This week’s Pearl of Leadership Wisdom is on….

Integrity

“To thine own self be true, and it must follow, as the night the day, thou canst not then be false to any man.” – William Shakespeare

Being pregnant…

Integrity is a bit like being pregnant…you either have integrity or you don’t. You either are principled, honest, scrupulous, faithful, consistent and trustworthy….or you’re not.

I think there are a lot of people around who feel they have integrity but they’d be shocked at what others thought of them.

The person who over-claims on their expenses, has swine flu during the test match, lies to the taxman, parks in the disabled space.

Some tests…

Integrity is what you do when no-one’s looking. It’s the six o’clock news test – how would you feel if everything you said and did during the day was broadcast on the 6 o’clock news?

Mummy what did you do today?

It might be legal to help a company walk away from £80,000 of debt but does it show integrity?

You are the law!

Another great test of integrity, and forgive me because I read it just the other day and cannot remember to whom I should offer credit…is to imagine everything you did became the law and everyone else had to comply…

• Parking in the disabled spaces – everyone?
• Insurance claim for a “stolen” camera whilst on holiday? – everyone?
• Having swine flu during the test match – everyone?

Don’t be so priggish…

Some of this stuff is trivial, some not. And pragmatic people skim over the small stuff saying it doesn’t matter. But it does matter. It matters a lot.

When some very, very smart people working for a small energy company created a better business model in the gas market in the US it was profitable and sustainable and all was well. But some small “lapses” in their integrity became the norm and the small cracks became big cracks and soon the game was up, Enron was bust. The share price was near zero…everyone was out of a job and their pensions, which were invested solely in Enron stock…were valueless.

And there are further examples much closer to home but I cannot write about them because if I started I’m not sure I could stop.

As day follows night…

Integrity is central to leadership, and the first person to lead is ourselves…to thine own self be true.