Episode Summary
Rachel Botsman from Susan Cain’s Quiet and discussing the importance of uncertainty in building trust.
Have you ever done a trust fall? The strong hands of your team catch you and support you, and in that moment, years of resentment, dissatisfaction with the underlying power structures, and petty politics are washed away; we are all together, united! At the heart of this version of trust-building, there is certainty. I know what’s going to happen. I can trust the future.
I’ve just finished reading Margaret Heffernan’s wonderful book, Uncharted, and there, she makes the compelling case for the opposite. Navigating the future requires comfort in uncertainty, ambiguity and big dreams, she posits. So what’s the role of confidence in this? Is vulnerability an anathema to confidence, or actually paradoxically foundational to it?
Rachel Botsman joins me today for an insightful conversation about her experience with the exploration of trust. She has many titles: an author who writes about trust, a lecturer at Oxford University, and a well-regarded keynote speaker.
Rachel reads two pages from ‘Quiet’ by Susan Cain. [reading begins at 8:50]
Hear us discuss:
- “One of my biggest pet peeves is when we conflate confidence with capability and competence.” [15:28]
- The connection between humility and trust: “To have humility, you have to be able to sit with uncertainty.” [15:42]
- Gaining status when you lack privilege. [16:50]
- Having the courage to admit uncertainty: “When you say what you can’t do as much as what you can do, that is rocket fuel for trust.” [21:24]
- Implementing trust in organisations. [25:14]
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Resources:
Rachel Botsman | Website | TED | Linkedin
Rachel’s books: Who Can You Trust?: How Technology Brought Us Together and Why It Might Drive Us Apart | What’s Mine Is Yours: The Rise of Collaborative Consumption
Susan Cain | Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can’t Stop Talking
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