The dream of every CEO is a workforce that is deeply committed to a company’s purpose and mission.  Mark Wetterau, the Chairman and CEO of Golden State Foods (GSF), has made unusual progress on this journey.  He believes a key reason is how the GSF Foundation was uniquely positioned to tap into the hearts and minds of thousands of employees.  The story is unique and provides great learning for any CEO. 

As background, Golden State Foods employs approximately 6,000 people and was established nearly 70 years ago. The company provides food products, including protein, liquids, dairy, produce and distribution services to quick service restaurants and retail companies such as Starbucks, McDonald’s, 7-Eleven and Costco. GSF was founded on a strong set of values. These are not just ideals. They are real-world valuespracticed on a daily basis.

Leadership is a relationship between the leader and those who choose to follow.  Trust is the foundation of that relationship.  If you break trust, you damage your future as a leader.  Trust is complex, but it can be broken down into four habits that, if practiced regularly, will raise your “trust meter” significantly whether you are the leader or the one who chooses to follow.   

In a 2015 podcast interview, Rob Reindl and I talked in detail about the four key habits for building trust across an organization. Rob is the former head of HR for Edwards LifeSciences.  Edwards is the global leader in the science of heart valves and hermodynamic monitoring. The company is known in the health care space for its outstanding culture of trust.

Corporate Purpose + Individual Choice = Collective Passion

Here’s a quick peek at something tangible that really works:  The formula above is the focus for a paper I recently co-authored with the team from Co.tribute, a platform empowering businesses, employees, and clients to connect their work to the social causes they care about most.  The paper will be published soon on their website, but in the meantime, here is an early look.