Earning the way back
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There's a very specific feeling that arrives when you've let someone down who trusted you.
It sits in your chest. It’s heavy and it feels somewhere between guilt and shame.
I remember feeling it for the first time at scale a decade ago, when I was building a company that could detect anything you heard on a commercial radio station and save it for later. We automatically captured ads, offers, interviews and music without touching your phone while driving.
If you've used Shazam, you'll know the experience. We extended it and it worked.
A regional radio station came on board to test it. Then a large national network decided to trial it across one of Australia's biggest markets. Our small team moved technical heaven and earth to make it happen. We had sold magic, backed it up with live, real-time data and built a technology from scratch.
What we hadn't done was think clearly enough about what that data would mean for their business.
For the first time in the history of radio, a network had granular data about who was listening and when. It was powerful information. The problem was they didn't know how to use it with their advertisers. We had given them a capability they weren't ready to monetise.
Instead of opening a door, we'd handed them a key with no lock to put it in.
They didn't continue the relationship.
Our investor-backed business came to a standstill and the company was eventually wound up.
Our team was out of a job, our investors lost money and I felt like I had broken trust with people who had placed it with me.
Episode 201
Last week, I published Episode 201 on the Partnership Playbook podcast (How smart GTM leaders enter markets they don't own) about how partnerships allow companies to borrow existing trust rather than build it from scratch.
It resonated more than I expected.
That weekend, my good friend Ben messaged me with this question after listening.
"But how do you get trust back if you've partnered with another organisation and you've let them down in the delivery?"
I nodded as I read it.
I've been there.
And I've spent a lot of time since that radio company, across the businesses that followed and in my coaching work, thinking about what the path back to trust actually looks like.
It isn't an apology tour or a presentation with a new plan. And it certainly isn’t moving fast and hoping the other party forgets.
The path back is a sequence.
Earning the way back
The framework I use with CEOs is called EARN. I comes from what I've seen working (and what I've seen fail) when trust breaks down with a client or partner and the relationship is genuinely worth recovering.
There are four steps.
E: Expose
Own it completely. Name what went wrong, when it happened, and what it cost the client or partner specifically. Exposure sounds like:
"We underestimated the impact of X on your business. Here's where it went wrong and here's what it cost you."
This is uncomfortable and it's supposed to be. The discomfort is the signal to the other party that you've sat with the weight of what happened.
A: Ask
Before you present a solution, ask them what they need to see.
"What would good look like from here?"
Most people skip this step. They assume they know what recovery looks like and arrive with a new plan ready to present. All this does is manage their own discomfort by filling the silence with action so they can feel like they're moving forward.
The single question "What would good look like from here?" signals that this is about them, not you.
R: Rebuild
Now you present the plan. Not before.
Specific, sequenced and with visible checkpoints they can hold you to. This is all about proof. The rebuild plan isn't only about demonstrating that you care. It's about demonstrating that your approach has changed. There's a difference between the two, and the other party will feel it.
One important note here, drawn from hard experience: wherever possible, put a different delivery team on the recovery work.
The original team might be able to execute the new plan but a different team signals structural change, not just renewed effort from the same people who produced the original outcome.
N: Name them
This is where you stick the landing.
When the recovery succeeds, and it will, if the first three steps are executed well, make the other party the hero of it.
The credit belongs to them.
They extended you their patience, their directness in telling you what went wrong and their willingness to give you another shot when they didn't have to.
The story that gets told after this should be about their leadership, not your comeback and it matters more than you might think.
The recovery narrative shapes the relationship that follows.
If the story is "Phil's team messed up but turned it around," that's a story about competence recovered.
And, the intended outcome of EARN isn't just relationship preservation, it's about a relationship that ends up stronger than it was before the failure because it's been tested, and the test was handled with integrity.
This strategy works and I've seen what happens when leaders skip steps, usually the first one and last one, because they made it about themselves.
Define reality and offer hope
Ken Chenault, the former American Express CEO, talks about the leader's job being to define reality and offer hope. I've carried that framing for years and it’s never more relevant than in the moment after a failure, when the people around you need to be reminded of the immediate reality and be offered hope.
The difficult reality is that most leaders will, at some point, let down a partner or client.
The real test is whether, when it happens, you'll have the courage to expose it fully or whether you'll reach for the new plan before you've earned the right to present it.
Do you have a situation where EARN might apply?
PS If this essay helped, Episode 201 (How smart GTM leaders enter markets they don't own) from my podcast is worth a listen. Tune in on Apple Podcasts, Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts.
Work with Phil
CEO Coaching — For CEOs who want to lead with clarity and grow their business without sacrificing what matters most. A tailored 12-session experience across three dimensions: scaling you as a leader, elevating how you lead others, and building conditions for sustainable growth.
I've spent 20+ years leading, building and recovering businesses and coaching CEOs doing the same. I work with a small number of people at a time. If the timing is right, let's talk.
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