Trust: A Systems view

There is a reinforcing causal loop between trust, transparency and productivity.

      +                     +
      --->Trust -------->Productivity------
      |                                                     |
      |                                                     |
      |--------Transparency<-------------- |
                                            +
Of course the metric for "productivity" in this sense may be the subject of much debate, but I mean it in the sense that you are doing better, you are more effective and more efficient. So the loop says, if you increase your transparency ( as an individual or an organization) you generate increased trust among your stakeholders and increased trust increases your ability to perform, which in turn leads to an increased willingness to be transparent...   On the other hand the more you tend to obscure the situation (decrease transparency) the less trust you will engender, leading to reduced productivity since it now takes extra work to obtain trusted information (sign-off, approvals, verifications, etc.) and as your performance goes down so does your willingness to share that information.