In the digital world,

How much trust do your customers, employees, supply chain partners and other key stakeholders have in your company?

One of the major changes that came out of the Covid-19 pandemic was the increasing trust gap between individuals and institutions. Whether it was employees at Starbucks, Google, Twitter, and Amazon challenging the legitimacy of their companies’ business motives or an increasing lack of faith in critical institutions like the CDC and the Supreme Court the bonds of trust were frayed if not broken.

Fast forward to today and we see this trust gap extending not retracting with the emergence of AI, GenAI & Agentic AI.

With the rapid rate of adoption and shift from traditional search and discovery, AI has become the new frontier in customer engagement. But even as some consumers become accustomed to AI, frontiers can still be rough terrain. More than half (58%) of consumers say they’re only somewhat or not at all comfortable using AI tools to engage with brands. In addition, a recent PWC survey shows the pressure to implement AI often comes more from internal ambition than from customer demand. The result? A gap between what companies can automate and what some customers actually want.

• 75% of executives say the pressure to implement AI comes more from internal stakeholders rather than customers.
• 75% of consumers say it feels like brands don’t think about whether consumers even want the technology they are investing in
• 92% of executives say it would be helpful to have better mechanisms for getting customer feedback on the AI solutions

The PWC survey also documented that as AI use increases overall, many consumers prefer some interactions more than others.

• 49% say they’re likely to use AI to track an order or delivery status
• 29% say they would use it to make a payment
• 86% say human interaction is moderately or very important in their brand experience

The survey also found that consumers with higher AI usage are much more likely to say they’ve become more loyal to brands in the past few years. In addition, high AI users are generally more willing to share personal data for more personalized experiences, and they show loyalty in more ways.       Source: PwC’s 2025 Customer Experience Survey

Collaborating with your customers instead of marketing at them is a good place to start

Traditional marketing is primarily about stimulating product or service trial. In the digital world, trial is replaced by what a customer or prospect can learn on their own about your product or service and the trust they have in their friends’ experience with it.

To successfully compete and grow your business in this environment, you need to start with the outcome the customer wants to achieve and build a collaborative process to deliver that outcome. When the customer is a direct participant in the development of the product or service, they have a much higher level of trust in the ultimate solution.

Recent surveys have shown that the stakes are high.

• A US survey from Oracle notes that 43% of consumers will blacklist a brand as a result of a bad experience. A further 34% say they will never shop with a company again after just one poor experience.
• An SAP study showed that 72% of customers will share a positive experience with six or more people.
• Aa Epsilon study, 80% of consumers are more likely to do business with a company that offers them personalized experiences based on their expressed desire for them.

Shifting from a transaction-centric to a relationship-centric customer engagement model

Transaction-centric customer engagement models create a lopsided exchange of value between the provider and the consumer. They are based on the provider’s belief that what they have to offer is more important than the experience of how they offer it. Increasingly individuals and businesses are making buying decisions based on their emotional connection to the company and its desire to create a shared value experience.

As Paul Robson, President of International at Adobe says, “It is no longer a case of just creating experiences for customers; the future hinges on creating experiences with customers to establish ongoing relationships, and, ultimately earn trust and loyalty.”

According to Adobe’s latest research, more that 90% of marketers rated their company good or excellent at delivering personalized customer experiences at scale. However, only 33% of consumers felt brands had improved personalization on the last 12 months. To close this enormous gap, companies need to leverage systems of intelligence to better measure, understand and thereby anticipate the actual personalized experiences consumers are looking for. GenAI & Agentic AI when properly utilized can be extremely helpful to accelerate this transition.

To achieve that result, CMOs, CIOs and other C-suite leaders need to work together to transform their thinking about the critical need to deliver emotionally rewarding experiences and redefine their customer engagement strategy accordingly.

Employee trust is essential for sustainable competitive success

Gallup research has documented the significant impact and value employee trust has on a company’s performance:

• Companies with high trust levels outperform companies with low trust levels by 186%
• 96% of engaged employees trust management compared to 46% of disengaged employees
• Highly trusted workplaces enjoy 50% higher employee productivity, 106% more energy at work and 13% fewer sick days
• Employees who trust their employers experience 74% less stress
• 33% of employees would stay longer if the company kept its promises

A Gartner survey has shown that companies with high levels of trust have more fully engaged employees as the chart below illustrates.

Building a culture of trust is now mission critical

In its essence, trust is the belief employees see and feel that their workplaces are safe and their co-workers are looking out for their best interests. Many have called this “psychological safety.” According to Google, “psychological safety is by far the most important out of all the dynamics they measured in high-performance teams.”

To build trust across any organization requires a clear definition of individual and team roles and responsibilities along with specific decision-making governance policies that foster innovation and experimentation without fear of failure. Here are some characteristics I have observed in leaders that are good at creating a culture of trust:

• They know the right balance between dealing with current developments and getting out in front of future developments.
  • They seize the narrative at the outset being very clear about what is known, what is not known, and what needs to be done to learn more.
• They recognize that a crisis ruled by unfamiliarity and uncertainty requires decisions and responses that are largely improvised.
  • They promote an environment of “psychological safety” that allows people to openly discuss ideas, questions, and concerns without fear of repercussions.
  • They distribute decision making authority and information sharing.
• They mobilize their organizations by setting clear priorities and empowering others to discover and implement solutions to achieving those priorities.
  • They unify cross-functional teams behind mission critical outcomes and realign incentives for them to achieve those outcomes.
• They understand that “competence precedes comprehension” which puts a bias on taking action and iterative learning to make necessary adjustments in real time.
• They act with resolve and visible decisiveness.
• They know that their ultimate goal is to “make a positive difference in people’s lives.”