Every year I watch leadership teams try to fix engagement with the same toolkit. A new benefit. A pulse survey. An offsite, with a good dinner. Then the next survey comes back flat, and everyone wonders what went wrong.
Earlier this month, ADP CEO Maria Black offered a blunter diagnosis. In an interview with Fortune, she said: “Trust is a direct corollary to engagement.”
The numbers behind that line are striking. According to ADP’s research, as reported by Fortune, employees who trust their CEO and senior leaders are 41 times more likely to be highly motivated and committed. Employees who trust their coworkers are 16 times more likely. And for every 1% drop in full engagement, the likelihood of voluntary attrition rises by 45%.
That isn’t a perks problem. It’s a credibility problem, and it starts at the top.
Why perks don’t fix it
Perks are things you give people. Trust is something people decide to give you. You can’t buy it, announce it or roll it out in a program.
In my coaching work with owners and executives, I rarely see trust collapse in one dramatic moment. It leaks out in small, forgettable ones:
- A decision is announced without the reasoning behind it.
- A promise slips, and nobody names it.
- A leader says “my door is always open” but is never seen on the floor.
- Bad news reaches the team through the grapevine before it reaches them from you.
None of these feel serious on the day. Added together, they teach people that what leaders say and what actually happens are two different things. Once people learn that, no benefit package will win them back.
Trust is built on the ground
Black made another point I agree with: “The only way to keep current is to be on the ground and be trusted.” In other words, be present.
Many leaders I work with have drifted away from being present without noticing. Their week is filled with reports, board prep and external meetings. They see the business through a dashboard. The dashboard tells them what is happening, but not what people believe about it.
Being present doesn’t mean a staged walk-around once a quarter. It means regular, unscripted contact where people can ask you hard questions and see how you respond.
A simple trust audit for this week
Here’s an exercise I use with clients. It takes about 30 minutes, and it’s uncomfortable in a useful way.
- List your commitments. Write down every commitment you’ve made to your team in the last 90 days. Include the small ones: “I’ll come back to you on that”, “we’ll review this next month”, “I’ll fix the schedule”.
- Sort them into three columns. Delivered. Delayed, with an explanation. Gone quiet.
- Look hard at the third column. Every item there is a small withdrawal from your trust account. Your team noticed, even if you didn’t.
- Close the loop on one. Pick the most visible item that went quiet. Go back to the people involved and say what happened. You don’t need a perfect answer. You need to show that you remembered.
- Change one habit. Choose one recurring decision and commit to sharing the “why” alongside the “what” from now on. Use my “Managers Freedom Scale” to effect organizational change!
The point of the audit isn’t guilt. It’s to make visible the things that quietly shape how your people experience you.
What does this mean for owners of smaller businesses
If you run a business of 20 or 200 people, this matters even more. You don’t have layers of management to absorb the gap between what you say and what you do. Your team sees it directly.
The upside is that you can also fix it directly. One honest conversation, one closed loop, one decision explained well can shift how people feel faster than any engagement program.
The question to sit with
Fortune also reports ADP’s finding that only 19% of employees describe themselves as “overly engaged” at work. Most people are holding something back.
So, before you plan your next engagement initiative, ask a different question: What would my team need to see from me in the next 30 days to believe me a little more?
Start there. The perks can wait.
If you’re a business owner or executive who wants to work on how your leadership is experienced, that’s exactly the kind of work I do in coaching. Get in touch for a conversation. Ask me about my Managers Freedom Scale.
Source: “ADP CEO Maria Black says employees who trust their CEO and senior leaders are 41% more likely to be engaged at work,” Fortune, October 15, 2026. Fortune corrected the article on October 16: the figure is “41 times,” not “41%.” ADP’s method isn’t described in the article.
