Diamond Notes: Trust, a function of the Air Force core values Published Aug. 2, 2011 By Master Sgt. Robert Tibi 27th Special Operations Medical Group CANNON AIR FORCE BASE, N.M. -- Relationships built and sustained on trust are something so essential to making an organization as large and diverse as the 27 Special Operations Wing effective that its importance cannot be understated. In fact, it both resonates throuhout and functions as the framework for our core values. Author, Steven Covey, contends that trust is a function of character and competence. Character includes integrity, motive and intent; while competence includes skills, results, and capabilities. The dictionary definition of trust is the assumed reliance on the character, ability, strength, or truth of someone. To be trusted means confidence has been given that you will consistently deliver expected results with competent behavior and displayed integrity. Think for a moment about our core values and it will become evident where trust fits in. Integrity First Integrity is the inner monologue that tempers your decisions and guides your actions with courage, honesty, responsibility, and accountability. Executing your duties with a sense of integrity is essential to being a good Airman. This is what inspires each of us to execute our part in the mission, regardless of scope or difficulty, to its intended conclusion, every single time. Acting with integrity invites the trust and confidence of your teammates, builds relationships, and makes you an invaluable Airman. When every member of the team acts with integrity, trusts others, and is trustworthy, the speed in which the mission can be accomplished increases exponentially. Service Before Self This is a selfless dedication to duty, and the trust of others that you are going to act for the greater good of the mission and the team knowing it may often come at the expense of family or personal wants and needs. You are trusted to behave in a tolerant and loyal manner, support your chain of command, and show faith in the institutions that shape our wing are always acting for the betterment of the team. In other words that the acts and perspectives of your teammates, as well as your own, are well intended, selfless, and are done for the good of the mission. Excellence in All We Do You should always strive to perform your very best and exceed all established standards both on and off duty. Competence is at the core of what we do; we are trusted by our nation, joint partners, and 27 SOW team members, to be both highly skilled and highly professional. Consistently providing excellence in all you do inspires trust and will continue to bring the customers back. Relationships are built and sustained on trust, and it is those trust-based relationships that provide much of what makes us a more effective fighting force than our enemies. Trust is valuable and it cannot be imitated nor can it be substituted. Relationships built on trust are dynamic and highly productive. Strive to consistently behave in ways that inspire trust. In other words behave in ways that leads you to extend trust to others and ways that makes others extend trust to you. Intelligently extending trust to those around you while being worthy of their trust will quickly produce measurable dividends for your unit's mission accomplishment. As you report for duty each day make a deliberate effort to focus on establishing and developing relationships based on trust.