on into Misconduct in the Banking, Superannuation and Financial Services Industry. We partnered with financial services leaders to win back customer trust. The outcome of this work is a four-pillar model of customer trust and a starting point for leaders responsible for delivering it.  The trust collapse in supermarkets Australian supermarkets were amongst the most trusted brands in Australia during the pandemic. Now, they rank amongst the least trusted brands. That fall over a five-year period is extraordinary. It speaks directly to the fragility of our trust in big business. A fragility that mimics similar declines in our trust in government, post-pandemic. Before that, our trust in financial institutions was decimated by the Hayne Royal Commission. Sure, trust is fragile, but does trust really matter? As in, does it affect customer behaviour? Does it affect market behaviour?  Trust is rhetorically important. It matters. I’d argue that it’s the most important metric to solve, more important than the sacred and embedded NPS programs in big retail.  Yes, erosion in customer trust affects the market capitalisation of the ASX giants involved. Trust is a fragile social currency with enormous commerciality.  On 25 January 2024, during the month that big retail takes a breath, the Australian Government announced that it would direct the ACCC to conduct an inquiry into the pricing practices of Australia’s supermarket sector. One of the matters to be investigated was whether the retailers were price gouging – increasing prices over and above system inflation at the time. The accusation alone was trust destroying.  Then, on Monday, February 19, 2024, a Four Corners story featuring an interview with Woolworths CEO at the time, Brad Banducci, aired in Australia. The coverage of the interview portrayed Banducci as resistant to scrutiny amidst a cost-of-living crisis affecting all Australians. This triggered a mega trust quake for Woolworths.  Woolworths shares lost about $3 billion on February 20, 2024. Banducci’s resignation was announced the next day. These events had to do with the destruction of customer and market trust. These are trust quakes – digitally amplified events that move markets with immediacy and impact.  Another trust quake occurred on April 16, 2024. On that day, Banducci was questioned by Greens Senator Nick McKim. ‘Confrontational’ is a fair description of the exchange, given that Senator McKim at one point threatened Banducci with being found in contempt and facing jail time. If Australian CEOs had a Hall of Fame, Banducci would be in it and on the wall. His professional record speaks for itself. Yet, trust in him was falling. Woolworths’ market capitalisation was holding at $45 billion at the time. Woolworths’ market cap is currently $31.75 billion. Your eye-math is right, that’s about one-third down. Yes, there’s a long list of extraneous variables causing Woolworths’ decline in market capitalisation – including leadership changes, the sale of the Endeavour business and the performance of BIG W. It can also be said that these extraneous factors lead to loss of trust. Winning back customer trust must be a prominent objective in board discussions, and in the strategic plans of leadership teams in big retail right now. Still, there are worse positions to be in than knowing the problem to solve. There’s an executional clarity and energy that comes with rebuilding around a single problem, understood in a singular way.  It’s also likely that the major retailers are transforming around trust, investing heavily in rebuilding it. They’re most likely applying trust governance – with decision rules around execution. As in, leaders are asking their teams, ‘Will doing this win trust?’. The same questions their boards are probably asking them. Getting scientific What’s presumed by customers, shareholders and stakeholders is that the energy and investment in customer trust is empirically grounded in and commensurate with rigour. We’re giving the highly capable leaders in big retail the benefit of a doubt that they know, empirically, how trust works in their market and for their customers. Starting with science is especially important for trust. It’s a topic so ubiquitously experienced, so germane to being human, that everyone has a point of view, an instinct, for trust. Thus there is a waterfall of strongly held opinions on how trust works and what to do to win it back. These varied opinions make governance of trust more difficult. Science cuts through opinion – it provides structure and understanding – it’s a leader’s best first shot at fixing a deeply psychological construct.  Moreover, the ‘science’ of trust is not held in the customer insights teams or the annals of corporate Australia. It must be mined from the validated science. The rub, which is causing the missed opportunity here, is overconfidence internally, in assuming that ‘we ought to know how to fix this’, in assuming the possession of the knowledge, expertise and wherewithal required to solve trust themselves. Take, for example, the commonly made mistake of conflating trust and transparency – with the latter being a ‘treatment’ for mistrust. As Rachel Botsman writes, “Trust is a confident relationship with the unknown.” The need for transparency is a symptom of – not the cure for – a low-trust system. As a behavioural scientist, I’ve had the opportunity to ‘science’ customer trust. Over the last decade, my team and I have systematically reviewed the peer-reviewed science specific to customers’ trust of companies they deal with. We’ve reviewed the meta-analyses – the studies of studies on customer trust. The citation list of our meta-analysis runs into the hundreds; it’s something we’re openly sharing. Our exhaustive review led to a trust model comprising four ‘pillars’ – or most impactful drivers – of a model for customer trust, with excellent evidence of replicability. The four pillars for customer trust, as derived from the science:  Integrity: customers’ belief that the company has defined, and acts in accordance with, mutually shared values. Benevolence: customer’s belief that the company will prioritise the best interests of the customer over profits. Capability: customers’ belief in the company’s expertise in delivering on its promises. Predictability: customers’ belief that the company will reliably be there when they need them. Dr Johann Ponnampalam is the founder of @Bettr behaviour change science Further reading: Five key consumer behaviour and technology shifts impacting retailers