Earn trust

We do what we say. We listen attentively, speak candidly, and treat others respectfully. We are humble enough to recognize our own mistakes and commit to improving.

Back to the universal principles

Calibration

Under, just right, over.

Situation	Under	Just Right	Over
A date you gave slips	Lets the day pass and hopes no one notices. The other person finds out when they chase the work.	Flags the slip as soon as it is real, says what still holds, and offers a new date they can keep. Owns the miss once, then gets back to the work.	Sends a long apology and keeps asking if people are still disappointed. The delivery waits while the relationship gets managed.
Credit after a shared win	Tells the story as if the call was mostly theirs. Teammates hear their names late or not at all.	Names who did the hard parts in the review, and still owns the outcome if something breaks later.	Deflects every compliment so thoroughly that no one can tell who decided what. Reviewers leave unsure who is accountable.
Asked something you do not know	Answers with confidence anyway. The gap shows up later in the work.	Says what they know, what they do not, and when they will come back with the rest. People can plan around the gap.	Prefaces every answer with how little they know. The meeting stalls because no one will take a position.
A gap in a peer's draft	Stays quiet to keep things easy. The issue ships with their name next to the review.	Takes the concern to the person first, with the specific evidence, and stays open if they have context the reviewer lacked.	Raises it on a wide email thread to show they caught it. The peer spends the week defending the draft instead of fixing it.
Bad news for a stakeholder	Softens the update until the risk is hard to read. The stakeholder learns the truth from the outcome.	States the miss, the impact, and the next step in the same note. Does not pad it, and does not dump it without a path.	Leads every update with everything that might go wrong. People stop paying attention because every update sounds like an alarm.
You were wrong in a review	Lets the written comment stand. People keep building on a view they already know is off.	Corrects themselves in the same review thread, briefly, and updates the decision. Takes the awkward minute so the written record is right.	Replays the miss in later meetings. The team spends more time on the apology than on the new call.
A newer teammate flags a risk	Waves it off because the person is new. The risk sits unexamined.	Hears them out, checks the claim, and credits the flag if it holds. Pushes back with reasons if it does not, so they still bring the next one.	Treats every new concern as equally urgent. Nobody weighs which ones matter, and the list fills with noise.
Comparing the team's work	Talks as if this team is already the standard. No one looks at stronger work nearby.	Puts this week's work next to a stronger example, without shaming the people who built it. Uses the gap to pick one thing to raise this week.	Compares the team to a famous team somewhere else so often that people stop believing the comparison. Energy goes into feeling behind, not into the next fix.

Further reading

Sources and essays on this principle.

About Dawn Aerospace
The public mission this tenet is meant to serve.
dawnaerospace.com
Careers at Dawn Aerospace
How the company presents the work to people who would live this tenet.
dawnaerospace.com