The Trusted Leader: Bringing Out the Best in Your People and Your Company »

Robert M. Galford is currently a Managing Partner of the Center for Executive Development in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and was formerly the executive vice president and chief people officer of Digitas, Inc., a leading Internet professional services firm with over 1,400 employees. He taught for many years on executive programs at the Columbia Graduate School of Business and the Kellogg Graduate School of Management at Northwestern University, in addition to consulting to professional services firms, technology companies, and financial institutions.

Rob has lived and worked in both Western Europe and North America as a vice president of The MAC Group and its successor firm, Gemini Consulting. He has practiced law with the international firm of Curtis, Mallet-Prevost, Colt & Mosle in New York and Washington, and has also worked in investment management for Citicorp.

Rob's writing and commentaries on management have been published in the Boston Globe and he is a three-time contributor to the Harvard Business Review. He currently sits on the boards of directors of Forrester Research, Inc., and Access Data Corporation. He also hosts the business video Talk About Change! with the popular cartoon character Dilbert.

His educational background includes Liceo Segre, Turin, Italy; a B.A. in economics and Italian literature from Haverford College; an M.B.A. from Harvard; and a J.D. from Georgetown University Law Center, where he was an associate editor of The Tax Lawyer. Rob lives with his family in Concord, Massachusetts. He may be reached at:

E-mail: rgalford@tiac.net

As today's headlines remind us, trust is the hot-button issue in business today, especially for investors, managers, workers, and consumers. More than ever before, the success of an organization depends on leadership that fosters strong connections across teams and among bosses, colleagues, and subordinates. Companies are in urgent need of trusted leaders, but how can managers meet that need? "Be trustworthy" is the short, logical answer, of course. But being trustworthy and building trust in an organization are not one and the same thing. The former is an inherent part of a person; the latter requires developed talent and considerable skill.

Based on highly specific research and experience that covers a wide spectrum of managers and organizations, The Trusted Leader identifies the three critical types of trust that leaders need to master: strategic trust, organizational trust, and personal trust. It introduces a practical and effective formula for building organizational confidence, and provides a unique analysis of the obstacles to trust and the sources of resistance to the building of trust inside organizations. Through a series of interactive exercises, executives will learn how to determine where trust is missing and how it can be supplemented in people, departments, and even whole companies. Perhaps most timely are the book's series of diagnostic tools and skills that help executives rebuild trust that has been broken or betrayed.

As business insiders and authors Robert Galford and Anne Seibold Drapeau show, trust inside a company provides focus, fuels passion, fosters innovation, and helps employers to hire and retain the best employees. Trust inside,the authors argue, also builds trust outside by gaining credibility with today's skeptical consumer.

Trust is all too frequently overlooked in other leadership books, and is even more important today as companies face uncertain customer demands and the pressures to compete successfully in a whiplash market. Crises, restructurings, mergers, downturns, and executive departures are often trust-destroyers. The Trusted Leader examines those defining moments, and helps leaders turn such situations into trust-building experiences, creating a culture and legacy of trust throughout the organization at large.

Rich in true stories, examples, and practical advice, The Trusted Leader guides leaders on how to climb the ladder of trust and how to secure their legacy as trusted leaders. For managers of all levels, The Trusted Leader is the only comprehensive guide for building trust inside an organization — the key to every company's long-term survival and success.

Publishers Weekly

With Wall Street teeming with questionable characters and their equally questionable practices, trust is a hot topic these days; Galford and Drapeau have perfect timing with their handbook for becoming an executive employees can actually put their faith in. A knitting-together of management theory, real-life anecdotes and snappy tools and self-assessment quizzes, the book tries gamely to be both authoritative and accessible. Its strongest section is a discussion of the "enemies of trusted leadership"-office archetypes ranging from power-hungry control freaks to underperforming slackers-who can undermine what a CEO is trying to achieve. The authors also share helpful tips on how leaders can handle brutal situations (e.g., mass layoffs) with the appropriate amount of class. Although at times weighed down with turgid writing and an overabundance of lists, the book succeeds in distilling what the authors readily admit is an "intangible:" the essence of great leadership. (Jan. 9) Copyright 2003 Cahners Business Information.