Let's talk about integrity - I
(April 4, 2005)How do you communicate a code of conduct to a fellow worker who is seeing the positional collapse of government, big business and organised religion?
These are difficult times indeed - when people look up to sources beyond the self for reassurance. When we were children and failed, we looked up to parents. Later on, in life, we looked up to a teacher or mentor who would help clarify values during difficult times. And beyond all that, there was always the government. It presented an assurance that there would be continuance. Beyond government, of course, were the church Father, the Imam and the Shankaracharya. The model remained the same, irrespective of your country.
In recent times, we have seen such an established model break down. We have seen a US President compromise the sanctity of his office by giving into the allure of sex. We saw big business fail transparency tests - from Jack Welch, NYSE chairman Richard Grasso, and Martha Stewart, to the folks at Enron. The last bastions to fall were government and the pulpit. Government emerged frail when 9/11 happened. The successive convulsions in the US Catholic Church involving serious accusations of sexual abuse left people wondering: where is our source of strength in times of difficulty?
In India, institutional corruption in big business and government is so pervasive that the average person has pretty much learned to live with it. Solace is often drawn from religious belief that there is an afterlife and in the end, truth will triumph. This was so until the controversy involving the Kanchi Seer left people questioning the power of institutions to clarify values, to physically and spiritually protect and heal us. To me, these institutions represent a power of intermediation between the individual and his future state of existence. And that is progressively exposing its own vulnerability.
When such things happen, people begin to discount the messages they receive from their environment. This is a survival mechanism. It works like this: if a child has witnessed domestic violence, she will begin to switch off from it so that she can move on. When intermediation fails, no form of preaching or teaching works.
This creates significant challenges for organisations that value integrity and expect their people to be principled - personally and professionally. The challenge becomes: how do you communicate a code of conduct to a fellow worker who is seeing the positional fall of government, big business and organised religion? Posters and first day assimilation do not work anymore. The only option, and a difficult one, becomes: walk the talk and talk the walk. First, people in positions of influence have to demonstrate integrity, and then personally communicate the message to their organisation.
This is easier said than done. The reason is that value-clarifications usually take place during dark moments. These happen when things fall apart. Each time there is a fiscal irregularity, or there is a report of misuse of power, or sexual misconduct, we invariably witness two things: first, facts and emotions get mixed up. Then, we get lost in what is called 'shades of grey'.
People falter when they begin looking at a matter - not in black and white, but in shades of grey. Once you get there, you begin to get lost, because we are told the human eye can see 108 shades of grey! Go to a computed tomography machine, it can see even more shades of grey. So, people get mired in the many shades of grey because they find it uncomfortable to see breach of integrity as a black-and-white issue. Some managers skirt determination of facts and let emotions cloud them. They develop cold feet while dealing with a breach.
The other frequently-felt emotions are potential organisational embarrassment and business loss. Consider this: you discover that your star salesperson has faked a travel voucher. He is negotiating a huge order, likely to be settled in a week, and is the only person who knows the ropes in the client organisation. Do you keep quiet; do you warn him and let it go; do you warn him after the order comes in, or do you call him and sack him on the spot? Let's talk about this in the next instalment.
