Can I trust you?

"Can I trust you?"

I find that this is an interesting question but yet hardly people around us will ask it. If you ever asked this question, no one would ever replied, "No, I can't be trusted." Just like a villain will never say he is bad guy. He will always say he is being forced by circumstances.

We played a simple game called "Can I trust you?" Everyone is holding a red and a blue chip. All you need to do is look at your partner and showed to him one of the chips. The red chip means that you trust him while the blue chip means you don't. At the end of the day, you calculate how many blue and red chips you give and receive.

Although this game is simple but yet it says a lot. From this game, I learnt that not all people, whom you trust, would give you red chips. "Not trustworthy guys" might be someone whom you can trust and "Good guys" end up betrays your trust.

Once you received a blue chip, you could be giving other people blue chips. It means once there is a sense of betrayal, you could have your own defense or maybe you will start to betray the next person who comes along.

Sad to say, that's how corporate life works.

Many a times, it is difficult to tell whether who you can trust. Are you able to tell who are your true friends or your enemies? Especially when you first meet that person, you will not make any assumptions until you get to know that person better.

It's a way of life. Especially in the business world, we have learnt to keeping within our own "boundary", people have become less trusting to other party. Compared to the previous generation, our generation has become more isolated and more individualistic.

Trusting is mutual. It ties strongly back to our own values. It will be painful if everyday we have to guard ourselves from everyone around us.