Something has shifted in organizations. Not dramatically, not all at once, but in the way that fatigue sets in gradually, then unmistakably.
Leaders hesitate where they once decided. Teams deliver but feel brittle underneath. People speak about pressure and restructuring and hybrid isolation, but what they are describing, in quieter moments, is something more human:
“I don’t know who or what to trust anymore.”
It is rarely said with anger. More often, it is said with exhaustion. And it is heard across industries, levels, and countries with striking consistency.
Trust has become harder to sustain.
What is heard in our coaching rooms is mirrored in global research. The 2025 Edelman Trust Barometer, which surveys 33,000 people across 28 countries, reports the steepest decline in workplace trust since 2018. Employees say they are increasingly unsure whether their leaders are honest with them, whether decisions are made transparently, and whether their contributions are valued.
At the same time, corporate restructurings have surged. In 2025, tech firms including Amazon, Microsoft, and others announced large workforce reductions amid restructuring and shifts toward automation and AI, part of a broader wave in which US employers announced around 1.17 million job cuts – the most since the pandemic. Restructuring, once the last resort, has become, as many describe it, “a managerial reflex.”
Even when no restructuring is happening, the constant possibility of it conditions behavior. People take fewer interpersonal risks. They hesitate to speak up. Many over-prepare or over-perform, driven by a quiet sense that they must keep proving their value. They interpret ambiguity negatively and protect themselves by withdrawing or becoming more transactional.
This isn’t a failure of character. It’s what happens when people spend too long in systems that feel unstable.
“While cognitive trust is largely independent of whether work is virtual or in-person, affective trust is significantly harder to build and sustain in remote and hybrid settings.”
Hybrid work has brought flexibility, but it has also removed the invisible threads that used to help trust regenerate naturally: the hallway check-in, the spontaneous reassurance, the small confirmations of goodwill that pass between people when they share physical space.
Without those touchpoints, assumptions fill the void. Under stress, they often tend to take a negative turn.
A delayed reply becomes “They don’t care.” A short message becomes “They’re upset.” A cancelled meeting becomes “They’re disengaged.”
Research on trust in virtual teams helps explain this dynamic. Scholars distinguish between two forms of trust: cognitive trust – confidence in someone’s competence and reliability – and affective trust – the sense of emotional connection and genuine goodwill that develops over time. A 2025 study by Kloepfer and Carbon found that while cognitive trust is largely independent of whether work is virtual or in-person, affective trust is significantly harder to build and sustain in remote and hybrid settings. Without regular opportunities for informal interaction, emotional connection thins – and ambiguity becomes more easily interpreted as indifference or threat.
This helps explain a paradox many leaders recognize: teams that function well on paper yet feel increasingly brittle underneath. People aren’t becoming less trustworthy. The conditions for trust have weakened.
The answer begins with a mindset that is neither naïve nor cynical: realistic optimism.
So, what can individuals do when the climate itself feels uncertain? And what can leaders do to create islands of trust in systems they don’t fully control?
The answer begins with a mindset that is neither naïve nor cynical: realistic optimism.
Realistic optimism shows up less as a mindset and more as something people practice under pressure. It does not ask people to deny uncertainty, but to relate to it in a way that keeps them resourced and connected. In practice, it rests on three commitments: trusting ourselves, trusting others, and trusting the situation.
When the ground is shaky, people often subtly lose trust in themselves. They question their intuition, second-guess their judgement, and forget the strengths that carried them through previous storms. Meetings are over-prepared. Emails are rewritten again and again. Not because people have become less capable – but because the environment has taught them that certainty is risky.
Three practical approaches can help rebuild inner trust:
Under stress, the brain is wired to interpret ambiguity as threat. In hybrid work, where cues are missing, this tendency becomes even more pronounced. Small gestures – a glance, a quick clarification, a shared moment of levity – are simply no longer there to correct misunderstandings before they harden into beliefs.
Purpose doesn’t eliminate uncertainty, but it gives it direction.
Many people oscillate between two unhelpful positions: resignation (“There’s nothing I can do”) and hyper-control (“I must anticipate everything”). Neither helps. Resignation drains energy and agency, while hyper-control exhausts attention and creates brittle expectations.
Trust is rarely rebuilt through major initiatives or sweeping cultural statements.
Many leaders sense the strain in their teams even when performance indicators remain strong. People deliver. Deadlines are met. Yet something feels brittle beneath the surface. Leaders often recognize that trust is under pressure while feeling constrained by systems they did not design and decisions they did not initiate.
Trust is rarely rebuilt through major initiatives or sweeping cultural statements. It is rebuilt through consistent signals that shape the emotional climate day by day. Five concrete micro-practices stand out:
Restructuring, hybrid work, and economic pressure are not temporary phases; they are the new context of leadership, but the human ability to respond with clarity, dignity, and courage remains intact.
There is no return to the old stability. Restructuring, hybrid work, and economic pressure are not temporary phases; they are the new context of leadership, but the human ability to respond with clarity, dignity, and courage remains intact.
Trust will not rebuild itself, but it can be rebuilt – relationship by relationship, interaction by interaction – when realistic optimism is practiced from the inside out.
Not the kind of optimism that says, “everything will be fine.” But one that says: “We can meet what comes with presence and humanity.” That kind of optimism doesn’t eliminate uncertainty, but it does restore trust.
As geopolitics and advanced AI reshape risk, productivity, and value creation, CFOs sit at the center of the response. IMD’s Salvatore Cantale identifies five priorities that shaping finance leadership this year....
Joanna's fear that setting boundaries would make her unkind cast her team adrift. Chloé Christopoulos says clarity and accountability are not departures from care, but expressions of it ...
Audio available
In turbulent times, leaders need geopolitical savviness, political influence, and stress management says IMD’s Jennifer Jordan ...
Ecosystems promise a new way to compete, yet most squander the opportunity by bolting them onto old strategic logic. Mark Greeven makes the case for putting ecosystem thinking at the heart of...
Audio availableExplore first person business intelligence from top minds curated for a global executive audience