically fulfill our positive expectations of them” (p. 18).
To be a trusted advisor, we must first be trustworthy—that while we seek to become trusted we must also extend our own trust to others while working, to extinguish any behavior that has the appearance evil (May, 2004; Urban, 2005). We must not allow a seed of mistrust to be planted, and if a seed of mistrust is found, we must immediately eradicate it…
To read the entire white paper download the following file: