Hey, it's Rachel Cook, your modern mentor.

I'm the founder of Lead Above Noise, where we help leaders activate stronger results and performance from their teams by changing how the work gets done.

So things like development, wellness, and engagement, they happen inside the work, not bolted on to the outside.

So now, today's episode. I got a call last week from my client, Sarah. She's one of my favorites. High energy, super creative. I'm always excited to pick up the call. She was kind of bummed, though. She told me, I was at this AI conference a few weeks ago, and I came back with a ton of really cool ideas I couldn't wait to share with my team. But when I got back to the office and pulled them together,

as I shared what I'd learned and what I'd love us to work on, I got a bunch of dead eyes staring

it back at me. To be honest, I was a little surprised because I know firsthand how infectious

Sarah's energy and enthusiasm can be. But okay, I was a little surprised because I know firsthand how infectious Sarah's energy and enthusiasm can be.

But, okay, I was listening.

And she continued, I'm trying to understand where the disconnect is.

Like I thought they'd all be on board, but I feel like they're moving like slugs on this.

And I need us to change course, but I don't know where to start.

So she asked me to run a team check in with them. It's something I do on the regular, just a quick hit conversation to unlock

what's really going on when a leader's feeling stuck. And here's what I learned. They said things like,

well, here we go again, or we're drowning in the flood of her new ideas, or yes, we're excited

about AI too, but we know that as soon as we start down this path, she'll be on to something else,

so it's just easier to stand still. While they weren't necessarily using the word explicitly,

what they were telling me is they don't trust her. Not because they think she's malicious or has

bad intentions, but her behavior, unbeknownst to her, is eroding their trust. And she needed to

acknowledge this and build it back up. But now we had the insight. And so suddenly she knew what

she needed to do to win them back. This is something I'm seeing more and more

commonly in the workplace. As the pace of work and change are ramped up, as uncertainty stays high,

as more people are working remotely or hybrid, our baseline for trust is just lower. And while so

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