Personal Responsibility Starts With Honesty and Integrity






December 11, 2003

We’ve all been in these types of situations. I was at the Post Office the other day mailing a package. Fishing around in my wallet, I found a $20, a $5 and a $1. Guessing that the tab would be about $7 or $8, I pulled out the $20 and placed it on the counter. “That will be $5.85,” said the clerk, picking up my $20 bill. “Wait a minute,” I said, reaching back into my wallet and pulling out the other $6. The clerk took my $6, handed back my $20, put the $6 in her drawer, looked at her computer screen – and proceeded to give me $14.15 in change.

Mental imagery quickly formed in my head, with a devil sitting on my left shoulder and an angel perching on my right shoulder. “Keep the money, it’s her mistake, not yours, it’ll make up for some of the times when you’ve been shortchanged,” I heard the devil whisper into my left ear. “No, don’t listen to him, give the money back, it’s not yours, your integrity is worth more than a few bucks,” the angel whispered into my right ear.

Sorry, but for me, it was a no-brainer. I quietly told the clerk that she only owed me 15 cents in change, gave her back the remaining $14 and walked out, comfortable with the understanding that I had dodged temptation and done the right thing.

Honesty is one of those “bottom lines” for me. I know that I can’t control the actions of anyone else, but I do know that I have total control over my own actions. I know that a certain percentage of people are going to take advantage of opportunities that come their way, whether it is right to do so or not. But I also know that if I would like to see honesty and integrity exhibited by others, I cannot fail to offer those same traits myself.

Every day, we are presented with opportunities to demonstrate personal integrity, to exhibit the kind of person we see ourselves as being. How we respond to those opportunities, when no one else is around and nobody will ever know, determines what type of person we are and what type of moral values we practice.

A few years ago, while in Omaha on business, I found a wallet beneath a hotel bed. Being the curious type, I looked inside and saw that it contained more than $200 in cash. If I had been a thief, I would have pocketed the cash and used the credit cards to buy clothes, jewelry and electronics. Not being a criminal, I had several other options. I could have left it under the bed and let the maids eventually find it and deal with it. I could have turned it into the front desk clerk, trusting that he would do the honorable thing. I could have returned the wallet and kept the cash as a “finder’s fee.” Or I could have done what I did, which was to call the guy, tell him that I had found his wallet, and that I was mailing it back to him.

Some of you might think that personal integrity is dependent more on one’s individual circumstances than on personal philosophy; that willingness to part with unearned money is merely a function of economic status. Put another way, you might think that it’s OK to be honest if you can afford it -- but equally fine to be dishonest if you cannot afford it. To my way of thinking, that flies in the face of logic. Either you are or you aren’t. Being 99 percent honest is the same as being 100 percent dishonest; being “a little bit dishonest” is like being “a little bit pregnant.” Whether you want to acknowledge it or not, white lies are lies nonetheless.

Those of you who believe integrity can be measured in degrees should remember the story told by Winston Churchill. At a dinner party one night, an inebriated Churchill asked an attractive woman whether she would sleep with him for a million pounds. “Maybe,” the woman said coyly. “Would you sleep with me for one pound?” Churchill then asked. “Of course not, what kind of woman do you think I am?” the woman responded indignantly. “Madam, we’ve already established what kind of woman you are,” said Churchill, “now we’re just negotiating the price.”

Most of us have our limits, or more precisely, our temptation level. It’s also not always as black-and-white as the examples I’ve portrayed. But there’s usually a right and a wrong, and using common sense and integrity will usually lead you to the correct result.

If you found $100,000 on the street, you might or might not be tempted to keep it. But what if you discovered that the funds had been stolen from the Red Cross or the Salvation Army? Would you be less likely to want to keep funds that had been earmarked by others for charitable purposes? Conversely, what if you learned that the money had been dumped by drug dealers during a police chase? Would you be more likely to keep it, since you wouldn’t want to return it to criminals? Or would you be less likely to keep it, since it is “dirty money” garnered through illegal activities? Persons of integrity wouldn’t let those types of questions cloud their judgment; they would turn the money over to the authorities (the police or the courts) and let proper ownership (and any possible resultant rewards) be determined through a legitimate legal process.

The last thing I want to do is paint myself as being holier-than-thou. I’ve made my shares of mistakes over the years, most of them when I was much younger than I am now. I don’t attribute my past errors in judgment to being poor financially (although I was); I attribute them to being immature; I hadn’t clearly defined for myself the difference between right and wrong, and my willingness to live within those boundaries of morality.

My wife will never let me forget something that occurred during our first year of college more than 30 years ago. I stopped at a Texaco station in rural Minnesota for some fuel, but nobody came out to help (this was in the days before self-service, when attendants would fill your tank, wash your windshield, check your tires and add oil – and gas was 25 cents a gallon). After a minute, I went inside, and discovered that the place was empty. “Free gas!” I thought happily. I returned to my car, picked up the gas nozzle and proceeded to fill my tank to the brim. As my girlfriend/future wife slid down in the seat, totally embarrassed by my actions, another car pulled into the station. Acting as if I was on duty, I walked over and asked them whether they wanted regular or premium (again, this was before the days of unleaded). Yup, you guessed it. I filled their tank, too, then took their money and waited for them to drive off before I beat a hasty retreat.

Is that the type of thing I’d do today? Of course not! It’s the kind of thing an immature teenager would do. We all make mistakes. I don’t believe we can ever be perfect; perfection is unattainable. My goal is to improve myself as much as possible, understanding that I will always be human and will continue to make mistakes for as long as I live. The only people who don’t make mistakes are people who don’t do anything. Every time you venture out of your house, you risk slipping up. But the alternative is to spend the rest of our lives at home curled up in the La-Z Boy. I’d rather take my chances out in the world. I’ll do the best I can, and do my best to apologize and make amends when I mess up.

There have been times when I’ve been faulted for being “too honest” with people. Despite what they say, some folks don’t want to hear the truth, and aren’t mature enough to handle it when they do hear it. Since it is my nature to be forthright, I’ve found that I need to ask questioners whether they really want my answer. My preference is to tell somebody the truth and give them a chance to succeed at their task, not sugar-coat some namby-pamby response that ensures that they fail. As a marketing consultant for more than a decade, I have helped dozens of people build successful businesses, and I’ve learned what it takes to rise above mediocrity. When struggling business owners ask me for an honest appraisal, I owe it to them to give them correct information, so that they can either make adjustments and succeed, or cut their losses and get out. To do otherwise would be to do a disservice to my clients.

About five years ago, a friend asked me to analyze his business and help figure out why it wasn’t growing the way he had anticipated. I told him the truth: the fellow had unrealistic expectations, given the amount of time and money he was willing to invest. I told him he couldn’t expect to reap maximum growth with minimal effort, and that if he wasn’t fully committed to his plan, he shouldn’t even try. That’s not what this guy wanted to hear. For whatever reason, he wanted me to maintain the illusion that he could be successful without paying the price – kind of like a farmer being able to harvest in the fall without planting in the spring. He chose to sever our business relationship. I looked at his decision as his loss, reasoning that he would have been better off working with someone who told him what he needed to hear, not what he wanted to hear. If you choose to surround yourself with sycophants, you deserve what you get.

I don’t always nail people between the eyes. If I see that somebody’s made up their mind and isn’t interested in hearing my opinions, I’ve learned to clam up. As Churchill said, one of the wonderful things about living in a free-market democracy is that people get precisely what they deserve. But that doesn’t mean I have to play along with them and feed their misconceptions. My view of personal responsibility and individual integrity requires that I treat others the way I would like to be treated. If I expect others to tell me the truth, I need to do the same.

One thing I cannot abide is people not following through on their commitments. Beginning at an early age, my father taught me that a man’s worth can be measured by how well he keeps his word. To Dad, there was nothing worse than breaking a promise. He believed that, when you made a commitment, you backed it up with your honor and integrity, and that nothing short of death should cause you to break that commitment. (In fact, Dad would believe that, even in death, you should have a backup plan, to ensure that your promise is fulfilled and that your good name is maintained.)

I must be somewhat naive. I am continually amazed by how many people think nothing of backing away from their commitments, particularly those that put others at a disadvantage. I’ve “loaned” significant sums of money (ranging from $5,000 to $10,000) to three people during my lifetime, and to this day, none of the three has paid me back. Because of my experiences, I’ve adopted a hard-and-fast rule: I no longer loan money to people. I either give them some money as a gift, not wanting or expecting it to be returned, or better yet, I show them how they can extricate themself from their predicament through their own actions. Given my rules of personal responsibility, I would rather teach someone how to fish than give them a fish.

In the end, it comes down to practicing what you preach. If everyone would simply live their life by the Golden Rule, if they would simply treat others the way they would like to be treated, most of the day-to-day problems we encounter would disappear. Road hogs would slow down, move over and let you merge. Restaurant workers would make sure that you were getting the kind of meal they would like to eat. Your next-door neighbor would shovel a few extra feet of sidewalk, rather than a few feet less. Your child’s teacher would spend a few extra minutes working on math problems, rather than simply issuing a failing grade.

Would you like all those types of things to happen? Then you have to be the one who is willing to slow down and move over; you have to be the one who offers a better quality product, does a little more work, spends a little more time. As I said earlier, you can’t control the actions of other people, but you can control your own actions.


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Copyright © Mister Personal Responsibility, Inc. 2003. All rights reserved. No republication allowed without the written consent of the author


Previous Articles

Determine Your Beliefs
Personal Experience
Half a Loaf
Compromising on Strong Opinions
Economics
Short Shots
The Budget Season
The Lesson
Deserted By My Party
Personal Responsibility Column #1

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About the Author;
Vic Ellison, Apple Valley, Minnesota, is the father of three and the grandfather of two, and has been married for 25 years. Vic is an independent businessman with extensive backgrounds in politics and writing. He can be reached at Vic@boomerjournals.com