Episode 3: Faithful or Traitor? What The Traitors Reveals About Leadership and Trust

Speaker: Hello and welcome back to the Leadership and Management Reset podcast. Before we begin this episode, I first need to offer a very clear caveat. We are discussing the TV program, the Traitors. So if you are partway through the most recent UK series or deliberately saving final episodes, I suggest that you pause this episode now, finish the series, and then come back once you've set it through. I wasn't just, it wasn't just about the entertainment. I was absolutely fascinated because beneath those clocks and the round table and the dramatic music and Claudia, and come and doing what she does best, this program is not really about winning money. It's about what happens to people under pressure.

Speaker 3: What it teaches us about leadership and fellowship, what it reveals about teams and what it exposes about human behavior when belonging feels fragile At its core, the traitor gives us the traitors, gives us two roles, the faithful and the traitors. And instinctively we want one to be good, another to be bad. But when we look at leadership, it's really that simple. If we strip away the game mechanics, both roles require influence, both involve judgment under certainty, both set in moral gray areas and both set test character. The faithful operate in the open, or at least they believe they do. They rely on trust, that shared purpose of finding the traitors and banishing them, they rely on conversations and the assumption, if they keep talking long enough, the truth will emerge. Many leaders unintentionally adopt traitor like behaviors. That's not because they're unethical, but because they carry information others don't have access to because they feel responsible and because they believe secrecy is protective. And sometimes it's, you know, some leaders have NDAs that they've signed and can't fully disclose what's happening in an organization. Someone going quiet is no longer neutral, and what disappears very quickly is noons. There's no space for uncertainty or reflection. No room for, I'm still thinking. And everything flattens into either safe or unsafe. And you clear. This is so clear at the round table in the program, names start to land, not because there's hard evidence, but because of feeling has taken hold. What struck me most is how quickly the room shifts from curiosity to self-protection. People stop exploring what might be true and start paying attention to where the safest place is to stand. And that is the moment. Leadership really matters because when fear sets the tone, people do not become braver or more insightful. Yeah, everyone has a vote. They all do it in, um, privately. Everyone writes a name on that chalkboard, but psychologically something else is happening. People are reading the room. The tension is thick. You could slice it with a knife and they listen for which names are gaining traction prior to them writing down on their chalkboard. A name is floated tentatively, someone agrees, another joins in and suddenly a narrative forms. And that's not necessarily because it's accurate, it's because it feels safer to lie than to resist. Because very few people are willing to vote against the tide. And this is where the traitors becomes a lesson in group think, which thrives when dissent feels risky, when belonging feels conditional, and when speed matters more than reflection. Leadership isn't about getting agreement. It's about creating conditions where disagreement is safe, where silence is explored. Rather than seen as agreement or rewarded where people can stand apart without feeling the consequences when they can put the head above the para parapet without feeling that they're going to be shut down. I would like to explore a little bit about the very final of this recent episode of the, uh, season of the Treators. The very end of the final, honestly, genuinely had me on the edge of my seat. I had no idea which way it would go, and that was because of something that happened at the start of the program. And he would've won a clear opportunity to remove her from the game and take the full 90,000 pounds for himself. Yeah, he didn't, he honored his word. He stayed loyal to Rachel, even when loyalty came at a cost to him. Instead of writing Rachel's name on the slate, Steven wrote Jack's name on the slate and banished him. Leaving the two traders side by side to share the prize money. Watching that felt unexpectedly moving because in a program designed around betrayal, integrity stood out. Steven didn't behave according to what the system rewarded. He behaved according to who he decided he was. That was clearly values led leadership values only matter when they cost you something, Steven lost money, but what he gained was respect. I wonder how you could answer. And if you're listening, not as a leader, but perhaps as a team member, this also matters. Rachel, trusted Steven and that trust was honored. So you may want to ask yourself, who do you follow with devotion and complete trust? Followship isn't blind loyalty. It's conscious alignment. Now there is a phrase I kept returning to while watching the traitors. Would you die on the hill for your team? Would you absorb pressure for them? Would you protect them when things go wrong? Would you stand by them when it would be easier not to perhaps like Steven did? Because leadership is not about being liked, it's about being trustworthy. It certainly felt that in this series and who we've become and belongings feels fragile and what we choose when power sits in our hands and whether pr we prioritize safety or principle leadership begins with who you decide to be and when you, on your leadership, you create sustainable impact because people choose to follow you.