If we were honest with ourselves, we would probably admit that trust is one of the scariest words we ever in encounter. It’s hard to earn, quickly taken away, and must be constantly cultivated. It requires us to open ourselves up to others, which is probably what makes it so difficult.

Trust can be a foreign concept to us in IT. We spend a lot of times interacting with computers, which do what we tell them to do (whether we believe it or not). But we don’t work in a vacuum, and have to develop relationships with our teammates, stakeholders, and others. Sometimes that trust needs to be developed quickly, particularly given how teams come together for projects and can disband once the project is over.

I heard about Rodrigo Jordan a couple years ago and was stoked to see this video of him speaking at Google about developing teams for success. He’s led a number of mountain climbing expeditions around the world. He took this opportunity to discuss his experiences and explain why some expeditions succeeded where others failed.

Dr. Jordan is an educator and mountaineer, President of Vertical S.A., and Chairman of the Chilean National Foundation for the Alleviation of Poverty. Dr. Jordan was nominated by Time magazine in 1995 as “one of the 100 young leaders for the new millennium,” and led the first successful South American expedition to Mt. Everest and K2. He has applied the leadership and team-building skills needed to climb the world’s most challenging mountains to business and education.

Dr. Jordan is a civil and industrial engineer, earned a Ph.D. in Organizational Administration from Oxford University, and is a lecturer in Innovation Processes and Management at the Pontifical Catholic University of Chile. In January 2008, Rodrigo joined a National Geographic team for the Larsen Ice Shelf Expedition which sought to document the impact of climate change on the lesser-known side of the Antarctica Peninsula.

Trust me, the video is worth your time.