Reliability in this emotional sense is the repeated experience of expectations fulfilled

tips on enhancing credibility: 1. Figure out how to tell as much truth as possible, except where doing so would injure others. 2. Don’t tell lies, or even exaggerate. At all. Ever. 3. Avoid saying things that others might construe as lies. For example, “Yes of course, we’ll put our best people on the job.” (Really? Who are the worst? Says who? And

content expertise plus “presence,” which refers to how we look, act, react, and talk about our content. It depends not only on the substantive reality of the advisor’s expertise, but also on the experience of the person doing the perceiving.

Advisors who rate the highest on reliability will not just deliver their work on time and on spec. Nor will they simply be consistent, even at a level of excellence. They will also be expert at a variety of small touches that are aimed at client-based familiarity. Sending meeting material in advance is one example; staying current on client events

Through the following kinds of behaviors (which both represent and help create an inner state of client focus): 1. Letting the client fill in the empty spaces 2. Asking the client to talk about what’s behind an issue 3. Using open-ended questions 4. Not giving answers until the right is earned to do so (and the client will let you know when you

find (or create) a number of opportunities to demonstrate both rational and emotional reliability, by making promises, explicit or implicit, and then delivering on them.

following list reveals how many “threats” there are to client focus (and temptations for self-orientation): 1. Selfishness 2. Self-consciousness 3. A need to appear on top of things 4. A desire to look intelligent 5. A to-do list on our mind that is a mile long 6. A desire to jump to the solution 7. A desire to win that exceeds the desire to help

Reliability is about whether clients think you are dependable and can be trusted to behave in consistent ways. Judgments on reliability are strongly affected, if not determined, by the number of times the client has interacted with you.

Intimacy is about “emotional closeness” concerning the issues at hand, so it is obviously the most overtly emotional of the four trust equation components. It is driven by emotional honesty, a willingness to expand the bounds of acceptable topics, while maintaining mutual respect and by respecting boundaries. Greater intimacy means that fewer