by Jack Perry
“Nothing gives so much to a person's life as a set of principles.” – Ralph Waldo Emerson
Sometimes we might perceive that everything and everybody is for sale. We watch TV and see being carted off to jail those people who sold their lives away for a grab at the corporate till. We drive past a high school and see parents trying to buy their kids’ respect with expensive clothes and fancy cars. Everywhere you go you can see the nouveau riche, those who have bought the toys and trapping of success. At work, we might see employees giving lip service to a boss who basically bought their toadyism by making them fearful of losing their jobs.
Ironically, a huge difference exists between what these people think they’re buying and what they’re really getting. You can buy all the Hummers for your children you can afford, but you can’t buy the respect of others. In fact, that sort of conspicuous consumption usually earns the conspicuous consumer the opposite of respect; they’re a joke, at best, to those who understand that you must earn respect—you cannot buy it. Like all of the really important things in life, respect is just not for sale.
Character traits like loyalty, integrity, and honesty are not for sale. Your core beliefs and values might change from time to time, but at the moment of crisis or a big decision, you must stop yourself from crossing that line and selling out.
Look at some of the corporate leaders who have gone to jail because of their dishonesty and self-serving greed. They sold out their integrity and honesty. If those values are not for sale for you, then you have to commit to being totally honest, 100% of the time—no tiny white lies or a little fudging here and there. Even for seemingly minor things, you do not sell yourself short and are completely truthful.
Selling Sales Success
In business and in personal relationships, accurate and timely information should definitely always be for sale, because your honesty and personal integrity should never be for sale. That means you give complete product and service descriptions: every plus and every minus without smoothing over the shortcomings of a product to meet a particular client’s needs. When a client or prospective client presses and asks, “Is this really the right thing for me?” even if you need the business, if you know the product or service is not right for the prospect, do the right thing and tell them no. Because in the long run, what you will have sold for that short-term gratification, you will end up losing in the bigger sale: that client’s confidence and respect over a lifetime.
Other values you should never sell out include fair-mindedness. Even if you know some “dirt” on a competitor, you don’t “sell” it at any price because it would be unfair and inappropriate to do so. And if you do spread that gossip, it’s guaranteed to come back to hurt you another day.
The value of complete loyalty—to your family, friends, and causes—should also extend to your clients. Information a client gives you in confidence during a conversation is not for sale. For example, you might know some insider information about a client that would help another client, but if you’ve been told not to share that information, then you don’t do it. It’s not for sale.
When Temptation Lures
In our daily lives, we all allow the moment to get ahead of us, and that’s how we fall prey to temptation. What should you do when you’re tempted to compromise your values? We all experience those “just this once” and “no one will get hurt” and “no one even needs to know” feelings now and then.
When you find yourself being lured into a position that compromises your values, you must be strong enough to step away and fall back on your basic set of values. Ask yourself, “Is it worth it?” Think: What would my mom or dad do? What would my local pastor, priest, or rabbi or someone else I know and admire do? What would one of my heroes or role models do? What if I had to wake up and find this on the front page of my local newspaper tomorrow?
Consider the long-term: What do you want to be known for? How are you building that reputation? Know that if you start to sell out your core values, you won’t have a good reputation for long.
Stop and ask yourself, “What don’t I ever want to sell? Am I selling things I shouldn’t be selling? Am I selling valuable friendships,” for example, for the powerful but fleeting sensation of feeling important in front of a crowd?
A great way to help you resist the temptation to sell out is to create a values “bible” for yourself, a personal code where you determine what is strictly NOT for sale and what you are willing to compromise on. On the values side, put those things you are unwilling to let go of at any price. Begin with one word for each of those values: education, honesty, commitment, family, health, spiritual relationship, etc. Next, create a statement of your commitment to each of them, and then develop each statement into a paragraph. Now print it, frame it, and display it in your home or office where you will face it squarely each day.
With this personal code committed both to paper and within your heart, you can more easily live a values-based life and resist the temptations of short-term pleasure or ill-gotten gain. Whenever you encounter that line in the sand and are tempted to just put a toe or two across it, your personal code will help you stand more firmly on the side of your values—the side where you’ve planted the big NOT FOR SALE sign.
Ethics from The Respect Factor®
THE RESPECT FACTOR® is a trademark of Jack Perry in the United States and other countries. Used with permission. ©2009 Jack Perry. All rights reserved.
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Posted by: backlinks | December 12, 2011 at 01:18 AM