Leadership in the Era of Distrust

October 22, 2025

Distrust isn’t a barrier to reform. It’s an invitation to lead differently.

We’re living through a time when public trust in institutions—government, education, law enforcement, and even philanthropy—is at historic lows. People are skeptical, not just of what systems do, but of whether those systems were ever designed to serve them in the first place. And in many communities, especially Black and Brown communities, that skepticism is well-earned.


In child welfare and juvenile justice, distrust isn’t theoretical—it’s lived. Families have seen how “help” can feel like surveillance, how “accountability” can feel like punishment, and how “reform” can sometimes just mean a new acronym for the same old practices. The result? Deep skepticism toward leaders, data, and decisions that claim to be “for” the community but rarely come from it.


The Leadership Challenge

In this environment, leadership can no longer be about authority or technical expertise. It must be about credibility—and credibility is built through transparency, humility, and shared learning.

Leaders can’t ask communities to trust systems that won’t tell the truth about their own performance. Nor can they build trust through polished presentations or public statements. Trust is earned when we are willing to show our data, name our inequities, and stay in the room when the conversation gets uncomfortable.

It’s not enough to be “right.” In this era, leaders must be real.


From Control to Connection

For years, many systems have responded to public pressure by tightening control—adding new oversight, more audits, and endless compliance checks. But the more we try to control outcomes from the top, the less trust we build on the ground. The real work of leadership now lies in creating connection: between agencies and communities, data and story, intent and impact.

That’s what makes frameworks like Results Count so powerful—they remind us that leadership isn’t about titles; it’s about results and relationships. Building trust means helping communities see themselves in the data, ensuring families and youth have a real voice in defining what success looks like, and showing how public resources are being used to get there.


What Trust-Building Looks Like in Practice

Trust is built when:

  • Data is shared publicly, even when it tells a hard story.
  • Community partners are part of defining the problem, not just implementing the solution.
  • Leadership decisions are transparent about tradeoffs—what we’re investing in and what we’re letting go of.
  • Accountability includes the system, not just the family.

These are the habits of leadership that restore faith in systems—and they’re the habits that distinguish reform from rhetoric.


A Call to Leaders

If we want to lead effectively in this era of distrust, we have to be willing to move slower at first, to listen more deeply, and to share power more intentionally. That’s how we make space for trust to grow—and for transformation to take root.


Because the truth is, distrust isn’t a barrier to reform. It’s an invitation to lead differently.

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