Authors: Brian Tracy
Integrity means that you accept that your world can only get ccc_tracy_12_222-248.qxd 6/23/03 3:39 PM Page 230
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better when
you
get better. No one is going to come along and change things for you. If you want things to change, you are going to have to make the changes yourself.
Integrity means that you accept that your marriage gets better only when you become a better spouse. Your business gets better only when you become a better manager or executive.Your sales results and customers get better only when you become a better salesperson. Your financial life improves only when you become more intelligent and disciplined about money.
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ACCEPT PEOPLE THE WAY THEY ARE
Especially, honesty means that you accept people the way they are, not demanding that they be the way you want. You do not go through life wishing, hoping, and expecting that people will change and be different so as to suit you. One of the basic principles of human life is that, with few exceptions,
people don’t change
.
In fact, under pressure, people not only do not change, but they become even more of what they already are inside. If a person has a difficult personality, under pressure he will become even more difficult. If someone is stubborn or inflexible, when she is put under pressure she will become even more stubborn and inflexible. If a person is slightly dishonest, when he is subjected to pressure or temptation he will become totally dishonest. People don’t change.
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BUSINESS AND COMPETITION
Honesty in our fast-moving world also means that you see the world of business and competition as it is, not as you wish it were, especially with regard to the explosion of information and technology.
Many people think that they can make a token effort to keep up with the growth of knowledge in their field and the growth of technology in their work. But this minimum effort is not acceptable to the honest person. The truly honest person realizes that today you have to
run
just to stay in the same place. The truly honest person realizes that knowledge is doubling in every field every two to three years, and this means that your knowledge has to double every two to three years as well.
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Jack Welch, the past president and CEO of General Electric, once said, “If the rate of change outside your organization is greater than the rate of change inside your organization, the end is in sight.” This principle applies to you as a person as well. If you are not continually learning and upgrading your skills, you are in danger of becoming obsolete.
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WHAT ARE YOU WORTH?
All over the country today, people are being laid off or fired by the thousands, and even hundreds of thousands, each year. In many cases, these people have allowed their levels of knowledge and skill to decline to the point where their companies could no longer afford to keep them on the payroll.
Many of them were not completely honest with themselves.
They did not continually upgrade their knowledge and skills so they could continue to add more and more value to their companies.
They hoped that the dramatic changes taking place in the national and international economies would not affect them. And as a result, they got caught in the layoffs when the market for their products or services slowed down.
It takes the average white-collar professional two to seven months to find another job, usually taking a pay cut of 14 to 40 percent. Some people get laid off from highly paid jobs and never make that kind of money again. And if they don’t get busy upgrading their knowledge and skills, it can happen again.
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FOCUS ON ADDING VALUE
Honesty means that you accept that your income is totally determined by your ability to contribute value to your company and, through your company, to your customers. An individual must generate three dollars of bottom-line profit for every dollar of salary or income that the person earns from the company. If you are not currently generating three dollars of profit or cost savings to the bottom line for your company, your job is a prime candidate for outsourcing, downsizing, or eliminating. Honesty means that you ccc_tracy_12_222-248.qxd 6/23/03 3:39 PM Page 232
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accept this as a fact and then do everything in your power to maintain and increase your value.
True honesty means that you never expect to get out more than you put in.You never expect to get something for nothing.You don’t gamble or buy lottery tickets, which in a way is an act of dishonesty.
It is an attempt to get something that you have not earned. The truly honest person never attempts to get rewards without working, or to get rich quick or easy.
In the United States today, millions of people are attracted to the
quick fix
. If they are employees or executives, they want new and better jobs, and they want them immediately. They are always looking for shortcuts, and as a result they are always frustrated and unhappy.
They hope that problems that have taken many months and years to develop can be solved with a
silver bullet
of some kind. They are impatient and they want immediate results. But being an honest person requires that you resist the temptation of the quick fix in any part of your life.
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TRUST IS THE GLUE
Relationships are central to a happy, healthy, satisfying life. All relationships are based on
trust
. Trust is the glue that holds relationships together. You can have all kinds of problems and disagreements with another person, but as long as the trust and respect are still there, the relationship can endure. But, if anything ever happens to the trust, the relationship can fall apart quickly, like a house of cards collapsing.
All business relationships are based on trust. All relationships that involve money are dependent on the word of the borrower or the creditor. All relationships with your bankers, your suppliers, your customers, your staff, and everyone else in your financial world are based on that critical element of trust.
Men and women of high integrity are fastidious about the levels of trust that they have built and maintained. They are careful about their credit, and about their financial commitments and arrange-ments. They always keep their word. They are careful about their banking relationships, their credit cards, their bills, and any money that they owe at any time.
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A TALE OF TWO BANKRUPTCIES
Some years ago, two people I knew well, in two different businesses, were forced into bankruptcy because of the economic downturn.
But the outcomes of their bankruptcies were completely different.
The first of my friends had been meticulously careful about all of his bills and finances throughout his career. He had always paid at least the minimum amounts on his charge cards. If ever he had a financial problem, he went to the person affected and rearranged payments and interest. When he was finally forced into bankruptcy, by a massive and unexpected financial default over which he had no control, he had no choice but to go to court, give up all his assets, and walk away penniless.
But within a week, people were approaching him and offering him money, loans, offices, credit cards, a place to live, and a new car. One of his previous business associates, quite wealthy, mailed him a blank check already signed, saying, “Just fill in the amount you need and let me know for my records; I have complete faith in you.” Aside from removing a great burden of debt from him, his bankruptcy hardly affected him at all.
The second businessman, however, had a completely different experience. When he started to have financial problems, he continually misled and deceived his creditors, people who had trusted him. He neglected to make payments he had promised, and wrote checks that he couldn’t cover. He avoided his creditors when they phoned, and he eventually changed his telephone number. He moved and didn’t tell anyone his new address. He treated people who had trusted him by lending him money as if they were stupid. When he finally went bankrupt, no one wanted anything to do with him. It will take him years to recover, if he ever does. He can’t even get a credit card; he now has to pay cash for everything.
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THE KEY TO SALES SUCCESS
In sales, trust is the foundation of all relationships. A person will not buy from you until he or she trusts you completely. All top salespeople invest a good deal of time building high-quality, trusting ccc_tracy_12_222-248.qxd 6/23/03 3:39 PM Page 234
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relationships with their clients before they ever attempt to sell their products or services.
An association to which I belong commissioned a $50,000 survey of customers last year. Since most of our organizations sell forms of training and consulting services that are somewhat similar, they wanted to find out what caused a purchaser to buy from one company and not another.
One of the questions they asked the customers was what they were most concerned with in making a buying decision. More than 80 percent of the respondents to the survey said that the honesty and integrity of the salesperson was more important than any other factor.
When they asked them what they meant by honesty and integrity in a salesperson, the customers replied that this meant that the salesperson put their interests first. They believed that the salesperson would keep his or her word. They believed the salesperson’s claims about the product. They believed that the salesperson would do what he or she promised, and that the company would fulfill any commitments that the salesperson made. They had a high level of confidence in the word of the salesperson and in everything that he or she did or said in interactions with them.
An interesting fact that came out of this survey was that the quality of the product or service was hardly mentioned. When customers were asked about their concerns over product quality, they replied that they felt that most products or services at a particular level were fairly similar and would achieve the results offered. The key to the sale was how they felt about the character of the salesperson, and through the salesperson, the company itself.
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TRUTHFULNESS IS
THE KEY TO CHARACTER
The real essence of character, and the most recognizable expression of honesty and integrity, is
truthfulness
. If you are completely truthful with yourself and others, you will almost always be viewed as a person of high character.
In our society, men and women of character seem to attract opportunities. Doors are opened for them wherever they go. They are ccc_tracy_12_222-248.qxd 6/23/03 3:39 PM Page 235
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introduced to people who can help them. Money and other resources are made available to them. This is why the most important quality you can instill in your children is a sense of honesty and the habit of truthfulness in everything they do or say.
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PARENTS AND CHILDREN
I have four children. Each of my children has been brought up having the importance of truthfulness drummed into them from an early age. Today, all four of them are
adamant
truth tellers. They are completely honest. I can ask them any question and they will always tell me the truth.
When they were growing up, I made them each a promise. I said, “You will never get into trouble with me for telling the truth.” And I kept my word. When they did something foolish, as all children do, I would listen to their stories without judging or criticizing and then ask, “Well, what did you learn?” They soon learned that they could always tell the truth and never suffer criticism or disapproval. They loved it.
Sometimes they fool around, but all I have to do is ask them for the truth and they will always give it to me, whatever it is. I’m very proud of them. It is absolutely amazing how much better relationships are between parents and children when they absolutely trust each other.
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HUSBANDS AND WIVES
What is true for communications between parents and children is even more important for husbands and wives. One of the best definitions of love that I have ever heard is by Ayn Rand: “Love is a response to values.”
You love another person because he or she represents values that you respect and cherish. The other person embodies qualities that you admire. In short, you love another person for his or her character.
All else will change or fade away over time, but character remains.
Truthfulness and honesty between couples requires fidelity and straightforwardness between the two at all times. If a couple is ideally suited, they absolutely trust each other and are each other’s best ccc_tracy_12_222-248.qxd 6/23/03 3:39 PM Page 236
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friends. There is no one that they would rather talk to or express themselves more honestly with than the other. Character, integrity, and honesty are the foundation qualities of a loving relationship, and are more important than anything else.
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THE UNIVERSAL MAXIM
There is a wonderful test that you can give yourself on a regular basis to measure whether an act is good or bad, right or wrong. It is simple and you can use it throughout life. It is based on the Universal Maxim of the German philosopher Immanuel Kant, postulated more than 200 years ago. He said that
you should live your life as
though your every act were to become a universal law.
In other words, before you make a decision or take an action, imagine that everyone else was going to do exactly the same thing.
Imagine that your decision was going to become a law for yourself and everyone else. This is the true test of whether your decision is a good one. It is the true test of a value or behavior. What kind of society would we have if everyone lived and behaved exactly the way you do?