Trust is an essential element of all successful interpersonal relationships.
As a leader, it’s essential for you to build a collaborative, high-performing, innovative team—and that begins with you.
Your willingness to trust others will help people trust you in turn and feel more motivated to help, support, and trust one another.
What Are the 6 C’s of Leadership?
Sometimes called the six key elements of building trust, the 6 C’s are the essential skills and attributes that will help you enhance the confidence in your relationships: character, caring, competence, consistency, credibility, and communication. Again and again, it is seen that the most successful leaders and teams are employing these traits.
Thinking through your own strengths and opportunities for improvement in using the 6 C’s of Trust is the first step towards building trust and enhancing teamwork.
Learn how CMOE's teamwork programs can assist teams in overcoming common challenges and unlock formulas for success.
1. Character
Having character as a leader means you remain optimistic even when challenges arise. To motivate others, you must be clear about what motivates you, what inspires you, what your values are, and how you show your integrity. It means being clear and truthful with others about what you want and what you stand for.
2. Caring
Caring means showing your concern for and sensitivity towards others. The act of caring includes responding to the needs of others on the team by offering your help, showing interest, and taking the needs of the organization, team, and individuals to heart. As a leader, you must be supportive and willing to give credit to others where it’s due.
3. Competence
Competence is critical to making smart decisions and knowing how and where to get the information you need to accurately perform the functions for which you are accountable. When you are willing to share your expertise and continually develop your knowledge in the field, others will have more trust in your ability to guide them towards top-notch performance.
4. Consistency
Leadership consistency means establishing a history of reliable, dependable behavior. People want to know that you will follow through on your commitments and take personal responsibility for your choices, decisions, and actions. Sometimes this means standing by the decisions you make even when they are unpopular.
5. Credibility
Building your credibility with others means consistently fulfilling the expectations they have of you. To be perceived as credible, you must know how your actions affect others in the organization and seek out constructive feedback. Having the courage to admit your mistakes, stay calm, and respond to new information shows strong commitment to the success of the business.
6. Communication
Your verbal and nonverbal communication skills help people feel comfortable, listened to, and understood. Acknowledging ideas, discussing information, using open-ended questions, and keeping an open mind shows team members that you have respect for them.
Trust is easy to lose and hard to rebuild if it is damaged or lost, and it takes time to develop a high level of trust on a team. These six skills can help you build the trust needed to open up channels of communication with others and provide them with a sense of safety and inclusivity. When a team has trust, it can be more innovative, collaborative, and productive.
To increase or rebuild trust and improve the performance of your team, learn more here.
FAQs
The 6 C's of team-building – Communication, Collaboration, Cooperation, Coordination, Conflict Resolution, and Celebration – are the building blocks of a successful and cohesive team.
What are the 6 C's of effective teamwork? ›
The 6 C's of team-building – Communication, Collaboration, Cooperation, Coordination, Conflict Resolution, and Celebration – are the building blocks of a successful and cohesive team.
What are the 6Cs of leadership? ›
Leadership Tip - Becoming a person of influence that others will want to follow begins with working on you. Exceptional leaders are competent, committed to the cause, courageous, great communicators, charismatic, and possess a great deal of compassion for others.
What are the C's of teamwork? ›
In conclusion, the five C's of teamwork are critical components for building a successful and high-performing team. By focusing on communication, camaraderie, commitment, confidence, and coachability, you can create a team that is productive, engaged, and resilient.
How do you build trust in a leadership team? ›
Being approachable and friendly (people trust leaders they like) Championing authenticity, empathy, and humanity. Showing support for your team members, even when they make mistakes (and admitting to your own) Balancing the need for results with being considerate of others and their feelings.
Why are the 6 C's important? ›
The purpose of the 6Cs is to ensure people are looked after with care and compassion, by professionals who are competent, communicate well, have the courage to make changes that improve care and can deliver the best, and commit to delivering this all day, every day (NHS 6Cs England, 2012).
What do the 6 C's stand for? ›
Do you already know what the 6Cs are? What nouns beginning with C do you think might be essentially important in delivery of health and social care? So, the 6Cs are care, compassion, competence, communication, courage and commitment.
What are six 6 qualities or attributes of an effective leader? ›
The Characteristics of a Good Leader. A good leader should have integrity, self-awareness, courage, respect, compassion, and resilience. They should be learning agile and flex their influence while communicating the vision, showing gratitude, and collaborating effectively.
Which of the six key leadership traits is the most important? ›
Finally, and perhaps most important, effective leaders have integrity. Integrity characterizes leaders who possess the qualities of honesty and trust- worthiness.
What are the 7 C's of successful teamwork? ›
The seven C's of team effectiveness—Capability, Cooperation, Coordination, Communication, Cognition, Coaching, and Conditions—each represent a crucial aspect of what makes a team thrive and excel.
Common core team values in successful projects are trust, transparency, accountability, respect, innovation, and adaptability. Trust: Trust is a cornerstone of every successful project. It allows team members to depend on each other, share ideas openly, and work collaboratively toward the project's success.
How does teamwork build trust? ›
Teamwork sharpens listening skills and teaches employees to appreciate what others have to say, instead of automatically assuming that their own opinion must be correct. Attentively listening to your teammates' ideas is the start of a reciprocal, trusting relationship.
What is a way a leader may build trust? ›
Leaders can build trust by being visible in person as well as from a distance—by having regular contact and communication with team members, turning their camera on with virtual discussions and spending time intentionally in one-on-one meetings.
What are the 5 C's of effective teamwork? ›
And it is precisely on that path that he ended up finding the theory or the system of the 5 C's. This business philosophy states that, In order to improve the efficiency of teamwork, there must be commitment, trust, complementarity, coordination and communication..
3. Competence