Trusting Relationships Needed First

Kaser and Halbert (2009) state "when adult relationships in schools are characterized by trust, the stories about change shift from indifference or negativity to possibility and hope." A trusting relationship is essential to making any change. This relationship seems easy for successful leaders to make and sustain, while other leaders have difficultly building trust, and then there are the leaders that build relationships and lose trust through lack of integrity. In Kaser and Halbert (2009), Solomon and Flores (2001) are quoted, " Trust is cultivated through speech, conversation, commitments, and action. Trust is never something 'already at hand, it is always a matter of human effort. It can and often must be conscientiously created, not simply taken for granted."(p.87). In my opinion, relationships need to be build prior to trust being given. Leaders need to get to know and show interest in their people personally, to have invested time and energy into finding out what they think, believe, what their interests are, and who their families are. Is this necessary for trust to develop? Are there other ways, that trust can be developed?