Integrity

I was reminded of the importance of honesty and ethics in my learning this week. All of the readings and videos had such great advice on how to be an ethical person in business and other parts of our lives. One line that stuck out to me was this: “…you never do anything dishonest, …” It’s not worth any outside risk that there is. Always be honest in your dealings…” (Jan Newman, Risks in Business, March 7, 2011) This struck a chord with me not because I am planning on being dishonest and this brought me back to the right side, but because no matter any advantages we think we would gain by being dishonest, Mr. Newman said that it would not be worth it in the end. Another presenter said that there is no reason to compromise on ethics. I would have to agree. There really isn’t a good cause for being unethical because the bad surely outweighs the good that would come from it. I looked up business ethics examples on the internet and there were quite a few websites helping a person or business write or define their ethics. It’s a pretty big deal. I think knowing what you will do or won’t do early in the game will be very beneficial. Last week we learned about ethical guardrails and I think that if they are defined at the beginning of our journey, then these guardrails can guide us along the path to help us get where we are going. They will really protect us from making bad decisions in the future.

            I really appreciated the devotional given by Sheri Dew (True Blue, Through and Through, BYU-I, March 16, 2004) where she gave 7 points to help us become people of integrity. One of the points that stood out to me was number 5 “Expect your integrity to be challenged.” This scares me a bit, but I know that if I have been practicing integrity throughout my life and I have my ethical guardrails in place, I can be prepared for and overcome these challenges and come out on top.