Gaia Giambastiani (ESCP), ‘Businesses and leaders can tackle the challenge of trust through credibility’

‘People,’ he continues, ‘may be relatively capable of distinguishing between true and false content when asked to assess its accuracy, but this ability carries far less weight when they have to decide what to share on social media.’ So, in many cases, the spread of misinformation online does not stem from a deliberate intention to share something false. In fact, in a context such as social media – which tends to highlight elements such as engagement, reactions, interest or emotional content – ‘accuracy is not necessarily what we focus our attention on’ at the moment of sharing, according to the professor. For this reason, ‘research shows a substantial gap between what people consider to be accurate and what they are willing to share’.

Disinformation and misinformation pose systemic risks to those who consume information. “One of the main risks,” says Giambastiani, “is polarisation. False or manipulated information can reinforce pre-existing beliefs, harden positions and exacerbate social and political divisions”. Furthermore, the World Economic Forum’s Global Risks Report 2026 also highlights the strong interconnection between misinformation, disinformation and social polarisation. ‘A second risk is desensitisation,’ adds the expert. ‘Continuous exposure to contradictory, manipulated or hard-to-verify information can lead to habituation, reduce critical thinking and foster a form of informational disengagement.’ The risk, therefore, is not only ‘being deceived, but also becoming progressively less willing to verify and investigate further’.

The consequences can also be significant for organisations. First and foremost, there is a risk to trust: ‘inaccurate or contradictory information can undermine credibility with customers, employees, investors and other stakeholders’. Added to this, according to Giambastiani, is a direct impact on the quality of decision-making. ‘If false, incomplete or manipulated information enters organisational processes and is treated as reliable knowledge, it can lead to strategic and operational errors, with reputational, legal and compliance consequences,’ explains the expert. Furthermore, this information can spread through internal processes, stakeholder networks and supply chains, ‘increasing operational vulnerability’. It is precisely this ability to spread that makes misinformation a systemic risk: “an information problem,” the professor summarises, “can become a problem of trust, decision-making and coordination.”

At this point, one naturally wonders how organisations can communicate in this climate of mistrust. According to Giambastiani, they can ‘draw inspiration from certain principles of the scientific method’, which ‘does not require blind trust in the speaker, but makes the process by which a statement is reached evaluable’. Organisations must therefore base their communication on evidence, ensure transparency regarding the sources and criteria used, allow for the verification of information, and accept that new evidence may lead to a review or correction of what has been communicated. For this process to succeed, however, information and trust must become ‘a matter of governance’. First and foremost, “the organisation must define responsibilities, processes and standards,” explains the expert, “specifying who is authorised to communicate, on the basis of what information, through which channels, and with what mechanisms for verification and correction.” The quality of information must, in fact, be managed in the same way as the organisation’s other critical resources. In practical terms, this ‘means ensuring the quality and provenance of evidence, introducing verification stages prior to communication, developing information literacy skills, and safeguarding the integrity of official channels’.

Among the organisations that have successfully transformed transparency, verifiability and the quality of information into elements of governance is GitLab. The US technology company has, in fact, made its organisational handbook publicly available and uses documented and traceable processes as a reference for decision-making and communications. “The idea,” explains Giambastiani, “is to make visible not only the decisions, but also the information and the reasoning behind them.” Another interesting example is that of Patagonia, which for years has been making information available on the origin and impact of its products and suppliers. “The company’s promises are thus accompanied by information that allows them to be verified,” says the expert. In Italia, there is also the example of Barilla, which has developed supply chain traceability systems to identify the origin of raw materials and the parties involved in the process. In the case of the pasta manufacturer, “traceability,” she observes, “becomes not only a tool for quality control, but also a way of making the information shared with stakeholders more robust and verifiable”. In general, all three of these organisations base their credibility not only on what they communicate, but also on processes “which make the information underpinning that communication more transparent, verifiable and consistent”.

The crisis of trust is not however a problem that affects organisations alone, but leaders as well. To be credible, these figures do not necessarily have to communicate with greater certainty or always have an answer, but they must ensure that ‘their way of communicating is trustworthy’, says Giambastiani. ‘This means distinguishing between facts, interpretations and opinions; explaining the evidence on which one’s statements are based – explains the professor – acknowledging what one does not know or what might change in the light of new information’, but also ‘maintaining consistency between words and behaviour and, when something goes wrong, acknowledging it and explaining how one intends to address it’. One interesting example in this regard is Cristina Fogazzi, founder of VeraLab. Faced with a 2025 that ended with a fall in revenue and a loss of around 3 million euros, the manager in fact ‘chose to take direct action, starting with the figures and publicly explaining some of the difficulties the company had encountered’, says Giambastiani – “She spoke about changes in the digital market, investments in the physical network, and also acknowledged decisions that had not produced the expected results.”

“Credibility, in this case,” he continues, “does not stem from an attempt to downplay a negative outcome, but from a willingness to present the facts clearly, acknowledge mistakes and explain the subsequent actions.” Another interesting example is that of Brian Chesky, co-founder and CEO of Airbnb, during the Covid crisis. “When announcing a drastic reduction in staff,” Giambastiani adds, – “Chesky did not merely announce the decision but shared the information on which the company was basing its decision, explicitly acknowledging what could not yet be known, explaining the principles used to reach the decision and the measures planned to support those affected.” Both examples, despite their differences, show that “acknowledging a mistake or admitting uncertainty can strengthen a leader’s credibility when accompanied by transparency regarding the decision-making process”.

There is also another dimension that comes into play in the perception of a leader’s credibility: authenticity. However, according to research conducted by Giambastiani with Joseph Nunes and Andrea Ordanini and published in the Journal of Marketing, this ‘is not a one-dimensional characteristic’. Rather, ‘it is an overall judgement that consumers form based on six components: accuracy, connection, integrity, legitimacy, originality and competence, the relative importance of which may vary depending on the context’. Precisely for this reason, different leaders ‘can be perceived as authentic through different combinations of these characteristics’, according to the professor. An interesting example in terms of connection is that of the US Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. In August 2026, she chose to publicly share her journey of freezing her eggs on social media, documenting both the practical and personal aspects and explaining that she wanted to share what she was learning with other women. There is also an element of consistency over time, as she had already spoken publicly about the possibility of freezing her eggs back in 2020.

‘Sharing personal information, therefore, is not significant simply because it concerns something private: it becomes a possible sign of authenticity when it is consistent with one’s own voice and with the way one presents oneself over time,’ says Giambastiani. A completely different approach is that of expertise. For example, Jensen Huang, co-founder and CEO of NVIDIA, whilst leading a global company, continues to delve directly into the technical substance of the innovations he presents, moving in his public speeches from strategic vision to explanations of extremely complex technologies. In this case, expertise becomes something the audience can observe in the communication itself and in the leader’s ability to demonstrate that they genuinely know what they are talking about. In a landscape dominated by a crisis of trust and disinformation, authenticity can therefore contribute to the credibility of a leader and their organisation when the characteristics through which it is perceived are consistent with their identity and behaviour: ‘it does not, in fact, consist merely in being believed, but in giving others good reasons to do so’ and to place their trust in them.