Interesting points. It sounds like Michael and Issy have a lot going for them, and that they have a hard-to-find constellation of virtues, traits, and skills. It is that constellation that has brought about the atmosphere of trust, general goodness, and business success to the Four Seasons. It is the boss's aura that propagates to all levels of the organization, trust being but one matter.

The key to success is in people, starting with the person at the top of the pyramid. A bad boss cannot formulate success by inverting his personality or by adopting a daily "secrets to success" checklist to fervently abide by because he will fail eventually. That is a guarantee.

So if you want to be successful, you have to be good and hire good people. And if you can't hire good people it is probably because good people are hard to find (and probably expensive). That is why success is hard to achieve.

To push it one step further, an organization with lots of (or some) not-so-good people will not achieve trust, at least not to the fullest extent. A slacker causes other people to become embittered because they have to compensate. Slackers are not trusted. Gossipers are not trusted. Liars are not trusted. Greedy bosses are not trusted. Greedy bosses do not trust.