NEW YORK — With trust increasingly tied to business success, PwC has launched an educational program aimed at boosting executives’ ability to gain the confidence of stakeholders.


The Trust Leadership Institute features four-month learning tracks as well as access to thought leaders such as Harvard’s Sandra Sucher (pictured); cohort-centered learning; and experiential trust-building activities and more.

Topics include communications, cybersecurity, and managing sustainable value chains. Interdependencies, ethical decision-making and building a culture of transparency also are covered.

“Leaders today can’t know just their domain,” said chief strategy and communications officer J.C. Lapierre. “We are in a fundamentally new place.”

PwC's goal is to have 10,000 executives complete the course. The inaugural session started last year drew roughly 200 participants, with women and diverse executives accounting for more than half of them, she said. At least 50% of spots in each session are reserved for women and people with diverse backgrounds.

The next session starts in mid-March.

The launch of the Trust Leadership Institute is in keeping with the heightened pressure on business at a time when trust in institutions such as government and the media is down.

The 2022 Edelman Trust Barometer found business is the most trusted institution. 55% of respondents believe companies are best equipped to take a leadership role on societal issues and 65% believe in business’s ability to get results in doing so.