Transparency, credibility and trust
Three words used interchangeably. They do not mean the same thing, and the difference is the whole business model.
The three words
Transparency
What we do. The method, the yardstick, the terms, the subprocessors, what we cannot measure, and what we are not certified for — all of it is out in the open. There is no internal version of the truth that is prettier than the public one.
Credibility
What the transparency has to survive. Showing something is not the same as it holding up. Anyone can run the open scorer over the evidence and get the same result — or find a discrepancy and tell us. The property is only worth something because it can also fall out against us.
Trust
Not ours to take. It sits in someone else's head and is lost on a single overstated claim. As with independence: it is not declared, it is arranged for.
No step can be skipped
Transparency makes credibility possible; credibility makes trust earned. The last one is the customer's call.
Values are easy to write down. What makes them checkable is the list of things we are trained never to say: what we never say.