Trust or Consequences

CHAPTER 3

The Damage Done: Post-Enron Possibilities

I am different from Washington; I have a higher, grander standard of principle. Washington could not lie. I can lie, but won’t.

—MARK TWAIN

At a time when everyone is so disillusioned by and cynical about business, is there anything a company can do to build trust that has a chance of working? Actually, organizations can do a number of things to mend fences and reestablish relationships. The problem, of course, is moving beyond a gloom and doom outlook and recognizing that people are remarkably forgiving.

Doom and gloom, though, does seem to dominate the headlines: another governmental investigation of a leading corporation, another organization laying off thousands of workers, another company ...