I don’t know about you, but I find most people find it difficult to define the word “Integrity”.
According to Integrity and Values founder, Jennifer Elliott, “Integrity is not about whether we are honest or moral, rather it is about can we stay true to what is important to us personally, able to act daily in a way that is a demonstration of our values and attitudes. In other words, Integrity is our capacity to make our values and attitudes evident and present in our relationships with others and ourselves. We have Integrity when our behaviour matches who we say we are.”
As an example, Mark says he is honest and truthful. Most people do. This is your declared value.
You are in integrity if you behave in an honest and truthful way. You are out of integrity if you say you are honest and truthful and yet tell a white lie, tell a big lie or withhold information.
I started thinking about Integrity over the past few days when a candidate made a promise to complete some profiles overnight.
The next morning, the profiles had not been completed.
I received an sms in the early hours on the following day, explaining that the person had been held up cleaning and moving.
Having moved quite a lot, I understand the pain and stress and inconvenience of cleaning a property and relocating.
Still, I would have preferred for the candidate to have shared what was happening and to be more realistic with when the profile could be completed.
Did he lie? Not really.
Did he make a promise he had no intention of keeping? Probably not.
Did he want to make a good impression? Most likely.
Was he out of integrity? Well, that depends.
It depends on your definition and your values.
Initially I thought he was out of integrity and when I thought about it, I had to disagree with myself. He had made a promise, he didn’t keep the promise.
That’s not out of integrity.
If he had said “You can rely on me, I always keep my promises” and then did not, now he would be out of integrity because he didn’t behave according to who he said he was.
It’s a very fine distinction.
I’m curious, what is your definition of integrity and is it even important to you?
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