Felt trust and task performance: A laboratory study

Although the relationship between employee trust in managers and performance has been explored, less attention has been given to employee felt trust. Because trust entails risk for the trusting party and affords benefits to the trustee, employees who feel trusted by managers may be inclined to reciprocate that trust through their performance. This study uses a unique experimental methodology to extend previous findings on employee trust to employee felt trust, and posits that employees who feel trusted by their managers engage in greater task performance.