The next time you take stock in your career, the next time you think about what it will take to get that promotion or not next job, start with integrity.
Without personal integrity, it ain’t happening.
Some people hold the perspective that everyone you deal with professionally is a client to your personal brand. How well you serve your colleagues, your bosses, your subordinates, your team members. When there is no question from anyone who knows you that your every action flows from a set of high standards, when you have integrity, then you are lowering a barrier. You’re making it easier for the people who will make decisions regarding your career.
One of the easiest ways to lose integrity is by not being sensitive with information.
You can be the most competent person in the company at whatever you do. You can show you company that you’d be excellent at a job with more responsibilities and more accountibility. But if you can’t be trusted to keep information contained to the right audience, none of this matters. Once you make this mistake, even once, then you have a long road ahead to prove your integrity and win back trust:
- You have to acknowledge to your leaders that you made an error in judgment.
- You have to wait until your leadership decides to allow you to have sensitive information again.
- You have to demonstrate, probably for a long time, that you can use that information in appropriate ways.
Talking “out of school” is a bell that’s bery hard to unring. It’s also easy and fun to do. Who doesn’t want to create the secret information club. “Guess who is moving to another team?” “Guess who’s on the short list to get fired?”
You will hit your personal career ceiling hard without perserving your integrity with sensitive information.
Sensitivity to information isn’t the only measure of personal integrity. Have any other advice to share about maintaining integrity in the office, and in life? Please share your comments with us.
If you aspire to lead teams of people as a boss or as a cross-functional team leader, you have got to communicate well, so well that you set the example for your team…no matter what happens.
Some times, this is very hard to do. Which of these examples have happened to you recently?
- Someone is having problems accomplishing a task, and you learn about it three days after you needed to know.
- Someone you are counting on to lead fails to communicate the status of ongoing problems to you.
- A team that you don’t lead is notoriously bad at communicating updates that affect you.
Each of these can be frustrating. An inexperienced leader will:
- feel frustrated and let that frustration show. This is a self-defeating behavior – when you act this way, the message you’re sending is it’s best to avoid being the bearer of bad news.
- complain to a colleague. This can feel good, but you’re just avoiding the problem.
- complain to the boss. Don’t bring problems to the boss…bring solutions. Get the next job by excelling at the job you have.
The best thing you can do is to look into the mirror.
Lead your team and your colleagues by example. Show them what open and honest communication is like. Ask them to be open and honest with you. Show them that there are no consequences for delivering bad news. Admit to your own mistakes and talk about how you’re going to do better – then follow through.
It’s far easier for us to blame others than it is to hold the mirror up to ourselves. So if you want to create change in the world around you, start by changing yourself. The people who follow you will be inspired to change themselves too. This may take time – and this is where the patience comes in.
The more self-aware you become, the more you understand where others are on the same journey. This isn’t bad or good – it just is. Some will be receptive to your attitude immediately, and others will take more time to break away from the fear of change.
I find my patience by remembering that there were times when I was just as fearful. I needed some help and guidance… I still do!
As you encounter issues involving open communication with your team, set the example of good communications, look in the mirror for reasons why your team has difficulty, and have patience as your realize that the people you lead are all on their own path of self-discovery.
How do you act when your team has communications problems? Any good advice for aspiring leaders? Be sure to leave a comment!
Have you ever felt like this?
You’re working on a crossword puzzle. You have all but one of the letters filled in for a word that runs across, and you know the remaining letter must be a vowel. You look at the clue, but you have no idea what the word should be. Frustrated, you move to the word that runs down through that same missing vowel. You look at this clue, and you’re flummoxed as you realize that you have no idea what this word could be. You try running all five vowels through both words, to see if you can make them work, but you just don’t know enough. You try sticking in a “y”, just in case, but you’re still lost.
Sometimes I have this same feeling when dealing with a team of people. Technology leadership is one thing; people leadership is infinitely more complex. There’s a team of stakeholders with whom I’m having real communications problems. It seems like everything I’m saying is ignored, all my reasoning is falling on deaf ears: we’re not all on the same page.
What’s the missing letter?
1. Work harder at listening and understanding. People who disagree with you need to be heard, and know that they are heard. Communications is one of the foundations of trust.
2. Make decisions that respect dissenting viewpoints. The opinions of others need to be part of the decision-making process, even if the decision is made in spite of those opinions. Respect is another pillar of trust.
And then, later on:
3. If the decision turns out to be flawed, own up to that. Be accountable for your choice, tell your stakeholders what you learned, and live up to your promise.
This is the kind of leadership that leads to real growth.