The Entrepreneur Insiders network is an online community where the most thoughtful and influential people in America's startup scene contribute answers to timely questions about entrepreneurship and careers. Today's answer to the question "What leadership style should every entrepreneur try to adopt? is written by James Green, CEO of Magnetic.

Leadership is a journey, and I am learning new lessons all the time. So here are the top three that I currently strive toward, in order of importance.

Be yourself

If you’re not comfortable with yourself, others will pick up on that and doubt you. Or you’ll say one thing and communicate another with your body. With the advent of social media and being 'transparent' (more on that later), authenticity is increasingly important. With successful growth as a leader, you'll evolve into your own brand: every action - or inaction - will be judged and considered at a much finer level of detail than your average daily exchange. Try not to hide, omit, or spin the truth. Looking someone in the eye and conveying passion with all your being will be noticed. Then, when you inevitably have to change your mind, direction, or make a difficult and unpopular decision, people will understand, believe, and follow you more readily.

Build trust

This one is personal - I hate being told what to do. In fact, the best way to get me to do something is to forbid it and tell me it’s impossible. I firmly believe that one of life’s great joys is setting your own goals and getting yourself there with your team. So I try very hard not to tell people what to do. Even when it’s risky and uncomfortable, you’ve got to let the people who are closest to the problem make their own decisions.

When I was running Walt Disney’s film distribution business in Japan in the mid 1990s, AMC started building new, state-of-the-art facilities despite the dearth of movie theaters in Japan. To encourage this expansion, which was clearly good for our business, I lobbied to play our films in AMC at the same time as everywhere else. But AMC didn’t have very many screens (yet), and the traditional Japanese theater chains told us that if we played our films in AMC "first run" they would block access to their screens.

My conviction was that they couldn’t afford to execute on the threat, but my superiors were more conservative and caved to the Japanese demands. The result was that I realized I didn’t have much authority, and I quit.

The lesson I learned form this was that if you don’t think your people are strong enough to make the decisions, then recruit better people. But don’t overrule your management team. Trust and ye shall be rewarded.