We’re living in a time when distrust seems to be the default. Don’t trust what clients tell you. Don’t trust employees to get it done. Don’t trust prospects to be honest about their budgets. Don’t trust partners to hold up their end.
But here’s the reality: operating from distrust creates more problems than it solves.
If you can’t trust your employees to deliver, you’ll micromanage them into mediocrity. If you don’t trust clients to implement your strategies, you’ll hold back your best thinking. If you assume prospects are lying, you’ll waste time playing games instead of having honest conversations.
This week I want to talk about why trust needs to be your starting point—and what to do when you realize you can’t trust someone.
But first let’s look at what Jen has rounded up for us this week.
— Chip Griffin, SAGA Founder
Latest from SAGA
HOLDING COMPANIES DISCOVER RETAINERS. S4 Capital recently announced a bold new pricing innovation: fixed monthly fees, annual contracts, all-in pricing. You know — retainers. The model independent agencies have used for decades. In the latest Agency Leadership Podcast episode, Gini and I dissect the “innovation” with appropriate sarcasm before getting to the genuinely hard question underneath it: how should agencies price around AI when costs are uncertain and likely to rise?
WRITE THE PRESS RELEASE FOR YOUR LAST DAY. Most agency owners never seriously think about how their story ends until it becomes urgent. This exercise fixes that. I wrote about a simple thought exercise that forces you to get specific about the exit you actually want, and reveals whether the agency you’re building today could actually get you there.
Jen’s Weekly Roundup
If you could start over, what would you do differently? That question showed up this week in different forms—and the answers reveal something important about where experienced leaders think the real leverage points are. It’s not about tactics, tools, or timing. It’s about building resilience into the foundation instead of retrofitting it later when things go sideways.
WHAT CAUGHT OUR EYE THIS WEEK:
THE FRESH START FANTASY — 2Bobs tackles if I were starting a new firm with the kind of wisdom that only comes from doing it the hard way first. Anchor Advisors explores the tactical retreat—knowing when to step back, regroup, and reset rather than grinding forward. And David C. Baker at Punctuation examines the power of competitive bids, arguing that competition can sharpen your positioning even when you’d rather avoid it.
ANTI-FRAGILE BY DESIGN — The Agency Profit Podcast features Brent Weaver on how to build an anti-fragile agency—one that gets stronger under stress rather than breaking. AgencyAnalytics gets specific about how growing agencies keep clients engaged without burning out, offering practical systems for sustainable client management. Both pieces reject the hustle culture mentality and focus instead on building capacity that lasts.
MEASUREMENT THAT DOESN’T MAKE YOU CRAZY — Spin Sucks addresses the perennial challenge: measuring the PESO Model without losing your mind. The podcast cuts through the noise and focuses on metrics that actually matter for integrated campaigns. Spin Sucks also published how knowing history strengthens your communications strategy—because context and pattern recognition matter more than real-time reaction.
WHEN THINGS GO WRONG — For Immediate Release explores when companies blame layoffs on AI and leave communicators holding the bag, examining the impossible position PR pros face when leadership makes decisions and expects comms to clean up the mess.
PRACTICAL TAKEAWAYS — RSW/US distills 10 things every agency owner and biz dev team should take away from our 2026 conference, offering actionable insights from their recent event. The Innovative Agency features Tim Bradley on video that converts—not just video that looks good. Also from RSW/US is the video Under the Hood interview with Michelle Abdow from Market Mentors.
THE BOTTOM LINE — Agencies are never going to not be under pressure, face setbacks, or have to make difficult choices. But the ones that last are built to get stronger under stress—with systems that scale, measurement that informs without overwhelming, and the wisdom to know when stepping back is the smartest move forward.
— Jen Griffin, SAGA Community Manager
Your default should be trust
Here’s an uncomfortable question: do you trust the people you work with?
Not “do you say you trust them.” Do you actually trust your employees to deliver work without you checking every detail? Do you trust clients when they tell you what they need? Do you trust prospects to be straight with you about their budgets and timelines?
If the honest answer is no, you’ve got a problem. But it may not be the problem you think it is.
Why distrust doesn’t work
When you operate from distrust, you create exactly the problems you’re trying to avoid.
You don’t trust an employee to manage a client, so you stay on every call and review every deliverable. The employee never develops the skills or confidence to actually manage the client. Your distrust becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy.
You don’t trust a client to implement your strategic recommendations, so you hold back. You give them the safe advice instead of the transformative stuff. The engagement stays tactical and eventually they wonder why they’re paying you.
You don’t trust a prospect when they say they have budget, so you play games. You avoid talking about price. You dance around commitment. They sense your lack of directness and either walk away or become exactly the difficult client you feared they’d be.
Distrust creates friction everywhere. It slows things down. It makes relationships transactional instead of collaborative. It turns you into a police officer when you should be a partner.
Trust as the starting point
Your default stance should be trust. Not blind trust, of course. (As the old Cold War expression goes, “trust but verify.”)
You should start from the assumption that people mean what they say and will do what they commit to.
When an employee says they’ll handle something, trust that they will. Give them the authority to make decisions. Let them work without constantly checking in. Yes, they might make mistakes. That’s how they learn. The alternative is micromanaging them into people who can’t function without you, which is worse.
When a client tells you what they need, believe them. They know their business better than you do. Yes, they might be missing something important. That’s why they hired you: to help them see their blind spots. But start by trusting that they’re telling you the truth as they understand it.
When a prospect tells you they have budget and decision-making authority, take them at their word. Ask clarifying questions if you need to, but don’t approach every conversation as if you’re trying to catch them in a lie. Most people aren’t lying. They’re just doing their job, same as you.
What trust actually means
Trusting someone doesn’t mean you’re hands-off. It doesn’t mean you never check in or ask questions. It doesn’t mean you ignore warning signs when something’s not working.
Trust means your default assumption is competence and good faith, not the opposite.
It means when you delegate something to an employee, you give them real authority to make decisions, not just responsibility without power. It means you’re there to coach and support them, not to swoop in and take over at the first sign of struggle.
It means when a client pushes back on your recommendation, you assume they have a good reason even if you don’t understand it yet. You ask questions to understand their thinking instead of dismissing their concerns.
It means when something goes wrong, you don’t immediately assume bad intent or incompetence. You figure out what happened and what needs to change, without turning it into an indictment of the person’s character.
When you can’t trust someone
Here’s the thing: sometimes you genuinely can’t trust someone. And when that’s true, you need to deal with it directly.
If you have an employee you absolutely cannot trust to deliver work on time and at acceptable quality, you have two options. Either you haven’t given them the training, resources, and clear expectations they need to succeed (in which case that’s on you to fix). Or they’re simply not capable of the role (in which case you need to move on from them).
What you can’t do is keep them around while constantly doubting their work. That’s miserable for both of you. It turns you into a micromanager and them into someone who phones it in because they know you’ll redo everything anyway.
If you have a client you don’t trust to tell you the truth or implement your recommendations, you need to ask yourself why. Is it because they’ve repeatedly proven untrustworthy? Then they’re a bad-fit client and you should part ways. Or is it because you’re bringing your own baggage to the relationship? Then you need to work on yourself.
If you have a prospect you don’t trust, don’t work with them. Seriously. If your gut is telling you they’re not being straight with you, that’s probably not going to get better after they become a client.
The pattern is the same across all of these: if you genuinely can’t trust someone, you either need to change the situation or change your relationship with them. Living in ongoing distrust doesn’t work for anyone.
Fix the root cause
Most agency owners who struggle with trust have one of two problems.
Either they’re not hiring well. They’re bringing on people who aren’t capable of doing the work, and then wondering why they can’t trust them to do it. The solution is to get better at hiring for the qualities that matter like problem-solving ability and good judgment.
Or the owner has personal trust issues that have nothing to do with the people they work with. They were burned in the past, or they’re natural micromanagers, or they struggle to let go. The solution is to work on themselves, not to blame their team.
If you find yourself unable to trust most of your employees, or most of your clients, or most of your prospects, the problem is probably you. Not in a “you’re a bad person” way, but in a “you need to examine why this keeps happening” way.
Maybe you’re not communicating expectations clearly. Maybe you’re delegating without giving people the resources they need. Maybe you’re hiring for the wrong qualities. Maybe you’re taking on clients who aren’t good fits because you’re desperate for revenue.
Whatever it is, you can’t fix it by just trying harder to trust people. You have to address the underlying cause.
Start today
Think about the people you work with right now. Who don’t you trust? Why?
If it’s a specific person with a specific pattern of behavior, deal with that directly. Have the conversation. Fix what’s fixable. Move on from what isn’t.
If it’s a general feeling that you can’t trust anyone to do things as well as you would, that’s a you problem. And the solution is to start demonstrating trust even when it’s uncomfortable. Delegate something and don’t check on it. Let an employee run a client meeting without you. Take a prospect at their word instead of playing detective.
Trust is like a muscle. It gets stronger with use. But you have to actually use it.
