In 2020, when the world was fighting a pandemic, I started a new role as the country head of an organisation in South Africa. I had been warned that in the last two years 5 country heads had joined and left the organisation. In other words, the local team had been managed by multiple managers and things were chaotic. The global team blamed the local team for vindictiveness and politics. This made survival very difficult for me. In my first meeting with the team, I started by talking about transparency. I told them that if they did not surprise me, I will not surprise them. This was the only way to build trust in the team. If there was a big change in the consultation process, I would not do it without informing the team. I had genuine compassion for my team. During the COVID period, nearly 32 of my team members were infected and I felt responsible for taking care of them. I created a WhatsApp group for the team members and kept in touch with them regularly. I found out that those who were infected had to either work from home after they recovered or take a second Covid test and produce a negative report if they wished to return to the office. But most of them did not have the technology required to work from home, nor could they afford the second Covid test. Although this did not come to me as a management issue and none of the staff were complaining, I decided to take the step and arrange for the organisation to pay for the second Covid test for all the team members. This decision brought my team together who not only supported me but trusted me with whatever decisions I took as a leader.