Some background and context

In July this year I was made redundant. Out of the blue and my first day back after holiday. Ouch.

It’s the fourth time I’ve been made redundant in 6 years — the last time I swore it would be my last and was one of the main reasons I escaped the corporate world of banking and finance and flew over to agency-land. How wrong was I?

Anyway, time has moved on and so have I. This latest event created some amazing opportunities for me, so it’s not all bad.

But where does honesty come into this? It’s the lack of honesty and the easy use of dishonesty in similar circumstances that led me to think back over the 15 years or so of working to assess if this has been a common thread — not just for redundancy but all facets of working life.

I came to a worrying conclusion. Dishonesty, either overt and extreme or small and subtle, has existed my entire working life.

Is is that prevalent?

There’s been countless times during my career where I’ve been asked not to say something to customers or colleagues or say something else:

• where we’ve bent the truth slightly in a marketing asset to make us look better than the competition;
• where we’ve been told about a company vision by a leader only to find out after they left, their task was to massively cut costs and maximise profits purely for shareholder benefit;
• where I was told the rationale for being made redundant was one thing, when in fact it was another.

There are many other examples, small and big, and I think if you thought about it you’d find some as well. Maybe ones that aren’t so far back in the mists of time? Looking back I think I would have had more respect for the people concerned if they had been honest and up front. But if this is such a common thing in business, it must be pervasive outside of the bubble I lived in?

The implications

Honesty used to be the best policy and was the foundation for business. That and a firm handshake. But now it seems less relevant. Maybe its the fear? Fear of failing. Fear of not making payroll. Fear of not generating “shareholder value”. Fear of getting sacked. Or fear of all the above combined?

Surely the cumulative effect of lots of smaller lies must affect someone’s thought processes such that it becomes the norm? Lie once and it becomes easier the next time — Domino effect. Just look at the banks to see a very relevant and recent example of how institutionalised dishonesty can actually lead to the breakdown of an economy.

A new way

Seriously what is the worst that could happen if something’s gone wrong and you need to tell the other person? Unless someone actually died, and I’m being quite serious, what’s so important that honesty should not be used?

So let’s all make a pact. Let’s stamp out dishonesty in business one little lie at a time.