If This is Happening to You; You Have A Bad Reputation.

Well they won’t tell by words but the treatment they give you surely signifies something!

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You might agree that every one of us is tempted to take shortcuts to success. You might also agree that success comes to those who compromise.

But the question is what is the short cut and what are you compromising?

The way you take and the compromises you make is going to build your reputation in a long run. I agree that compromises are necessary but what kind of things are you compromising is very important.

Compromise with your principles, will give you a tag of “not trustworthy” and compromising the rules will give you a reputation of “going to any end”. Are you ok with being anyone of them? If your answer is no this article is for you.

Reputation is one of the things which you are going to live all your life with. Now, will you have a respectful life, depends on whether you build a good reputation or a bad one! A bad reputation might give you money but it will never give you respect, but a good reputation will give you money as well as respect.

The question then arises why people choose to do wrong and build a bad reputation, the answer is simple: instant money. When you choose a client or a project which has to be done anyhow it is obvious that you are going to charge more than normal. If the work could be done by the usual means you might have not catch the eyeballs!

WHAT IS REPUTATION: It means the beliefs or opinions that are generally held about someone or something. In simple words belief about someone’s characteristics.

Characteristic means a feature or quality belonging typically to a person or a thing serving to identify them.

Kasturi, why are you giving the exact meaning of words? you may ask. Because my dear, you are going to be treated by people, on the basis of this. You might earn very little or too much but in all situations, you will have your character and your reputation defining you.

Have you come across a person who is rich and successful (and silently you want to be like him) but then when you get to know him and the curtains fall and he comes out to be the most unethical person. Also, all the people in his field only respect his money and not him?

Being unethical may get you rich but not in a long run, people come to you with their selfish intent and you would never be respected for the work you do. Sooner or later everyone who is engaged with you will acknowledge you by your character and the reputation you have build.

And hence it is important to take a moment and verify yourself if you have a good character and reputation. Now how can we do that, well no one is going to come to you to discuss your reputation neither anyone will tell you about your character so how are we going to find out?

Well, they won’t tell by words but the treatment they give you will surely signify something.

Here is the list of situations to understand it better.

1. You Are Treated Like a Ploy: Once your negative reputation is been created, people will only approach you with things that are not ethically possible or might involve situations that are illegal. Whenever the plan is evil or requires someone to go beyond rules you are the one hired. Obviously, you are paid a lot, but take a moment and realize, money is coming at what cost.
2. You can be bought by money: Once you accept money for doing something unethical; people know that you can do anything for a few bucks you are treated as if they have purchased you. They pay you your price and then treat you like crap.
3. You Only Attract Wrong People: Suddenly you see your company consist of people who will do anything if paid well be it legal or not. You cannot trust your friends as all of them are only driven by money.
4. You are treated with Disrespect: No one respects a fraud, you are blamed for always finding an unethical way out, and hence no one trusts the work you do. Your work and you are often insulted with innuendos of cheating and getting extra money to cheat.
5. You are offered incentives only in the form of money: All of your colleagues are getting promotions based on their output but you on the other hand only get paid a little extra. The kind of work you do can never be shown anywhere and hence only extra cash is given to you in the form of incentive. Also, a company will never want an unethical person to represent it on higher levels.
6. You Are not valued by your Boss: Your boss rarely praises you in public but on the contrary, cannot stop appreciating you in private. A boss will always want someone who can go to any means to get the work done, but the means you take are not be applauded in public. He treats you less in public, something like you do not matter at all or like you are just there because of your employment agreement.
7. You don’t have job security: The only thing hovering over your head is that you could be thrown out of the company at any time. All your mistakes are taken into strict consideration as you were never able to create trust with your employer. You are in constant fear of losing your job for your smallest mistake.
8. You attract unethical work: Once you step in the shoes of an unethical employee you will only be given the work which needs ethics to stay at bay and get the work done by a crook. If you notice that, the only kind of work you get needs you to step out of ethics, it means you have gained a reputation for the same.

If you can relate to any or all of them, you need self-supervision. Our workplace is the place where the majority of our character builds if we compromise there, we will have to compromise everywhere, as vague as this sentence sounds it is very serious.

I come from a place of love; to shout at you to stop behaving unethically and get yourself together. If you find yourself in this situation and do not know how to get out of it just start by saying ‘NO’. Saying no to things that you think will take you on a wrong track will protect you from gaining a wrong reputation. I understand that saying no is not easy but trust me sometimes it is just necessary.

I understand that ethical ways can take a long time for success but it is inevitable and when you reach there you are they to stay. On this note, I will take your leave!