In the post-Enron world of the early-21st century, integrity, and its cousin ethics, are words that get plenty of air time and even more lip-service. They’re tossed around carelessly, but the deeper, more difficult, dialogue on what integrity is and why it matters is critically absent.
Your own definition of integrity may involve nuances different from the CEO across town. But, ultimately, the quality of integrity is based on strong values. It is the most-cited response to survey questions of what employees want in a boss. This top-ranking transcends generations and cultures. Universally, people want to work for someone they can trust.

Steelcase, the office equipment manufacturer, regularly conducts surveys of the worldwide office environment. In 1991, being honest, upright and ethical were very important to 87% of Canadians, and 72% of Japanese respondents. Jim Kouzes and Larry Posner, in Leadership is a Relationship, cite honesty as the most important supervisory trait in every study they have done since 1981. Over the years no fewer than eighty-seven percent of respondents listed honesty as number one.

Trustworthy

Integrity is the corollary to commander’s intent - the direction we receive from the boss. It is the trait that sends the message, “You can trust me to guide you in the right direction, and to watch out for you.”
The reciprocal of trust is leadership in its most basic form. A leader says, “Here is what I want you to do, and I trust you to do it.” The follower says, “I will do it because I trust you to do the right thing.”

My formative leadership experiences were in the Marines. Those unfamiliar with the military will cite the captive employee aspect that mandates compliance by a subordinate. And yes, unfortunately there are examples of people in leadership positions in the military–and in the civilian sector–who rely on the power of their position to get the job done. Ultimately, the assigned task does get done, but usually, less effectively than in a situation in which the leader relies on positional power.
The more-enlightened leader uses influence to accomplish the objective and acts with integrity. It is only the weak military leader who resorts to, “I am ordering you to do this.” Such comments are more often seen on television than in real life. The captive employee knows the rules and will comply with them. He respects the position occupied by the weak leader, but not the leader.

Consistent

People with integrity deliver on the commitments they make and accept. They do this by knowing not only their own capability and workload, but also, that of their team. They don’t over-commit. They are able to say no and explain why. When they do say yes, they get the job done. If they later find that they cannot get it done, they quickly get help and notify the appropriate people.

Non-negotiables

Too frequently, people look at the world in black and white. And that black and white is based on their values, skills, ability and experience. An activity or decision being evaluated is labeled either right or wrong–depending on the perspective of the one doing the evaluating. But, the reality is that leaders need to be comfortable with a wide gray area that allows individual action and flexibility for the subordinate.

When I coach leaders, one of the first exercises I ask them to work through is their “non-negotiables” list. This gets to one of the classic leadership conversations: Do you want those following you to follow a specified path to achieve the desired result, or do you want the desired result?

Integrity is about tangible actions for an intangible concept and is the foundational element of leadership. People do not want to follow a leader they cannot trust. If they are forced to follow that leader, they will do the bare minimum needed to get by.

Integrity dictates the same behavior, whether in public or in private. Consistency, delivering on commitments, and maintaining standards are all facets of integrity.

A bit of advice Marines often hear before going on liberty in port applies to integrity and ethical decision-making: would you want your mother to know what you are doing? For you the question may be, would you want this to be on the front page of USA Today?

(c) 2006 FireStarter Speaking and Consulting

Wally Adamchik is President of FireStarter Speaking and Consulting. His new book is NO YELLING: The Nine Secrets of Marine Corps Leadership You MUST Know TO WIN In Business. Visit him online at http://www.beafirestarter.com. He can be reached at 919-673-9499 or wally@beafirestarter.com.

Tags: ethics, leadership, motivationethics, leadership, motivation

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We’re a chess set online retailer. With the stakes so high in terms of profit - what to do when competitors get more and more nasty? What if they threaten to send the boys round? Publish a little online defamation? Register confusingly similar domain names? Steal photography and other content to use in selling their similar products?

The maturing of the web has allowed hundreds of thousands of opportunities to people across every industry who previously couldn’t afford to get a physical store. And thousands of IT consultants have managed to join the two skills (technical and business) they have to jump into the shark infested waters of online commerce. This example of chess set retailing is real and current. The victim is a successful niche chess set company who suddenly appeared on the web by utilizing SEO skills, techie ability and a love of chess. After a year of trading, one of the chess competition noticed and started with threats and intimidation. But this has happened across many industries previously dominated by other web sites. What’s the best course of action and reaction?

Flattery

The first thing we feel is pride in the work done. The victimizer has been in chess set retailing for 12 years, we have been active for just one. A fellow retailer has flattered us by recognising a loss of income from our attempts at online marketing of chess sets. Hell, we’re good! - what other industries might we impact? Of course, the reality is that we all build upon the ideas of others. we see an idea and think of some improvement. Inertia then becomes our enemy - continuous improvement is required. So enough with the feeling of being flattered and keep on with the innovation.

No such thing as bad publicity

Naming the defauding site may have the effect of publicising the business to our detriment. Indeed the unethical web site selling inferior chess sets did refer to us directly, but probably realised that it was just sending people over to us. We want to focus on our business with a long term objective, so need to take action such that we don’t lose focus. This is one knee-jerk reaction that won’t necessarily help with the problem, but neither is ignoring the problem the best course either.

Losing focus

We seem to be occupying the aggressor somewhat. Well, that’s something too. Whilst he’s focusing his energies on us, he’s distracting himself from his own company. Nike found this years ago. ‘Hold your friends close and your enemies closer’ only goes so far. Nike innovated from the gut - they came up with their own designs that no other ‘competitor watching’ could have inspired. Whilst our chess competitor is sticking pins in our voodoo doll, he can’t innovate on chess set design and better chess suppliers with clarity of mind. More market share for us then.

Poor business

Our chess retailing aggressor clearly has a poorer business model than us if he has to resort to this kind of behaviour. Why doesn’t he work on his own business and compete in an ethical way rather than the threatening and abusive emails he regularly sends? If he believes we are taking his chess sets market - then why not work on improving his such that customers see a better business? Is this really so difficult? Perhaps he should be working another type of business. Or working for continuous improvement. Harassing the competition in some mafia style suggests a bullying manner that would be better channelled elsewhere.

Legal action

‘Theft’ of intellectual property rights (chess photography, chess product names, chess product descriptions…)- whether yielding any advantage or not - is just that - theft. The plain fact is that such illegal use of property rights may well confuse customers and lead to the wrong conclusion - that the cheaper chess set product is the same as the original site - what a great find? In the world of chess sets, most families will be truly defrauded as they unknowingly have a defective or inferior product at the expense of our company. They are unlikely to compare the product with another and so may never know the quality chess set they could have had. Sometimes, therefore, legal action is required in order to establish the bounds of unethical behaviour. Action can be threatened against the site hosts and against the aggressor company itself. Often a lawyer’s letter may suffice, but may be seen as ‘bluff’. So real court action may be required to bring the matter to a conclusion. Taking this course of action amidst physical threats is something demanding courage, especially when the chess aggressor’s last name has a distinctly Sicilian ring to it. But the only other option may be to be bullied. As in the school playground, bullies have to be stood up to even when a bloody nose is the result.

Site warnings

It has to be remembered that bad publicity is still publicity. Mentioning the aggressor may only serve to send potential customers scurrying over to the site to see his side of events, and his chess sets. We did wonder whether to post the emails sent to us on the site - but the use of bad language is so bad that many filters would block our site. We have resorted to posting a notice of inferior chess set copies being available with language that communicates our ethical stance on such matters. Each overlapping product has a notice attached. This is by no means ideal - but it’s better than nothing. (Suggestions welcome…)

The new world is here. Online retailing and competition is a fact of life. Competition is good for consumers and good for business improvement. But as in the schoolground and in the High Street/Mall there are aggressive unethical bullies online too. Actions can be taken to offset the aggression, evasive tactics can be used with some success, but the end game may involve taking hooligans to the law to stop the murky activities affecting the sanity of our lives and helping us have societies with admirable qualities we all look up to.

Author: Baron Turner of ChessBaron UK, USA, France, Canada - Chess Pieces, Chess Sets, Chess Boards

Tags: business ethics, chess aggression, chess retailing, chess setsbusiness ethics, chess aggression, chess retailing, chess sets

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Within the past four and a half years or so, I have been “fortunate” to run into - and in certain instances - work quite closely with - some unscrupulous, or “not very honest”, entrepreneurs. In most cases, I was heartbroken to find that the impressions I initially had, tended not to be accurate representations of what they did in reality(I say “fortunate”, because I learnt quick, valuable lessons as a result, that now make it possible for me to write THIS article for the reader’s benefit).

Quite a number of these individuals seem willing to - every once in a while - allow themselves a little indiscretion here and there. Some are greedy cheats, and will go out of their way, given the slightest opportunity, to take advantage of another person - even if s/he is a relative!

Yet they KNOW it is wrong to deceive or defraud customers, clients - or indeed anybody. James Cook in his book, “The Start-up Entrepreneur” was obviously familiar with the widespread nature of this problem, and hammered quite a bit on the need for entrepreneurs to be ethical in all their business dealings, at all times. The fact remains that no matter how many people openly engage in dishonest or fraudulent business practices, it will still be wrong for YOU to do the same thing!

But Why Do People Do It?

We must not be too abstract in the way we discuss this problem. To understand it, one could ask the question: Why do some people in business appear to so readily succumb to the temptation to cut corners?

The truth is that many who embark on entrepreneuring with honest intentions, often encounter traumatizing trials, challenges, setbacks and disappointments. In Think And Grow Rich, Napoleon Hill acknowledged that an individual, due to the pressure of a prolonged period of adversity may become temporarily dishonest, in a bid to secure some relief for the pain s/he feels.

So the necessary suffering that a person undergoes in the pursuit of a challenging goal might make him/her do one or two things that are dishonest, for a while. Ideally however, his/her conscience would eventually force him/her to take corrective action to discontinue the bad habits.

Where it becomes a problem is when the affected person, or another who does not even have such a problem - but who seeks a quick and easy route to success - makes engaging in dishonest or insincere acts a regular habit. In other words, s/he adopts routine and repetitive corner-cutting or crooked dealings, as a preferred alternative route to reach a desired goal(s).

You Do Not Need To Do It

I want anyone confronted with this kind of challenge to understand that IT IS POSSIBLE to weather those rough periods of adversity without engaging in unethical business conduct. Simply dig in, learn quickly from your experiences, and correct your mistakes. Keep in mind ALWAYS, the proven fact that periods of difficulty and hardship WILL help you develop psychological stamina, and become more resourceful in dealing with problems you encounter while pursuing your goals.

Again, and at the risk of sounding boastful, I know this to be true because I’ve been there. Had it not been for those terrible losses and disappointments that I have continually overcome in pursuing my goals, I would not have become as self-confident, as I am today, when it comes to discussing entrepreneuring or what it takes to persistently pursue challenging life goals under situations that appear utterly hopeless and discouraging.

What Will You Do, If/When Confronted With A Fraudulent/Tempting Offer ?

Before you give me an answer, I will ask you to read the following statement I use to guide myself: “you will never know if you will steal, UNTIL the day you find yourself presented with a perfect opportunity to do so, in a way that you can be certain no one will ever find out that you did it”.

Now that you have read it, think about my preceeding question again. Do you KNOW for certain what you will do if/when confronted with a tempting proposition to do something dishonest or unethical in business(or elsewhere) in exchange for a reward/return you place a high value on? For many, what they are willing to do is usually dependent on how they feel it will make them look to those who KNOW about it. This is the reason why people keep getting caught for corruptly enriching themselves: they ALWAYS think no one will find them out!

I believe every person who desires to achieve authentic success, must be able to successfully say NO to the above stated type of fraudulent/tempting opportunity (i.e. one known only to him and which s/he is sure no one will find out about). It however takes HAVING a compelling vision, strong values, plenty of self-discipline, great will power and an achievement orientation, to behave in this manner consistently - especially when you experience painfully prolonged periods of lack and hardship.

Work Hard To Immunize Yourself Against The Temptation Of “Corner Cutting”

You must work hard to develop the needed moral strength to resist the temptation when it does come…and it will! In the case of the entrepreneurs described above, they allowed their desperate desire to succeed quickly, to cloud their judgment of what was proper and ethical, and consequently adopted shameful practices.

Sometimes (especially in societies where entrepreneuring is not yet widely accepted as a viable means of earning a living, and social welfare schemes are absent or in their infancy) clients or customers may push the point(where they consider “switching from honest to dishonest”), by refusing to pay up after the entrepreneurs had delivered requested products or services. When this happens, those entrepreneurs who are unable to stay strong under these conditions, look for ways to cushion the “pain”: they begin to cheat those who do bring business to them! Having said that, there are certain entrepreneurs who don’t need any “tempting”, because they are just naturally greedy cheats - perpetually on the prowl for unsuspecting persons they can take advantage of.

BUT the truth must be said: Whether or not you have been cheated by clients, punished, exploited, or betrayed, there is absolutely no excuse for becoming fraudulent in your dealings with others. You won’t last long if you go on doing that. So, it’s up to you to decide where you want to stand. I hope when you take your decision, it will be the right one: which is to act with integrity at all times, in all your dealings, be it in business or life in general.

Tags: bribery, business ethics, business gifts, business integrity, business success, gratification, profitbribery, business ethics, business gifts, business integrity, business success, gratification, profit

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