Local and central government are the industries least trusted by their own staff, with ‘budget cuts and upheaval’ causing employee concern – a report claims.

A survey of 1,600 UK managers by the Institute of Leadership and Management (ILM) found just 10% of central and local government employees – including the police and fire service – had ‘high trust’ in their organisations – the number of positive opinions charted minus the negative. This compares to 32% in education and 34% in financial services, banking and insurance.

Only 29% of public sector managers are thought to have high levels of trust in their organisation, compared to 45% in the private sector and 46% in the third – according to The truth about trust.

Research suggests leader ‘openness’ was the highest driver of employee trust, followed by effective communication, the ability to make decisions and competence in their role.

‘Our research shows relatively low levels of employee trust across the public sector, which we believe is due to uncertainty following several years of budget cuts and upheaval. This challenge is by no means unique to the public sector – we also see a real opportunity for leaders to transform low trust across the financial services industries by building the open two-way relationships that enable high-performance workplaces,’ said Charles Elvin, CEO of the ILM.

‘It’s no surprise that those industries with the lowest trust levels internally are also among the least trusted by the general public. This suggests that the first step to building trust with consumers is to focus on gaining the trust of your most important stakeholders – your employees.

‘Trust is more than a nice-to-have, it is the lifeblood of sustainable organisational performance,’ he added.