There are few words more important in business than integrity. Without it, people won’t want to work with you, they won’t give you the benefit of the doubt or take you seriously. Why then do so many people make basic errors that damage the perception of their integrity?
As with most of my blogs, something happens during the week that triggers the topic. In this case it was the behaviour of my daughter’s driver for her morning school run. As I write this blog it is Saturday and school returns after a two week break on Monday. We had already been having an issue with the driver who frequently arrived late without any advance notice, resulting in me receiving a letter from school regarding the issue. Despite the assurances this would not continue, we should have known better..
I contacted the driver to confirm the pick-up time for Monday only to receive a WhatsApp response that he was out of the country and wouldn’t be back for at least two weeks. Given that it was I who initiated the communication, I wonder when he was planning to inform me – or was he simply not going to turn up on Monday and leave the rest for me to sort out? Needless to say, I have terminated the agreement with that driver.
This is a case of lack of integrity. A message advising me in advance that he was out of the country for a few weeks and if possible, offering a solution in the interim, was all that was required to display integrity.
A similar situation happened a year ago with a friend’s son who at 25 years old is the last of the millennials. He had an interview with a potential employer and was 5 minutes from the employer’s office when he received a call from an existing client with an urgent need for him on site. Immediately and without second thought he turned around and rushed to the existing client’s office. Clearly, he had a sense of responsibility to his client and felt he was doing the right thing.
The problem was that he didn’t take 30 seconds to send a message to the interviewer explaining something urgent had come up at the last minute, apologizing and requesting an alternate time. This would have displayed integrity. Instead, the interviewer waited, tried to call (no answer), grew frustrated and developed a picture of an irresponsible and disrespectful young man with no integrity. No second chance was forthcoming.
I find this lack of communicative common sense more common in younger millennials and Gen Z’s. There appears to be the perception that if it’s important for them then everyone else will understand. However, older millennials and Gen Xer’s like me expect to be notified.
This links directly into the Trust Equation which states that Trust is a function of four variables; credibility (product or market knowledge), reliability, intimacy (ie relationship) and orientation (self or other focused). By not communicating changes in your schedule, ability to deliver etc., you are negatively impacting your reliability score and thereby damaging trust.
Trust is notoriously difficult to win back once it’s damaged or lost. It only takes 30 seconds to communicate a change in circumstances and people will normally give you the benefit of the doubt when you do this in a sincere and timely manner.
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