The promises list: trust is built from small kept promises.
People remember the one you forgot. The Engage item is “promises made to employees are kept”, and for your team, the promises that count are yours.
One list, written in the meeting, read every morning, with slips announced before they happen and a monthly question about what you have left undone.
Most broken promises are not broken on purpose. They are made in a meeting, agreed with a nod, and never written down. Three weeks later the person who asked has stopped asking, which is worse than if they had complained.
One list
- Keep one list of every commitment you make, with a date. Add to it in the meeting, not afterwards; afterwards you will have forgotten half.
- Look at it every morning. Close what you can.
- For anything that will slip, tell the person before it does: “I said Tuesday and it will be Thursday. Here is why.” A broken promise explained keeps trust; one ignored loses it.
- Friday afternoon, read it through. What is still open is Monday’s first job.
Once a month, ask what you have left undone
At the end of one one-to-one a month: “Is there anything I said I would do that I have not?” Write the answer on the list in front of them. Do it that week. The question is itself the behaviour: it tells people their reminders are welcome.
When a promise cannot be kept
Say so, say why, say what instead. In person. The promise you cannot keep is the one that tests whether your word means anything, and the test is passed by the explanation, not the outcome.
The clearest thirty minutes in your week.
Send us your last engagement survey and we’ll show you what it’s missing – no charge, no deck, no obligation. Or start with a pilot or a 30-minute conversation.