When the newly constituted jury announced that it had quickly reached a verdict in the Scott Peterson trial, pundits flashed back to another notorious double-murder case: when O.J. Simpson was acquitted in 1995.

But this jury found Peterson guilty in the first-degree murder of wife Laci and second-degree murder of their apparently unborn son, Conner, even though the evidence didn’t seem as overwhelming as the evidence had been against Simpson.

So what was the difference? Trust.

Although members of the Peterson jury can’t comment publicly yet, it’s obvious that they trusted police and prosecutors more than the defendant. Peterson’s credibility might have been ruined by all the tape recordings made by his former mistress, Amber Frey.

In the Simpson trial, almost anyone who trusted the police saw it as an open-and-shut case. But the credibility of some officers was questionable, and that created a reasonable doubt in the jury’s mind.

Think about these two verdicts the next time you’re in a crazy situation at work. If a decision has been made or an action taken that seems to make no sense, look at the personalities involved.

Don’t leap to this right away, of course. If the decision involves you, try to get as full of an explanation as you can; maybe there is a crucial piece of information that you’re missing.

But if not, consider the issue of trust. Have you earned the trust of the person making the decision? What actions could you take to increase that trust? Could the trust have been eroded by any past actions that might have been misunderstood?

It’s like telling a teacher, “My dog ate my homework.” A straight-A student might get away with that. But no one else would.