Promises, promises

"Let's do lunch!"

"I will make that happen"

"I can get that to you by Friday"

I bet either you've said that or heard that recently.  If you said it, did you deliver?  Nothing is more irritating than having something promised to you, then the commitment is not met.  Then you have to nag the person mercilessly until they provide it.  So, did you promise something and then not deliver it, and now you are being nagged?

An instant way to build trust is to deliver on your promises.  No matter how little, following up on something you said you'd do will pay off handsomely in the long run.  The key to  this; however, is not over-promising. We tend to automatically spit things out like: "of course I can do that in 24 hours!"  when our brain truly knows that we can't in fact do that in a week.  There is no shame in taking more time to provide a realistic estimate rather than promising to do something then not doing it.

Even worse, if you can't make your commitment, don't ignore the promisee!  Communicate a clearly revised deadline with plenty enough notice so that they can reasonably adjust whatever may rely on the output of your task.  Again, I don't care how small you think the promise is, the person you committed to may think that it is much more important.

Lastly, if you can't do it, then say so!  How often would you have appreciated a real answer versus a tap dance?  As infosec professionals, being honest and ethical is part of the job description.  If our partners can't believe and trust in our work and ourselves, then why would they want to work with us?  Think about the traits of people that you like to work with: I bet one of them is delivering on their promises.  We must be the examples if we are to succeed, so start practicing now!

For a little more on this topic, here is a good article.