Trust is a powerful force in business that permeates all relationships and is the foundation of a high-performing organization and its teams.
When people trust each other, there is less friction and more cooperation.
When people don’t trust each other, there are impediments to collaboration that reduce the overall team's effectiveness. Our research suggests that a trust gap exists between in-house communications professionals and internal stakeholders in their organizations.
This isn’t to say that it exists in every organization and with every team. Still, it does exist in every industry surveyed as part of this research.
This trust gap creates friction in the communications team’s ability to drive strategy, operate effectively, and obtain the necessary resources to deliver high-quality outcomes and measurable ROIs.
A trust gap exists or is exacerbated by all of these business challenges. Thankfully, trust can be built.
In this report, we unveil research on how a trust gap can impact in-house communication teams and recommendations for teams to create and fortify sustainable trust.
“The trust gap experienced by in-house communications professionals is real. It doesn’t happen in every organization and with every team, but it happens in every industry we surveyed. We hope that our research and recommendations from the report can provide a first step towards in-house communications professionals working to close the trust gap."
To quantify the importance of trust for in-house communications professionals, understand how a lack of trust manifests itself, and identify which aspects of an in-house communications professional’s responsibilities are most affected by a lack of trust.
PR73 commissioned a survey that was conducted by NewtonX in December 2023.
We spoke to in-house communications professionals from organizations like NBC Universal, Disney, Visa, and CBRE. The respondents encompass a diverse range of seniority levels, span a variety of industries, and all have decision-making authority.
