Repairing Trust in a Small Consulting Firm

Through surveys and interviews, we identified the six habits that were most eroding collaboration in the firm:

• Talk or vent about someone behind their back

• “Swoop and poop” - come in at a late stage of a project and criticize out of context

• Reject ideas quickly, before asking questions to learn more

• Hesitate to share something, for fear of hurting feelings

• Go silent or stop communicating with someone when they've made a mistake

• Interrupt someone in order to share your own thought/opinion

After building buy-in with key stakeholders, the Ei team created a custom 1/2-day workshop for the full company. We created safe enough conditions that the team could acknowledge and reflect on the impact of these habits. Then, we helped them develop and agree to a plan to recognize and interrupt these habits going forward. Each individual ended the day by making a commitment to a specific shift in their own behavior.

This kind of culture change is impossible to enact in a single day. Knowing this, the head of HR at this firm created intentional trios for follow-up and accountability. These groups met to reflect on how things were going, and to collectively problem-solve around interpersonal issues as they arose. She also shared with us that the CEO followed-through on the commitment he left our session with: to proactively and frequently seek feedback on his communication.

“Doing this together was like three years’ worth of executive coaching in one afternoon.”

‎‎‎‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ ‎‎ - Company Founder