Building Trust and Courage Together Workshop

Choose this exercise

Purpose: Identify observable behaviors that build or damage workplace trust and practice direct, respectful peer conversations.

Use it when: Use during team retreats or quarterly reviews when a group needs shared standards for feedback, boundaries, and disagreement.

Skip it when: Skip during active formal grievance procedures, during ongoing layoffs, or when severe hostility makes direct practice unsafe.

Group arrangement: Individual reflection, trios for conversation practice, and whole-room review. When division leaves one remainder (for example 7, 10, or 16), add a second observer to make a group of four. When division leaves two remainders (for example 8, 11, or 14), form one pair where partners alternate roles.

Timing: Source specifies a 2-hour agenda across six sequential phases.

Materials and tools

• Flipchart easel and 2 paper pads
• Marker pens (1 per participant)
• Sticky notes (2 pads per table)
• Timer or phone stopwatch
• 1 printed BRAVING Trust Framework and Conversation Prompts sheet per participant

Before participants arrive

1. Label one flipchart sheet 'What We Are Letting Go' and mount it on the wall.
2. Label a second flipchart sheet 'Trust in Our Team'.
3. Arrange seating so participants can speak comfortably in clusters of three.
4. Place markers, sticky notes, and printed handouts at each seat before arrival.

Say this to open

Welcome. Today we examine how trust and courage function in our daily work. Trust builds through small, observable actions, not slogans. To talk about trust honestly, we need to inspect the defensive habits we use when tasks feel risky. To begin, shout out words or short phrases that come to mind when you hear the word 'vulnerability'.

How to run it

1. Set context and map vulnerability 15 minutes

   Open using the opening script. Write participant responses on the flipchart. Read aloud: 'You cannot get to courage without walking through vulnerability.' Allow 30 seconds of quiet reflection. Briefly review the four agenda parts: workplace armor, the BRAVING trust model, small-group conversation practice, and personal commitments.

2. Examine self-protective workplace armor 20 minutes

   Define workplace armor: self-protective habits like perfectionism, avoiding conflict, defensiveness, or appearing busy to dodge extra requests. Give 4 minutes for silent reflection on a recent tense work moment. Each person writes 1 or 2 armor examples anonymously on sticky notes and posts them on the 'What We Are Letting Go' chart. Read 5 or 6 notes aloud neutrally. Ask how these habits affect trust.

3. Analyze trust behaviors with the BRAVING framework 30 minutes

   Distribute the BRAVING handout. Form trios, making a group of four if one person remains or a pair if two remain. Ask each person to discuss which element is easiest for them at work and which is hardest during crunch periods, with reasons. Give 15 minutes for small-group talk. Gather the room. Record 4 to 6 observations on the 'Trust in Our Team' flipchart under strengths and missing behaviors.

4. Rehearse courageous conversations in small groups 30 minutes

   Introduce courageous conversations: stating facts kindly, clearly, and without blame. Run three 7-minute rounds (4 minutes rehearsal, 3 minutes feedback). Trios rotate roles: A gives feedback, B receives, C observes, then shift so each person tests every role. Groups of four use two observers. Pairs rotate through three 7-minute rounds: A gives, B receives, both debrief, then switch for Round 2, and pick one to repeat for Round 3.

5. Write personal action commitments 15 minutes

   Ask participants to work silently on their handouts. Each person writes two statements: 'To build trust, I will stop [armor habit]' and 'To build trust, I will start [specific BRAVING behavior]'. Allow 5 minutes of writing time. Invite participants to share their statements with their small group. Anyone may pass or share only one statement without question.

6. Close and appreciate team practice 10 minutes

   Gather the full room. Invite up to 4 volunteers to share what would shift if the team used these practices regularly. Thank everyone for their candid participation. End promptly on the two-hour mark.

Debrief questions

• Which specific BRAVING behavior, if practiced consistently across our team, would prevent the most rework?
• During the rehearsal practice, what made direct feedback feel straightforward or difficult?
• What is a concrete indicator that someone on our team has slipped back into defensive armor?

Finished output: A posted board of discarded armor habits, a flipchart capturing team trust strengths and gaps, and individual written commitment statements.

Remote

Run via video conference using breakout rooms for trios. Use a shared digital board with two columns: 'What We Are Letting Go' for anonymous notes and 'Trust in Our Team' for shared discussion points. Send the BRAVING handout as a PDF before the session. Broadcast timed chat alerts to manage the roleplay rotations.

Hybrid

Group remote participants together in digital breakout rooms and in-person participants in room clusters. Use one shared digital board so both groups post anonymous armor notes and read team reflections simultaneously. Display the digital board on the room projector.

Access and participation choices

• Armor reflection sticky notes are completely anonymous with no names attached.
• Roleplay practice provides printed neutral scenarios so nobody must share personal grievances.
• Sharing personal commitments at the end is optional; participants may pass without explanation.

If the session gets stuck

Participants use the armor reflection to call out coworkers instead of their own behavior.

Pause the group. Remind everyone that every note must describe their own protective response. Discard any note that describes a coworker.

The small-group rehearsal turns into venting about company leadership.

Remind the room to focus on immediate peer interactions. Direct observers to pause the conversation and redirect peers to the practice cards.

Terms used here

• Workplace Armor: Defensive behavioral habits such as perfectionism, blame, or avoidance used to shield oneself from criticism at work.
• BRAVING: A seven-part framework detailing observable trust behaviors: Boundaries, Reliability, Accountability, Vault, Integrity, Non-judgment, and Generosity.