34. The Law of Integrity

The Laws of Business Success

Under the Laws of Leadership

Great business leadership is characterized by honesty, truthfulness, and straight dealing with every person, under all circumstances.

This law requires that you be impeccably honest with yourself and others. As Emerson said, "Guard your integrity as a sacred thing. Nothing is at last sacred but the integrity of your own mind."

Integrity lies at the core of leadership, at the heart of the leader. Everything you do revolves around the person you really are inside. And the person you really are inside is always demonstrated by your actions, the things you do and say.

Leadership has been defined as "the ability to get followers." For people to follow you, to subordinate their interests to yours, they must be able to believe in you and be willing to commit their time, money, and energy to you.

Leadership is therefore a trust conferred upon you by others. To earn this trust, to deserve this trust, you must be true to yourself. You must live in truth with yourself. Only then can you live in truth with everyone else in your life and work.

Perhaps the most important thing you do as a leader is to be a good role model. Lead by example. Walk the talk. Live the life. Always carry yourself as though everyone is watching, even when no one is watching.

Good leaders are completely reliable. People can take them at their word and trust that they will do what they say. They make promises carefully, and then they always keep their word.

A key mark of integrity in human relations is consistency, both internal and external. The best leaders are consistent from one day to the next, from one situation to the next. Because of this internal consistency, these leaders are trusted. People know what to expect. There are no surprises.

Being consistent also means that you treat everyone the same. You do not have one persona for an important client and another for a subordinate. As Thomas Carlyle wrote, "You can tell a big person by the way he treats little people."

There are two basic types of leadership in business today, transactional and transformational. Transactional leadership is the ability to direct people, manage resources, and get the job done. But transformational leadership, the most important form of leadership today, is the ability to motivate, inspire, and bring people to higher levels of performance.

Transformational leadership is the ability to touch people emotionally, to empower them to be more and to contribute more than they ever have before. This ability enables transformational leaders to elicit extraordinary performance from ordinary people.

Leaders think about the future. They think long term. They think about how they want to be viewed by others, now and later in life. Because of this long time perspective, they never sacrifice their integrity or their reputations for short-term gain or profit.

There is a direct relationship between your feelings of self-confidence and self-esteem on the one hand and your levels of integrity and truthfulness on the other. The more you live your life according to your values, the better and happier you feel about yourself, no matter what happens around you.

How you can apply this law immediately:

1. Resolve to live in truth with yourself and with every person and situation in your life. Listen to your body and trust your intuition. Identify the main stress points and people problems in your life and then ask yourself, What is the right thing to do in this situation to resolve this problem and alleviate this stress?

2. Ask yourself: What kind of a company would my company be if everyone in it was just like me? What personal habits or behaviors would you need to change to answer this question in the affirmative? Whatever they are, do something today toward becoming the very best person you can be.

Source: Brian Tracy, The 100 Absolutely Unbreakable Laws of Business Success, Berrett-Koehler Publishers, Inc, (San Francisco, 2000).