Trust Audit Workbook

Purpose and quick start

This workbook helps teams and leaders gather structured evidence about trust across four actionable dimensions—reliability, transparency, competence, and care—and turn findings into prioritized, measurable actions. Use this as a short audit (one team workshop + lightweight survey) or a deeper diagnostic (interviews, observations, document review, and metrics).

How to run this audit

1. Define scope: choose the team, time horizon, and key outcomes you care about (e.g., speed of decisions, error reporting, innovation).
2. Collect quick evidence (1–2 weeks): a short pulse survey, 6–8 interviews, a few observations, and a review of relevant metrics or documents (turnover, rework, incident reports, meeting notes).
3. Synthesize findings: map evidence to the four trust dimensions below and identify clear examples that illustrate each finding.
4. Discuss with the team using the conversation script to explore causes and surface ownership of fixes.
5. Create a prioritized action plan with owners, measures, and due dates. Re-check progress after 6–8 weeks.

Audit dimensions and evidence prompts

Use these prompts to collect observable, specific evidence rather than impressions.

• Reliability (does the team keep commitments?)
  • Prompt: Recent missed commitments? Example: project milestones, late deliverables, or unprepared meeting owners.
  • Evidence to collect: delivery records, project dashboards, examples of unmet expectations, frequency of last-minute changes.
• Transparency (is information shared openly and appropriately?)
  • Prompt: Are decisions and their rationales documented and accessible?
  • Evidence: meeting notes, decision logs, frequency of ad-hoc status updates, examples where hidden assumptions caused rework.
• Competence (do people have the skills and support to deliver?)
  • Prompt: Gaps between expectations and skills, or recurring quality issues despite effort.
  • Evidence: training records, error rates, examples of unclear role boundaries, time spent on fix vs. forward work.
• Care (do people feel psychologically safe, respected, and included?)
  • Prompt: Are people willing to surface concerns, admit mistakes, or offer dissenting views?
  • Evidence: anonymized pulse responses, examples of punished or ignored feedback, participation patterns in meetings.

Short pulse survey template (use as a 5–7 question instrument)

Respondents rate each statement 1 (strongly disagree) to 5 (strongly agree). Add an optional open comment for examples.

1. Reliability: "When our team commits to deadlines or actions, they are usually completed on time."
2. Transparency: "Decisions that affect our work are explained and documented in a way I can access."
3. Competence: "My team has the skills and resources needed to meet expectations."
4. Care (psychological safety): "I can raise concerns or admit mistakes without fear of blame or negative consequences."
5. Information flow: "I receive the information I need to do my job well, in time to act on it."
6. Cross-team trust (if relevant): "Other teams deliver on commitments that affect our work."
7. Open comment: "Give one recent example of where trust helped or got in the way of our work."

Evidence collection checklist

• Run the pulse survey (anonymized where possible) and capture results by dimension and verbatim examples.
• Conduct 6–8 structured interviews using the audit prompts; take notes on specific incidents and dates.
• Observe 2–3 meetings or handoffs for behaviors that support or undermine trust (e.g., cancellations, closed-door decisions).
• Review objective metrics tied to reliability and competence (on-time delivery, defect counts, rework hours, escalation frequency).

Conversation script to explore findings (use in a team workshop)

Use a neutral, curious tone. Read this script verbatim if helpful.

Opening: "We ran a short trust audit to understand where trust is helping us—and where it might be getting in the way of our work. I'll summarize what the evidence shows and then we'll discuss causes and actions. Please focus on examples and solutions rather than assigning blame."

Present findings: "Here are the strengths we saw (specific examples). Here are the gaps by dimension (specific examples)."

Explore causes: "What patterns or root causes could explain these examples? What systems, norms, or tools contribute to these patterns?"

Agree actions: "Who should own testing these fixes? What would success look like in 6–8 weeks?"

Close: "We'll commit to the action plan, check progress in X weeks, and iterate based on evidence."

Prioritized action plan template

Copy this into your team's tracker. Prioritize actions that are specific, small enough to test, and directly linked to evidence.

Next steps and follow-up

• Schedule a brief check-in 6–8 weeks after implementation to review measures and adjust actions.
• Share findings transparently (summary + actions) with the broader organization when appropriate to build credibility.
• Repeat the short pulse each quarter to track trends and test whether interventions improved trust-related outcomes.

Example adaptations

If you want to embed this audit in everyday workflows: convert the pulse survey into a short interactive form for regular collection, use the action plan as a living tracker, and surface progress in team huddles or dashboards.

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