Trust No One

John Bradley "JJ" Jackson

24 Feb 2026 • 2 min read

In the early 90s, The X-Files made paranoia fashionable. You may recall the protagonist Fox Mulder’s password was “TrustNo1”. I think it perfectly captured the mood of the show.

Today, it feels less like television and more like a personal cybersecurity policy.

For example, today wire fraud is common. Deepfakes are so good I cannot tell what is real anymore. Phishing emails look authentic. And if you’ve been in business long enough, you’ve likely been burned a few times. It happens. And when it happens to you, it feels really creepy.

So the instinct is understandable: trust no one. Yet, the irony for you and me is one cannot build anything meaningful without trust.

Every startup and every small business requires it. Investors need to trust founders. Founders must trust early employees. Customers trust promises to be kept. Partners trust agreements. Remove trust, and everything slows down or the wheels fall off the bus. Innovation shrinks or dies.

Okay, blind trust isn’t noble. It is generally stupid. The real skill isn’t deciding whether to trust or not. It’s learning how to trust intelligently. So, what to do? I suggest that you should trust people (mostly). Control the processes (as best you can).

You can trust people while still managing the processes. Here are a few tips:

Separate financial duties. No one gets access to all the buttons and levers.
Require dual authorization on large money transfers. A very simple check and balance.
Confirm wiring instructions by live phone call every time. This is getting harder to do as financial institutions push to to their websites.
Use milestone-based compensation. Pay for performance.
Put agreements in writing. This may be the most important. Many of us have selective memory.
Keep your promises. Always.

Healthy trust cultures start internally. If you exaggerate, you expect exaggeration. If you cut corners, you will rewarded accordingly.

The best leaders I’ve worked with share an interesting duality. They are open, warm, and optimistic. And they are disciplined about process. They don’t assume evil but they don’t assume perfection either. They build in verification without building in hostility.

In a cyber age, “Trust No One” is a deal killer. It isolates good partners and attracts defensive ones. Instead, take the time to build trust and verify assumptions with evidence rather than just your gut.

Mulder was hunting aliens.

We’re building companies.

P.S. In layperson's terms, trust is the belief that someone or something is reliable, honest, and safe, allowing you to feel secure and without doubt.