According to Bryk & Schneider, trust arises from the role obligations people agree to uphold within an institution; we watch our colleagues’ actions and infer, from those actions, the level of trust we will grant to them. (In almost all of the articles I’ve read about trust in educational institutions, these two ideas are common: trust builds when educators uphold obligations, and trust builds when educators demonstrate and reciprocate vulnerabilities.)
Bryk &
Schneider then describe elements of trust (respect, personal regard, role
competence, and personal integrity). They then also explain some of the
benefits of developing trust (achieving buy-in for change initiatives, reform
efforts likely to move broadly across the institution, and supporting a moral
imperative to work on institutional improvement).
As a side
note: many of the discussions I’ve read about developing trust, developing
respect, or developing collegiality focus their attention on administrators
developing trust with faculty, or faculty developing trust with students (and,
in the case of K-12 education, with parents). These trusting relationships tend
to extend across boundaries from one group to another group.
These
articles seem to focus less attention colleagues developing trust with each
other; with trusting relationships within a group (such as faculty trusting
other faculty). This is an area that needs more research, and it’s an area I
can see myself devoting more attention to.
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