Three Principles of Trust for Resilient Leadership

Entrepreneurship teaches us early that if you want results, you take responsibility. At first, that means carrying everything yourself. As the business grows, though, we inevitably hit a limit and must hand key responsibilities to others.

Delegation, however, comes with a risk: sooner or later, someone will fall short. How do we balance the need to rely on others with the knowledge that some will fail us?

From hard-won experience, I’ve distilled three principles of trust. They don’t eliminate risk, but they do help build trust wisely and recover quickly when it breaks:

1. Trust people to be who they are

2. Everyone has a breaking point

3. Respect what they want, even if you disagree

1. Trust People to Be Who They Are

Many years ago, I sat in a meeting with my then-cofounder to terminate an employee. The call wasn’t a surprise—it followed months of missed KPIs and a failed Performance Improvement Plan. When hiring him, we had focused on past results and ignored culture. We didn’t catch that he lacked an entrepreneurial mindset. When something went wrong, it was always someone else’s fault or a matter of budget—habits that might slide in a large corporation but were deadly in a lean startup.

From that experience I learned the first principle of trust: trust people to be who they are. To do that, you first have to take the time to understand who they are.

2. Everyone Has a Breaking Point

Because this termination was not a surprise, I was blindsided when my cofounder suddenly reversed course, lobbying me in front of the employee to give him another chance. What followed was an all-out, public argument—mom and dad fighting in front of the kids. After agreeing in private, he was now leveraging social pressure to get me to cave, which I would not do. Our partnership collapsed soon after.

I was shocked by this sudden change in his behavior. Reflecting on this revealed more than a clash of opinions, it showed how stress can change people, which led to the second principle of trust: Everyone Has a Breaking Point.

Most people are collaborative until pressure exposes the limits of their character. Under enough—and the right kind of—strain, anyone can shift from honest and caring to defensive and deceitful.

Know your own breaking points. Study those of others. Before placing weight on someone’s shoulders, consider whether it’s a load they can carry, or if it may be too much.

Despite seeing my cofounder’s mistake of wanting a teammate to become something he wasn’t, a few years later I repeated a version of it myself.

3. Respect What They Want, Even If You Disagree

I was setting up a real estate deal and invited in a partner who was also a dear friend. He had never done a project like this before, but seeing his potential I created a sweat-equity position to give him a seat at the table. I knew he had the raw talent and that the deal was solid.

In my excitement to make this happen, I made a mistake. When my friend told me he wasn’t sure what he wanted, instead of listening, I pushed him toward what I thought he should want.

The first six months were great. Then cracks widened until the venture was on the brink of collapse. I called a trusted mentor and laid out the situation, asking what else I could try. His reply was blunt:

“Nothing. Act now or you’ll lose everything you invested and be on the hook for the loan.”

I stepped in and pushed my friend out. To his credit he didn’t fight me. He did blame me. The investment was saved, but our friendship was not.

For a long time I blamed myself for his behavior (because if you want results, you take responsibility) until it finally sank in: people aren’t results. You can’t take responsibility for another person’s choices.

My friend’s mistake was failing to decide what he wanted most, so he lost everything. My mistake was wanting things for him, instead of respecting that we all navigate life at different paces and in different ways. Just because someone isn’t where you want them to be doesn’t mean they aren’t exactly where they need to be.

When Trust Is Broken

Even with these principles failures still happen, because circumstances change as do people.

When they do, I’ve learned it’s pointless to blame or try to “fix” the other person. My dismay is mine alone. It’s more useful to take a breath, apologize (if only in my own head) for making my idea of success conditional upon their behavior. Then cut them lose from the responsibilities they’ve proven unsuited to, fill the gap in the team, wish them well, and keep moving.

Final Thoughts

Trust is not about control—it’s about acceptance. We cannot force people to be what they are not, nor can we take ownership of their choices.

What we can do is commit to seeing them clearly, giving them only the weight they can bear, and letting go when they choose a different path. In doing so, we build organizations where trust is resilient.