Five to One

Trust takes months to build. One lie kills it instantly.

Not symmetrical. Not fair. But that's the math.

Gottman studied marriages. Found a pattern. Healthy marriages have a 5:1 ratio. Five positive interactions for every negative one. Below that ratio, divorce becomes likely.

Organizations work the same way.

Your team spent six months building trust. Daily standups. Vulnerability exercises. Psychological safety training. Trust scores going up. Coordination improving.

Then one manager punishes someone for speaking up.

The trust doesn't just decrease. It reverses. People update their priors immediately. "Oh, that safety thing? That was performance. This is real."

The cascade goes backward fast.

You need five trust-building moments to recover from one trust-destroying moment. Most organizations try to recover with one apology. The math says that's insufficient.

This is why "one bad apple" destroys culture. Not because one person is bad. Because destroying trust is much easier than building it. The asymmetry is structural, not personal.

Watch your ratios.

Five to one. Always.