Honesty is the best policy

Interesting responses at work today, at least 2 or 3 people
came in and said “If only people would actually do this…” What does that say
about our society? Where honesty is perceived as a bad thing, or to be
considered rather than done.

I am not a good liar and when I do have the occasion to do
it, there isn’t a lot of time before I am coming clean. It makes me fell dirty
and uneasy to lie. Combine this with my direct personality and it can get me
into a pickle on occasion. This is not to say that I don’t care about people’s
feelings, but I am not going to lie to you about anything.

I am not against a good word smith to ease the pain, but I
won’t leave out the negative of a situation just because I don’t want to own up
to the consequences. Old parent adages are come back to haunt again. Didn’t
your parents tell you and then you tell your children that the truth told won’t
prevent a punishment, but it will prevent a more severe punishment?

While neither you nor I believe our parents, it is the
truth. I would rather know that something bad happened and you learned from it
than to have someone keep making the same mistake until the consequence costs
them dearly rather than correcting and moving forward.

On the flipside, why hold back when you have something good
to say? You don’t want to take the attention away from yourself? Recognition and
exposure are your only goals? Doesn’t every leadership book you have ever read
or had a class about say that if the people around you shine, so will you? And,
your start will get an opportunity to shine as well?

Not everybody likes the messenger, but overall the truth
will triumph over something less than that. And you can walk around knowing
that nothing is going to trip you up.