Built on Trust
By Arky Ciancutti, Thomas Steding
McGraw Hill, 2000 - 256 pages

Built on Trust needs to be read by CEOs and managers of all types. After finishing graduate school I worked for two different companies over a three year span and I found both organizations completely lacking basic managerial capabilities and functionality.  Being a young, ambitious guy I knew I was “wet behind the ears” but my managers were deplorable at best.  The result was my departure from both companies and a noticeable downward spiral in productivity at both companies while I worked there.

The key principles of the book are closure, commitment, respect, responsibility, communication and speedy resolution.  I won’t go into depth about the principles but most people don’t understand, including myself before I read this, how each contributes to an organizations overall success and “social capital.”

What the authors are trying to do is get companies to apply their “Trust Model” and the result is, in their minds and mine, that an organization will end up with a competitive advantage over their competitors.

I found the book to be quite similar, in many regards, to Abraham Maslow’s hierarchy of needs since one of the goals is to help employees in attaining “self actualization,” where their aspirations and sense of contribution occur.

The models goals, to list a few, include: (1) increasing group intelligence through communication (2) increasing creativity (3) making people feel passionate about work (4) creating synergies and (5) getting everyone focused on a common goal.

SENIOR MANAGERS OR ASPIRING MANAGERS!  BUY THIS BOOK!  This book, along with Peter Drucker’s The Essential Drucker, are where I would start to create a better managed, more efficient business. 

It is my belief that just about everyone has a passionate desire to contribute.  We have a hunger to be a part of something bigger than ourselves, especially when that something reflects and amplifies our inherent values.  That is what this book is about.  Creating the organization that everyone loves to work for and that the best talent flocks to.  If anyone wants some other good business books just e-mail me. 

As a physician, author, speaker, and facilitator, Arky has been teaching teamwork and change for the Learning Center since 1974. He has created customized courseware and train the trainer systems for IBM USA, IBM International, The Boeing Company, and many others. As director of Learning Center, Arky also teaches teamwork and change skills to organizations throughout the world.

Dr. Ciancutti has taught teamwork & leadership at the Stanford Sloan Program, Graduate School of Business, Stanford University. He is the first non-employee in IBM's history to teach the IBM Basic Beliefs (Respect for the Individual) to IBM management. In 1992, he developed and delivered the course on Change Management for IBM. In 1993, he supplied IBM USA and IBM International with a turnkey risk management system, one of three core courses in use for IBM's current turnaround. Also in 1993, he facilitated the Financial Improvement Process, through which employees themselves trimmed $25 million per year in overhead at the University of California San Francisco Medical Center. He developed turnkey systems and customized courseware at the Boeing Company and many others.

A graduate of Swarthmore College and Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine, he completed his specialty training in pediatrics at the University of California Medical Center in San Francisco. He practiced pediatrics and emergency medicine from 1970 to 1979. Dr. Ciancutti is also the founder of the Brewery Gulch Inn in Mendocino, California.