Robb Thompson is the founder and President of Robb Thompson International, an innovative company that focuses on developing leadership skills with integrity. His coaching centres on  personal excellence and character development. Recently he wrote on the necessity of honesty as a core value and respect as a mandatory skill:

Honesty

Webster’s defines honesty as honorable in principles, intentions and actions; sincere; frank; truthful. Honesty is the willingness to reveal your true motives. Honesty is similar to transparency, meaning full disclosure.

Honesty is a responsibility to yourself and to others. The foundation of your character cannot withstand the cracks of dishonesty. Every time you allow yourself to be dishonest, you weaken the strength of your character. Every crack reduces the strength of your foundation. Although a crack may be small today, it will eventually split the entire foundation.

Honesty does not change at home, work, or elsewhere. It is always the same. It is a way of thinking. People of honesty can hardly even imagine telling a lie. It’s just not in them. They have aligned themselves to the True God, and His life in them drives them to tell the truth. These people have a hard time believing that other people lie regularly, but they do!

Perceived Payoff:

Everyone does what they do because there is a perceived pay off. I use the word “perceived” because it is not necessarily true. An individual who is lazy has a perceived payoff. An individual who smokes perceives that the pleasure is worth the pain. Likewise, a dishonest individual lies or withholds truth because of the perceived payoff. In every case the payoff is immediate, but the negative costs are delayed. With a little foresight and wisdom, honesty becomes a much sweeter choice during trying times.

Truth always comes to the surface, if not in this lifetime, then in the next. And even if the truth never surfaces, the conscience is a constant, painful reminder. The murderer whose crime is never discovered may have gotten away from the law, but his memory torments him.

Half Truth – Full Lie:

People often lie to make themselves look better. Isn’t it interesting, though, that anyone we know who lies has a horrible reputation? Now, society doesn’t call this lying-it’s just stretching truth. It’s deceiving people without actually saying anything untrue. Nevertheless, honesty leaves no possibility for deception. Do you stretch the truth or hide revealing facts?

Although honesty may cost you in the beginning, you’ll experience the rewards in the end. The Scriptures tell us that the integrity of the righteous will deliver them.’

The message is in order to grow your reputation, you must be honest and be respectful. Nothing else will authentically draw people to do business with you or accelerate your success as much as these traits.

You have only to count the number of contributors who helped author Digital Nomads to understand the nature of ‘new media, new work’ paradigm.  Scroll to the end of the article and do a count…yes, that’s collective intelligence and knowledge capital at work. No doubt the geographies and timelines that intersected in the aggregation and evolution of the final whitepaper was greatly facilitated by continuous access to the web and a broad variety of social media tools.

‘Having a mobile workforce means exploring what productivity means to you as the employer and having clear communication of goal and progress. The benefits of having digital nomads outweighs the costs.’  It can lead to reduced infrastructure costs, better connections with customers, and happier employees. All of which are cost savings to the employer.’

Times, they are a changing.

Trustworthy people have to be consistent – their actions and lifestyles set out an example of integrity and commitment. Peter Drucker(2) describes the “mirror test”, where leaders make sure that the person they see in the mirror in the morning is the kind of person they want to be, respect and believe in. If there is a lack of consistency between our public and private lives, then sooner or later we will be unable to manage the divide.

Organizational values define the acceptable standards which govern the behaviour of individuals within the organization. Without such values, individuals will pursue behaviours that are in line with their own individual value systems, which may lead to behaviours that the organization doesn’t wish to encourage. Frequently, most organizations derive their culture from a top down model, but what happens in more flat cycle, chaordically driven environments?

In a smaller, co-located organization, the behaviour of individuals is much more visible than in larger, disparate ones. In these smaller groups, the need for articulated values is reduced, since unacceptable behaviours can be challenged openly. However, for the larger organization, where desired behaviour is being encouraged by different individuals in different places with different sub-groups, an articulated statement of values can draw an organization together.

Clearly, the organization’s values must be in line with its purpose or mission, and the vision that it is trying to achieve. So to summarize, articulated values of an organization can provide a framework for the collective leadership of an organization to encourage common norms of behaviour which will support the achievement of the organization’s goals and mission.

Five ways to live out values

However, just as with a mission or vision statement, it is one thing to have a written guide to an organization’s values that remains on the wall, or in a folder, but it is quite another thing to have living values which shape the culture – the way that things get done. So here are five suggestions to ensure you have living values:

1. Communicate the Values Constantly. Values should fit with the organizations’ communication, both internally and externally. If we say that we’re fun, team-oriented where everyone counts, then having a traditional style with a photo of the CEO may challenge this. Refer frequently to the values in talks and sermons, in articles in internal/parish magazines. Acknowledge and thank those people who have achieved something which particularly emphasises the values.

2. Enroll New Folk. The values should be explicitly available as new members join an organization. If your organization is a business, this can be a part of the selection process.

3. Revisit and Refresh the Values. Revisit your values periodically – allowing members to update them. This has the power of enrolling those who have joined the organization recently, and avoids the stated values no longer reflecting the business culture.

4. Confront Contradictory Behaviour. Ensuring that we give feedback to those who don’t live out the values of the organization. If people are allowed to live out contradictory values, then over time there is a clear danger that these will usurp the desired values, particularly if it is the more dynamic, dominant individuals who are espousing the contradictory values.

5. Periodically Check out with Feedback. Ask people what they think are the values of the organization – not only members, who may be influenced by the stated values, but outsiders – observers, customers, former members.

Pause for Thought : Do you have a statement of values. If not, let your organisation come up with them, rather than driving them yourself.  If you do have a statement, is it a living expression of current, real values in the organisation or an expression of past desires?   Review the five pointers above to see how well the organisation is living the values.

This article is courtesy of The Teal Trust.