Rob Chapman and Harry Hobson have spent years watching trust retreat when people reach for it directly. Their conclusion, and the thing they built a company on: you cannot rebuild trust by trying to rebuild trust. You smuggle it in with something else. Make an ordinary, useful thing easy, and let trust accrue as the residue.

Disclosure: Keiron is an investor in Neya.

Time Stamps:

0:00 - Trust as the foundation of healthy communities

0:29 - Spark Of Trust - A Spark With Rob Chapman & Harry Hobson, Part I

1:01 - Welcome to the show: how Rob and Harry met, and the ten-year path to founding Neya

6:31 - Why trust became personal for each of them, and the "adequacy of trust" tipping point

13:02 - What's at stake when trust breaks down: war, riots, and the cost of low trust

19:59 - Inside Neighborly Lab: the loneliness hub and the Newham deaf community project

25:55 - From local wins to systemic change, and the biggest lesson on contact theory

31:40 - Why digital infrastructure matters as much as physical spaces

38:08 - Why trust can't be tackled head-on, and how it's rebuilt after being lost

44:38 - Jane Jacobs on small interactions, and closing thoughts

46:36 - Outro and preview of part two

The paired essay, "You Don't Build Trust by Telling Someone to Trust You", is at https://www.sparkoftrust.com/p/you-dont-build-trust-by-telling-someone-to-trust-you

Find your people nearby. Neya helps you find local groups, events and neighbours who share your interests, so you can feel more at home where you live https://www.joinneya.com/

Thanks for listening to and watching Spark of Trust. If this conversation named something you've been feeling, share it with someone who needs it. And follow the show wherever you listen. It helps the right people find it.

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Our guests' views are their own, shared to encourage honest conversation. They don't necessarily reflect those of Spark of Trust or the host, and nothing here is legal, financial, medical, or professional advice.

Until next time, keep being the spark that ignites the Trust Revolution.

The chair is turned around for episode one. Dwayne Kerrigan — entrepreneur, host of The Dwayne Kerrigan Podcast, and a dear friend — interviews Keiron McCammon about why Spark of Trust exists at all. It starts with a wrong answer: Keiron went looking for what broke in 2022, blamed social media, and found something underneath it. Trust broke in three acts over six decades — first our communities, then our institutions, then our information environment — each stacking on the one before, so no single fix, founder, or organization repairs it. What follows is an hour and a half on that, and on why the honest response is not a solution but a signal.

Time stamps

00:00 – Trust is awaiting a spark

02:57 - Where this started: a 2022 realization

04:58 - Two wrong diagnoses before the real one

05:46 - The root cause: a breakdown of trust

06:08 - Three acts: community, institutions, information

07:59 - It didn't start with Facebook

08:21 - Why this is a wicked problem, not a hard one

09:08 - No one institution or person can fix this

09:26 - The show's premise: the bat signal and reigniting trust

10:17 - The builders nobody's funding

11:44 - The honest starting point

14:41 - Up next: Neya and rebuilding community

16:55 - Trust rebuilt through small useful acts

18:28 - Why the show is called Spark of Trust

19:22 - Trust is a stacking event

23:03 - Community decline since the '60s, institutions since the '70s

25:37 - Trust in institutions, now under 30%

29:48 - Maybe we're right not to trust them

31:17 - How institutions get captured

34:22 - What trustworthy education, healthcare, and news could look like

37:45 - Technology's long history of speeding up information

47:07 - You're not alone

52:45 - The return on collisions

54:10 - The Team of Teams model

57:35 - From information network to action network

1:05:45 - The stakes when trust breaks down

1:06:58 - Building companies that protect the mission

1:13:09 - The one spark: choose who you do business with

1:15:25 - The close: I'm one spark, looking for others

If this conversation named something you've been feeling, share it with someone who needs it. And follow the show wherever you listen. It helps the right people find it.

Connect with Spark of Trust

https://sparkoftrust.com/

https://www.youtube.com/@SparkofTrust

https://www.linkedin.com/company/sparkoftrust

https://www.instagram.com/sparkoftrust/

https://www.facebook.com/sparkoftrust

https://podcasts.apple.com/ca/podcast/spark-of-trust/id6807994008

https://open.spotify.com/show/3XYhVqgSkTCGMpUYiRZDAQ?si=befe38707d834864

Our guests' views are their own, shared to encourage honest conversation. They don't necessarily reflect those of Spark of Trust or the host, and nothing here is legal, financial, medical, or professional advice.

Until next time, keep being the spark that ignites the Trust Revolution.

Trust is not lost. It is awaiting a spark.

Spark of Trust is an interview show about the people rebuilding trust in our communities, in the institutions we depend on, and in the information we share. One long, honest conversation with someone doing the work: what they're building, what it's costing them, and one thing you can do this week.

Not a panel on how bad things are. The numbers are real, the failures get named, and nobody is selling a playbook. No ads, no sponsors.

Host Keiron McCammon sits with the people who chose the harder road on principle — founders, researchers, reformers, organizers, technologists — most of them invisible to each other. If that's your work, this is where you find out how much company you have.

Proof the work is happening. Language for what you've been feeling. Company for the road.

New episodes weekly, 60 to 75 minutes, each one paired with an essay at sparkoftrust.com.

Spark of Trust — Igniting the Trust Revolution.

If this conversation named something you've been feeling, share it with someone who needs it. And follow the show wherever you listen. It helps the right people find it.

Connect with Spark of Trust

https://sparkoftrust.com/

https://www.youtube.com/@SparkofTrust

https://www.linkedin.com/company/sparkoftrust

https://www.instagram.com/sparkoftrust/

https://www.facebook.com/sparkoftrust

Our guests' views are their own, shared to encourage honest conversation. They don't necessarily reflect those of Spark of Trust or the host, and nothing here is legal, financial, medical, or professional advice.

Until next time, keep being the spark that ignites the Trust Revolution.