Honesty: Hopes Truest Foundation

“I'm not upset that you lied to me, I'm upset that from now on I can't believe you.” ― Friedrich Nietzsche

“All the world is made of faith, and trust, and pixie dust.” ― J.M. Barrie, Peter Pan

Cameron’s Story

Cameron kind of felt like the members of his advisory council was holding out on him. Instead of giving him the guidance and support that he needed. Too often, they seemed to fain interest in what he was doing and then come up short with the connections and/or the financial support that he desperately needed to grow the company and create the amazing brand that he and all of his team desired. No matter how many PowerPoint deck projections and redefined concepts he showed them, they never really seemed to be invested in where he wanted to take the company.

Since he got his MBA from Darden over a decade ago, Cameron has wanted to start and run a successful company with him at the helm. He was able to become one of the top graduates in his year, many companies wanted to bring him in as a junior executive but he and a few of his close friends had their eye on starting a new software development company from scratch. Well, it wasn’t really from scratch, you see they had to develop a startup idea for their senior thesis and there’s won that year for best startup idea so they were fairly comfortable that they could pull this off even without money from outside investors. Because Cameron was the only one that could secure a small loan from his grandmother, that put him in charge. His friends decided to take junior roles without a stake in the company and Bushane Software LLC was born.

Although they’d done fine with securing contractors and building quite the reputation, over the last five years, Cameron still wasn’t able to pay himself and his friends anywhere near where they’d have been if they’d gone to work for someone else right out of school. As far as they were concerned, it was time to take it to the next level or get out of the game. Inherently, the team knew that they needed to be able to take maximum advantage of all of their strengths and do everything thing that they could to streamline their operation while opening up the pipeline to greater opportunities. The most important key to opening up their potential was to set forth a brilliantly articulated communications plan for all current and future stakeholders, customers, and teammates, they needed to win massive amounts of trust!

 “Trust starts with our ability to communicate well with fragile but specific connections and only becomes stronger with a commitment to consistency. “

Cameron's team understood that clear and honest communication always quickens the attainment of its various benefits which are: finding focus and direction, getting things done while prioritizing much easier, as well as feeling content, and attaining the ability to push through doubt. Trust starts with our ability to communicate well with fragile but specific connections and only becomes stronger with a commitment to consistency. The more experience you have with it, the more what you can and cannot trust the people around you for becomes evident, therefore, the necessity to expand and improve your circle of trust over time. It could be said that honesty is the incubator for hope and responsibility while dishonesty only breeds skepticism and suspicion. When we understand and trust one another only then can we reasonably share our feelings of expectation and our desires for certain outcomes? Only then can our relationships become what they are designed to actually be for us! So straighten out your reasons for everything and then share your truth openly and honestly often. Watch as more and more great things are made manifest in your life.

No matter our orientation to the great mysteries of life, even those beyond our limited grasp and understanding, we should still be able to rely on and communicate our deeply held beliefs and principles with others because, in the end, these are what our world is made up of. But be careful because as Nietzche suggests, I believe he is more than correct in his assertion that there is not much more to life than this. The environment of trust is a foundation we must build carefully and meticulously knowing that there will be setbacks, but ultimate victory is there for the resilient and strong.

Some of the greatest thoughts about communication and confidence in others come from the great Maya Angelou who wrote:

 “I don't trust people who don't love themselves and tell me, 'I love you.' ... There is an African saying which is: Be careful when a naked person offers you a shirt.” ― Maya Angelou

Here Maya helps us to question:

1.      How are you communicating your dignity and self-worth? Are you leaving it up to others to make assumptions about who you are and why you offer what you offer, or do you help them to determine their ideas about your brand? How do you demonstrate a level of excellence and mastery for what you do? Can you differentiate yourself well with your story?

2.      How do you demonstrate integrity and intention to yourself? How do you model honesty, truth, honor, uprightness, and reliability daily?

3.      Basically, why should anyone believe you when you share your character and competence?

Communicate Dignity and Self-Worth

When you can communicate that you are worthy of honor and respect to those that would love to give it to you, you win, BIG TIME! You’ll have to be in touch with the circumstances by which your pride and self-esteem are quickened. You’ll have to be intimately familiar with the things that you do that you are impressed with yourself. Your friends loved ones, and associates may have shared with you the things about you that they love, the things that make them proud to be associated with you. There is an inner nobility within that you must have a profound connection with if you want others to truly know you. It becomes important to capture and analyze all that there is about you so that your target audience, stakeholders, clients, associates, and team members should find comfort and joy in your character and capabilities. Your ability to articulate and then back up with actions all of the things that indeed make you special will help to speed the process of others feeling comfortable and connected to you. But, if you don’t know what valuable gifts you bring to the table, it won’t be easy for others to understand. You have no choice but to leave them with their assumptions and we all know how that goes.

Self-esteem or self-worth is a measure of confidence in one's worth or abilities. Our beliefs about ourselves, as well as our emotional states, like feelings of triumph, despair, pride, and shame. All play a part in how our self-concept (how we evaluated ourselves) is constructed which is a large predictor of how we will possibly perform under any given circumstance. People with a negative or low self-concept are likelier to do far worse in performance or success measures than those that think of themselves positively. So, it stands to reason that leaders that communicate in ways that help people feel good about themselves and their contributions easily become beloved.

Communicate Integrity and Intention

Another key ability is to be able to adequately convey your integrity, long before the stakes are high. When others see you as honest and having a strong moral code, they know that they can count on you when the chips are down. Because you are principled and of noble mind, you can be trusted in any situation to do the right thing, the righteous thing. One of my favorites, Alexander Lyon reminds us that being whole and knowing yourself, really matters because what you feel on the inside about your deeply held principles and values may or may not be what you express to the rest of us with your actions. When you don’t have congruence here, you find yourself, outside of integrity, and that’s not a good place to be. One of the times we tend to have problems with our integrity is when we feel like people don’t agree with our moral code and/or they spit on our principles. Here is where you may have to speak and act purposefully to remind them and yourself, who you are! Nothing test your character like opposition.

But, when you know that even under pressure your intention to sincerity and good character will not falter, you will be able to hold your head high wherever you go. Others will give you testimonials and participate in the execution of your stated goals and objectives, regularly. Your level of determination and resolve will inspire and delight your teammates creating an environment of infinite possibility as more and more people jump on board your dream train. To get this right, not only do you need well-written, brilliantly articulated plans along with an airtight execution strategy, you’ll need the energy and support to pull it all off.

Communicate Character and Competence

So what can you do to help those that experience you, know what they are experiencing? How can you help them trust you more? Stephen Covey, says that ‘trust’ is a combination of both character and competence but aren’t both of these things best expressed through demonstration? For this reason, most of us find it quite difficult to convey the quality of both our character and competence to others quickly. Innately we believe that people need to experience us to really understand us in this way and there is something to that but there is also evidence to suggest that some people just have magnetic personalities and can win trust quickly. I’m reminded of the words from a famous song “if you don’t know me by now, you will never, never know me.” Some people have that immediate spark, something special that reminds us exactly how wonderful people can be and how gifted some of us are. Some of our most famous actors, musicians, and artist are absolutely captivating individuals. They present this evidence in performance after performance. So, if you want to be understood, you, and everyone around you must develop the skills to create an environment of trust. It is in all of our interests, to develop collective trust. For this, we should probably review and analyze how those that have won our trust got there and then unpack and practice what we might do to win the trust of others. Not only that, we should listen to Symon Sinek who says, “leadership is a lifestyle and the purpose of that lifestyle is to create an environment of safety for others.” In his powerful short video, he teaches us how to work on building an environment of trust where people can be their best selves safely.

To know someone's character well is to know how they think and what they believe in. Obviously, you can take the bull by the horns and show enough interest in others to begin to figure this stuff out. In fact, we created TrueVOICE™ to allow professionals to really see each other and to give recognition to what they see and it works flawlessly when done correctly.

Often though, professionals too often have a hard time sharing the qualities in their character that matter most to those that would work with them because we just take too many shortcuts in communication. I mean it's hard to say to a friend or work colleague upon meeting them for the first time, “I’m one of the most courageous people that you’ll ever meet!” even if it's absolutely true! It may be of tremendous importance to know that you’ve had some experience with the task at hand and that you know which risks are appropriate and which are not. Yes, your colleagues and managers should want to know that you have certain insights, and it is to everyone's advantage that your wisdom and experience be acknowledged and shared but again, it’s difficult for obvious reasons. Some of us have been taught to be so humble and self-effacing that we don’t even recognize our distinct personal characteristics and values ourselves let alone understand how and when to share them with someone else. It’s like we bury ourselves under the weight of the world’s social inhibitions instead of letting our light shine.

Also, the only language we have, makes us sound boisterous and self-aggrandizing so I’ve learned to use a few additional tricks to help me communicate my character quickly. One is TPI (third-party influence)! When you track and curate your professional references, testimonials, and endorsements you can share with others fairly quickly, what others are saying about you and your character. How many recommendations do you have on LinkedIn? How do people rate your services on Yelp and other social sights? Do you have videos of happy and satisfied customers or stakeholders that don’t seem to run out of positive praise for you? I try to maintain these and use them liberally, so that the people that work with me, get a better sense of whom they are dealing with. It’s always best to have others toot your horn for you. Thomas J. Stanley author of The Millionaire Next Door would call these people promoters.

The other tool that I’ve grown quite accustomed to using is sharing my personal TrueVOICE™ interview results. A few weeks before I interview another professional that I’m considering adding to my network I send them the most current answers from using the TrueVOICE™ questionnaire and I will of course discuss and answer questions that they have about me before I do their interview. I know, sneaky right? I’m getting people to pay attention to me before I pay attention to them, but I’ve built so many solid collaborations using this exact method. I must be doing something right, besides, don’t people deserve to know the real you as well as the you that you’d like to become!?

It's much easier to show competence and the ability to do something successfully or efficiently so I won’t bore you with that stuff. But it is vital to winning trust, so don’t skip this piece.

The way that you think and execute your highest beliefs not only tells the tale of what your character is made of but also shows people who you are. Do you think and act similarly under any circumstance or do you flip and flop with the wind? There is a point where desire and expectation come together to inspire hope in everyone. This is the kind of value-add that allows people to avoid the suffering associated with feelings of melancholia and complete loss. With the right communication skills, we can keep pessimism and all manner of distress at bay, maybe even vanquishing anxiety altogether. It’s definitely a good strategy to combat stress and imbalance.