Business Owners life lesson

Integrity

Business Climate Today.

Honesty, ethics and moral values were taught in the classrooms of all major business schools. Professors placed strong emphasis on a company’s responsibility toward its employees, customers and creditors. Prior to the twentieth century, business courses, and indeed business schools themselves, were based on biblical principles. In reality, they were biblical schools that were training future business leaders. [1]

Integrity

State of completeness, Unified, Integer, Wholeness

Not even one thin slice removed

There is no duplicity or hypocrisy

Word matches actions

Integrate to integrity. Making real connections with people

Path of Integrity                                                            Perceived path of Integrity

The path of integrity is not a straight line of black and white decisions. We perceive it to be so but it is not. The world of integrity and integrity decisions live in the grey areas of life. These would be the areas that the bible does not always speak clearly about. For example, the bible is very clear about sin and sin issues. i.e. do not commit adultery. do not steal. do not lie. Do not cheat on your taxes. However in the grey area we don't get such clear direction.

A better way to look at the path of integrity is to see it as an outward growing spiral. We start out as a small speck as we begin our journey. We sometimes walk going around and around the same problems and same decision. As we learn to make the right decisions we expand our realm of influence and our realm of responsibility.

Job 8:20 God will not reject a man of integrity (Perfect in King James)

Psalm 84:11 No good thing will God withhold from them that walk in integrity                           

Proverbs 2:7 He stores up sound wisdom for the upright; he is a shield to those who walk in integrity

Proverbs 10:9 He who walks in integrity walks securely, but he who perverts his ways will be found out

Proverbs 20:7 A righteous man who walks in his integrity-how blessed are his sons after him

Psalms 26:1-2 Vindicate me, O Lord, for I have walked in my integrity; and I have trusted in the Lord without wavering. Examine me, O Lord, and try me; test my mind and my heart.

1.      Integrity is based on God. Be set upon the rock.

a.       Listen to God. He does what he says!!!!

b.      Abram wrestled for the city of Sodom ! God said if there are 10 righteous he will save the city!

c.       God put up a rainbow after Noah’s flood. A Covenant of his word. I am glad that God has integrity.

d.      Isaiah 44:26 I am the Lord….who carries out the words of his servants

2.      Integrity is more than talk.[2]

a.       Words must line up with actions.

b.      Debts must be made. Restitution is a foundation of Integrity

                                                                           i.      Returning stolen items

                                                                         ii.      Returning Milk Crates

                                                                        iii.      Going to old bosses and repaying stolen hours!!

                                                                       iv.      True Story? When he shorted a customer $0.01 he walked five miles to return the change.

                                                                         v.      Lincoln’s business partner ran the business into the ground and Lincoln repaid the whole debt. $1,100[3]

3.      Talent is a gift but Character is a choice

a.       Integrity is also a choice. Do you do what you say you are going to do?

b.      People volunteer. People get excited about the conference or the vision or a project but then do they show up?

c.       Students sign up for class but then drop

d.      Did you count the cost first???

e.       Let your yes be yes and your no be no!

f.        Do you as a contractor stand behind your work even when it breaks down and costs you money? My roofer says the problem is with the siding.

4.      Integrity builds trust

a.       Do what I say not what I do.

b.      Look at Adultery. How can I break a vow made before God and still have the ability to lead an organization. He who is faithful in the little is faithful in big. Interesting note is that authors Bennis and Nanus surveyed sixty successful CEO’s and almost all were married to their first wife

c.       Refer back to contractor story

d.      Influence has everything to do with trust. Without trust who will follow?

  Integrity (personal decisions)               Trust (must be earned)

Lack of Integrity                                                    Mistrust

5.      Integrity has high influence value

a.       Employers look for people of integrity for promotion.

b.      Pastor looks for the faithful. You say you will do it, then do it.

c.       I place a high value on those that do what they say they will do.

6.      Integrity facilitates higher standards

a.       Everyone is doing it

Responsibilities

Rights

                                    Leadership

7.      Integrity results in a solid reputation, not just image.

a.       Image is what people think we are

b.      Integrity is what we really are

c.       Three C’s

                                                                           i.      Consistency

1.      Are you the same no matter who you are with?

                                                                         ii.      Choices

1.      Do you make decisions that are best for others when another choice would benefit you?

                                                                        iii.      Credit

1.      Do you give others credit for contributions to your success?

8.      Integrity means living it myself before leading others

a.       “in quality control we are not concerned about the product. We are concerned about the process. If the process is right, the product is guaranteed” Integrity guarantees credibility

9.      Integrity helps a leader be credible, not just clever.

a.       You can schmooze your way through life. Eventually you will fail. Integrity does not remove failure but it is a requirement for success!!

b.      Do not make something seem more important than it really is. i.e. Do not twist the facts to make something seem better than it really is. Pastors sometimes do this to push an agenda through the board or make people give emotionally.

10.  Integrity is a hard-won achievement

a.       It involves self-discipline, identity, dependence on the prophetic to be what you are not yet.

11.  Finally Brethren, Personal Integrity leads to corporate integrity

a.       Story of Galto’s falling on my steps.

Integrity Stories.

I.                    Abraham

a.       Now Abimelech had not gone near her, so he said, "Lord, will you destroy an innocent nation? ⁵ Did he not say to me, 'She is my sister,' and didn't she also say, 'He is my brother'? I have done this with a clear conscience and clean hands." Gen. 20:4

b.      Abraham and Abimelech. 1^st time integrity is mentioned. A man of the covenant doesn’t act with integrity but Abimelech does act with integrity.

c.       Partial truth. Sarah was sister. Integrity is Whole not partial.

II.                 Solomon.

a.       When Solomon had finished building the temple of the LORD and the royal palace, and had achieved all he had desired to do, ² the LORD appeared to him a second time, as he had appeared to him at Gibeon. ³ The LORD said to him: "I have heard the prayer and plea you have made before me; I have consecrated this temple, which you have built, by putting my Name there forever. My eyes and my heart will always be there.  ⁴ "As for you, if you walk before me in integrity of heart and uprightness, as David your father did, and do all I command and observe my decrees and laws, ⁵ I will establish your royal throne over Israel forever, as I promised David your father when I said, 'You shall never fail to have a man on the throne of Israel.' I kings 9:4

b.      God desires us to walk with integrity of heart as David did.

III.               Kenneth Lay and Enron

a.       An executive who resigned as chief executive and chairman of Enron, the beleaguered energy trading company that filed for bankruptcy in Dec. 2001. It was the largest such claim in U.S. history, resulting in the loss of about 5,000 jobs and leaving thousands of people financially ruined. Enron's downfall uncovered a flurry of scandals, including questionable accounting practices by Enron to hide losses and massive document-shredding by both Enron and its auditor, Arthur Andersen.[4]

IV.              John Rigas and Adelphia

a.       Founder of Adelphia Communications Corp., was indicted in September on charges of bank, wire, and securities fraud. His sons, Timothy and Michael, and two other executives were also charged. Prosecutors allege the executives hid $2.3 billion in liabilities from Adelphia investors and that the Rigases used company funds as their “personal piggy bank.” The company filed for bankruptcy protection in June, after it had acknowledged that the Rigases had been given $3.1 billion in off-the-balance-sheet loans. John Rigas stepped down as CEO of the company in May. [5]

V.                 Martha Stewart

a.       With a partial scholarship and money earned by modeling, Stewart was able to leave her small New Jersey home town behind for the ivy halls of Barnard College. After graduating, she continued to model, worked as a stockbroker, started a catering business, wrote a column for House Beautiful, and worked as a contributing editor to Family Circle. Appearances on morning television programs led to the development of her own syndicated show, Martha Stewart Living (1993–present). Her publications include the books Pies and Tarts (1985) and Gardening (1993) and the magazine Martha Stewart Living (1990–present). In 2003, Stewart was indicted on charges of obstruction of justice and securities fraud, the result of a 2001 sale of ImClone stock.[6]

VI.              Bernie Ebbers, the CEO of MCI Worldcom

a.       Found guilty on eight counts of conspiracy and false reporting. Shareholders lost about US$180 billion in Worldcom's collapse, the largest bankruptcy in US history. 20,000 workers lost their jobs. Mr Ebbers could face up to 85 years in prison when he's sentenced in June.

VII.            Dennis Kozlowski and Tyco

a.       Toppled Tyco titan Dennis Kozlowski and two of his alleged partners in corporate crime were charged yesterday with looting their own company out of $600 million."Kozlowski, Swartz and Belnick treated Tyco as their private bank, taking out hundreds of millions of dollars of loans and compensation without ever telling investors," said Stephen Cutler, the SEC's director of enforcement.[7]

"Warren Buffett said after the [1991] Solomon Brothers [U.S. Treasury bond] trading scandal that trust is like the air we breathe," he says. "When it's present, nobody really notices. But when it's absent, everybody notices."[8]

Self Search Moment.

If you stand on the beach up to your ankles every time the tide comes in sand will get washed out and your feet will sink. Tide of the world will take you down.

1. Look at major areas of your life. Where does your word not line up with your actions?
2. Where have you cut corners?
3. Where have you let people down?
4. Where have you slacked?
5. Write down every instance you can recall from the past two months.

1. Look for patterns
2. Face the music

                                                               i.      Apologize

                                                             ii.      Make restitution

                                                            iii.      Fix relationships

3. Rebuild

                                                               i.      Recreate your future

A man took his daughter to a carnival, and she immediately ran over to a booth and asked for cotton candy. As the attendant handed her a huge ball of it, the father asked, “Sweetheart, are you sure you can eat all that?” “Don’t worry, Dad,” she answered, “I’m a lot bigger on the inside than on the outside.”

Integrity is being bigger on the inside.