An early model of organizational trust

“An Integrative Model of Organizational Trust.” Author(s): Roger C. Mayer, James H. Davis and F. David Schoorman. Source: The Academy of Management Review, Jul., 1995, Vol. 20, No. 3 (Jul., 1995), pp.

709-734. Stable URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/258792

The authors created one of the early (useful) models for organizational trust. They defined trust this way: “the willingness of a party to be vulnerable to the actions of another party based on the expectation that the other will perform a particular action important to the trustor, irrespective of the ability to monitor or control that other party.”

Furthermore, the model they argued for is one that has resonance even today. They were some of the first to treat trust structurally, pointing out that the conditions of both the trustor and the trustee matter. Below is their basic model of trust. What I particularly like is that risk is a part of the model and not an afterthought or an artifact of other things.