(From Home Channel News) -- Employees are more likely to trust their supervisor or manager than they are to trust the senior leaders in their organization, a recent survey finds. Nevertheless, experts encourage leaders to work on building trust.

A survey of 2,700 employees released Aug. 7, 2012, by the management consulting firm Healthy Companies International found that two-thirds of respondents (66%) said their boss earns the trust of employees.

And a majority of 2,616 North American employees surveyed by BlessingWhite, a global consulting firm, said they trust their senior leaders and managers, with a slight increase in each figure between 2010 and 2012. However, employees are much more likely to place trust in their managers than in senior executives, the research released in August 2012 finds.

“It remains difficult for leaders at the top to build trust with people who they rarely see or may have never even met,” said Joan Dasher, employee engagement practice vice president for BlessingWhite, in a press statement. “Yet our findings also suggest that leaders are becoming better at it.”

After all, when it comes to immediate supervisors and managers, “Their teams see them in action,” Dasher explained. “They can demonstrate trustworthiness in their daily actions and become known as people beyond their titles.”

As for executives, “The workforce scrutinizes everything that executives say and do -- and then speculates about their motives,” she added. “If leaders do not communicate with care, many employees draw incorrect, and unfavorable, conclusions.”

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