Annual planning without trust is just wishful thinking with spreadsheets. You can set all the right Rocks, nail your V/TO, and still fail if your team doesn’t trust each other. The secret? Build trust into your planning process, not around it.
Most companies treat annual planning as pure strategy—numbers, goals, tactics. They miss the foundation that makes everything else possible: a team that trusts each other enough to be honest, challenge ideas, and commit fully. EOS provides the framework, but trust provides the fuel.
Why Trust Matters More Than Strategy
Strategy assumes perfect execution. Trust enables it. When team members trust each other, they raise real issues instead of hiding problems. They debate ideas vigorously without taking it personally. They commit to decisions even when they disagree.
Without trust, your annual planning becomes theater. People nod along but don’t buy in. They protect their turf instead of collaborating. They blame others when things go wrong. No amount of Rock-setting can overcome a trust deficit.
EOS One can track your Rocks and Scorecards, but trust shows up in what happens between the meetings. It’s the difference between compliance and commitment, between going through the motions and driving real change.
Dedicating Time to Team Health
Here’s the radical idea: spend the first three hours of your annual planning on team health. Not strategy. Not goals. Just understanding each other as humans. This investment pays dividends throughout the year.
Start with a trust assessment. Have each team member rate the team’s trust level from 1-10. Share the scores openly. Low scores aren’t failure—they’re data. Now you know where to focus. Add “Team Trust Score” to your Scorecard and track it quarterly.
Use structured exercises to go deeper. Have each person share their hometown, number of siblings, childhood challenges, first job, and something unique about them. Simple questions, profound impact. Suddenly, the CFO isn’t just “the numbers person”—they’re someone who grew up on a farm and understands hard work.
The Five Dysfunctions Deep Dive
Before annual planning, have everyone read “The Five Dysfunctions of a Team.” It provides a common language for team health. During planning, assess where you stand on each dysfunction. Be brutally honest.
Absence of trust? Create a Rock around vulnerability-based trust building. Fear of conflict? Practice healthy debate during your planning session. Lack of commitment? Use EOS tools to create clarity. Avoidance of accountability? That’s what Scorecards and Level 10s solve. Inattention to results? Align Rocks to company outcomes.
Document your team health assessment in EOS One. Create specific Rocks to address weak areas. “Improve team trust score from 6 to 8” becomes as important as any revenue goal. What gets measured gets improved—including trust.
The One Thing Exercise
Here’s a powerful trust builder: go around the room and share one thing each person contributes to the team and one thing that sometimes gets in their way. Model vulnerability by going first. Be specific and kind.
“Sarah, you bring incredible analytical rigor to every decision. Sometimes your perfectionism can slow us down when we need to move fast.” This isn’t judgment—it’s awareness. When people know their impact, they can adjust.
Capture these insights as Headlines in EOS One. Reference them throughout the year. When Sarah’s perfectionism surfaces during a Rock review, you can address it with context and compassion, not frustration.
Creating Psychological Safety
Trust requires safety. People need to know they can speak truth without punishment. They can fail without being fired. They can disagree without being marginalized. Annual planning sets this tone for the year.
Establish ground rules: all ideas are valid, debate the idea not the person, confidentiality is sacred. When someone takes a risk by sharing a concern, thank them publicly. When healthy conflict arises, celebrate it as trust in action.
Use your IDS process to model safety. When solving issues, focus on root causes, not blame. When someone admits a mistake, appreciate the honesty. This behavior in planning sessions carries into weekly Level 10s.
Department-Level Trust Building
Don’t stop at the leadership team. Cascade trust-building through departments. Each department should do their own team health assessment during annual planning. Same exercises, same vulnerability, same growth.
Create a company-wide Rock: “All departments complete team health assessment and action plan.” This ensures trust-building isn’t just a leadership luxury. Every team deserves high trust. Every team performs better with it.
Track department trust scores on your company Scorecard. When a department’s score drops, make it an IDS issue. Low trust is a leading indicator of future problems. Address it before performance suffers.
Connecting Trust to Performance
Trust isn’t touchy-feely fluff—it drives hard results. High-trust teams execute Rocks faster. They hit Scorecard numbers more consistently. They solve issues more effectively. Trust is a performance multiplier.
Document this connection. Track Rock completion rates by department trust scores. You’ll see the correlation. Share this data to reinforce why trust matters. It’s not about being nice—it’s about winning together.
Create Rocks that explicitly connect trust and performance. “Increase sales team trust score to enable new CRM implementation” acknowledges that tool adoption requires trust. Technical solutions fail without human foundations.
The SWOT Through Trust Lens
Traditional SWOT analysis focuses on business factors. Add a trust dimension. What strengths come from high trust? Where does low trust create weaknesses? How could increased trust open opportunities? What trust-related threats exist?
Maybe your strength is a leadership team that debates fearlessly. Perhaps your weakness is silos between departments. An opportunity might be leveraging trust to retain talent. A threat could be upcoming changes that might shake trust.
This trust-aware SWOT goes into your V/TO planning. When setting your 1-Year Plan, consider how trust enables or constrains each goal. Build trust-building into your strategy, not alongside it.
Maintaining Momentum
Annual planning builds trust, but weekly practices sustain it. Start Level 10s with personal check-ins. Share Headlines about team members supporting each other. Celebrate when someone shows vulnerability.
Create quarterly trust check-ins. Is the trust score improving? What’s working? What needs attention? Don’t wait for next year’s annual planning to address trust issues. They compound quickly if ignored.
Use To-Dos to reinforce trust behaviors. “Have coffee with Mike to understand his perspective” or “Share my mistake in next Level 10” become tracked commitments. Small actions build big trust over time.
The Trust Multiplier Effect
High trust changes everything. Decisions happen faster because people don’t second-guess motives. Execution improves because people support each other. Innovation flourishes because people feel safe to experiment.
Your EOS implementation depends on trust. The Accountability Chart only works if people trust role definitions. Scorecards require trust in numbers. IDS needs trust to surface real issues. Trust isn’t separate from EOS—it’s the foundation.
Track your trust journey in EOS One. Document trust scores, trust-building Rocks, and trust victories. A year from now, you’ll see how trust investment paid compound returns in performance.
Starting Your Trust Journey
Next annual planning, fight the urge to jump straight into strategy. Invest those first three hours in team health. Do the exercises. Have the conversations. Build the foundation.
Create a “Trust Champion” role—someone who keeps team health visible throughout the year. Make trust as important as any other metric. Because it is.
High-performing teams aren’t just aligned on strategy—they’re connected as humans. They trust each other with their failures and fears, not just their forecasts. That’s the kind of team that turns annual plans into annual achievements.
Trust isn’t built in a day, but it can start in one. Make your next annual planning session the beginning of a higher-trust, higher-performing organization. Your Rocks will thank you.
