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Mentoring Moment: Ethics

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Is it still cheating even when you think you are helping others?

We have all seen situations where we wonder why certain decisions have been made, and, sometimes the decision seems to conflict with our personal standards of ethics. In fact, the importance of personal and professional ethics has become so important that many colleges make ethics a required course. Think about Enron, Parmalat, Martha Stewart, Bernie Madoff and the Wall Street debacle caused by phony baloney home loans, and you will see what I mean.Wally dabbles in crime

This Mentoring Moment (MM) is about intellectual honesty and ethics, and in particular the rationalization of questionable decisions that are made on the basis that the decision maker is not just furthering his or her personal interests but also the interests of others – making it is OK to cheat and be unethical. This is a particularly dangerous type of situational ethics leading to intellectual dishonesty. Hopefully, you chuckled a bit and agree with me that Wally in not on the right track.

Research has identified a number of axioms in the area. Here are just a few:

  • Ethical dilemmas occur regularly and often involve resolution of differing interests (or conflicting positions): by behaving ethically, people are able to maintain their positive self-image and personal ethos; by behaving unethically, they can advance their self-interest
  • People often resolve this conflict through “creative” reassessments and self-serving rationalizations, such that they can act dishonestly enough to profit from their unethicality, but honestly enough to maintain a positive self-image
  • When individuals have the opportunity to cheat in situations where the probability of being caught and reputational costs are minimized, most people cheat
  • People are more likely to engage in unethical behavior if they split the spoils of such behavior with another person than when they are the only ones benefiting from it because they find it easier to discount the moral concerns associated with unethical behavior that benefits another person than to discount behavior that only benefits oneself

At this point, let me offer an example.

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Accountability: A New Methodology

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Two weeks ago, I mentioned the importance of having someone’s back when it came to accountability.  I wanted to propose a new methodology when thinking of men’s small groups of accountability.

What if a group of three to six men were committed to come together regularly to pursue life transformation through prayer, Bible Study, transparent connection, and life-minded accountability?  Could lives be changed?  How about current and future marriages?  Could family trees be forever changed?  Could Fathers become daddies? Could leaders be transformed?

Duh, yes.

What if we called this methodology something like GM6?  GM6 equals Got My Six.  But who cares about the name.  We just didn’t want to call it Men’s Macrame Class.  We could call it Fight Club for all I care.  (In reality, you are fighting for your lives and families.)

So let’s complicate this thing for the sake of conversation and because we are men.   GM6 could be applied to whatever curriculum, content, or life-event chosen.  It is specific in that all its parts must be present to be GM6 but not all present at the same time.  It is a process to

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One On One With Your Children

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One on OneEach of us knows some things intuitively. For instance, as fathers we know that spending intentional uninterrupted time with your child has eternal rewards. No matter how much “stuff” you have bought for them, it will never compare to simply being with you and having your full attention.

Personal confession time here – Did I spend every waking moment engaging with my two children when they were growing up? No – I did not. To be sure, it is important to teach your children to play independently of you or with their siblings. After all, I had a job to go to each day, I had (and still have!) my wife to spend time with, I had tons of involvement in our church, as well as a drive pursue my individual interests and hobbies. I did, however, make an intentional effort to spend intentional time with them daily.

Child development experts tell us that frequent little bits of “Daddy Time” will create

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Courageous Teams

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Courageous TeamsWe recently took a look at the collective courage or cowardice of a team. And we noted that much of the collective courage of a team is drawn from the leader. But we would be incorrect in assuming that courage is inbred. It is a developed over time and through withstanding hardship and challenges.

Unfortunately, many brave leaders convey the impression that this is how they’ve always been. Whether or not they were born brave, bravery seems to come naturally to them. Even if it does not, it appears to be so.

For teams it is no different. Teams, like individuals, have to learn to be brave and to stand strong in tough times. It is imperative that they can communicate with each other about what this developing shared bravery looks like.  And the courage must be communicated in terms of what it looks like within the context of that team’s experience.

What is the leadership principle here?

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Leadership Lesson from Pope Francis

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Pope FrancisI do not pretend to understand the ins and outs of the Catholic church.  But I can recognize leadership when I see it.  We have touched on this before.  But one of the traits of a good leader is that they are humble and comfortable in their own skin.

It is very early in the papacy of Pope Francis.  But consider one of his first actions as Pope once the immediate pomp and ceremony was over. He rode the bus with his former fellow Cardinals back to the hotel.  He packed his own luggage and paid his own bill.  Could he have dispatched someone from the vast Vatican staff to handle that task?  Of course he could.  Would he have been well within his rights and within the bounds of acceptable behavior to have dispatched someone?  Of course he would.  Does he set an example of humble leadership?  I think he does.

I am not Catholic, but if this Pope leads in the days to come as he has in his early days, he may help the Catholic church recover from some dark days in recent years.

 

Photo by Peter Macdiarmid/Getty Images.

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The Measure of a Man

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The Measure of a ManMy wife and I were recently meandering through the back roads and little towns of East Texas. We stopped at a roadside antique store as is our custom. Something caught my eye that I had never seen before. They were Measuring Rods. Just look at the picture on the left and you will see what I saw.

Measuring rods have been around for thousands of years. The earliest preserved one known is a copper-alloy bar which was found by a German Assyriologist while excavating at Nippur in Southern Mesopotamia. The bar dates from circa 2650 BC. and it was used as a measurement standard.

In the Middle Ages, bars were used as standards of length when surveying land. These bars often used a unit of measure called a Rod (unit) of length equal to 5.5 yards, 5.0292 meters, 16.5 feet, or 1⁄320 of a statute mile. The rod unit was still in use as a standard unit of measurement in the mid-19th century, when Henry David Thoreau used it frequently when describing distances in his literary work Walden.

Standard. Now there is a word that we don’t hear very often. In fact we live in a world that doesn’t really have standards or expectations any longer. Certainly not when it comes to how we live our daily lives. We are told that if it feels good to us and it doesn’t impinge on anyone else’s rights, then it is OK to do.

Why was the measuring bar so necessary?

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Collective Courage or Cowardice

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Collective Cowardice or CourageWhen you list adjectives that describe a leader, what words would be on that list?

For many of us, words like strong, determined and courageous would probably be near the top of the list, don’t you think? We like our leaders to be brave and strong and determined. Everyone loves a heroic character.

When you list adjectives that describe a highly functioning and successful team, what words would be on that list?

Are they the same sounding words?

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Accountability: I Got Your Back, Bro!

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I have had the amazing opportunity to hang out with Operators. Those amazing men who have gone to sandy places, slept in foxholes, and returned to tell amazing stories of battle.  Every chance they get they share stories of camaraderie and close calls.

In those stories, I would hear a recurring theme. Trust. How each operator had each other’s back. They were constantly checking each others “six”.   SIX-An old aviation term to look behind you (“your 6 o’clock” referring to the relative location of a threat with 12 o’clock being directly in front of you).

In my current profession, I have to constantly keep looking over my shoulder.  Fortunately, when I’m in the field, I have a partner that helps me and has my six.  And in return, I cover my partner.

In our daily lives, as we bumble through life, it is good to surround yourself with trustworthy men that will have your back.  Men you can trust to guard you from the many pitfalls of life and help you get to your next objective.

As you strive to be a leader to your family, friends, and co-workers yield yourself to the cover of others and in return cover their six.

In the weeks to come, I want to propose/share a new way of retooling men’s small groups with you.  Not a curriculum, not a program, but a methodology.  (GREAT!  A new men’s small group technique. HOLD ON, Mr. Skeptical.)    A methodology to achieve life transformation…to be a better man/leader than you were yesterday.

Don’t worry.  It may hurt a little.  But the rewards are awesome.  And I got your back, Bro!