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It was a day I’ll never forget. During my morning “zen time” I had been reading Nathaniel Brandon”s, The Six Pillars of Self-Esteem (I think it was around 2003, when I was living in Seattle – definitely before my kiddo was born, as there hasn’t been much “zen” since). Having just finished a chapter about the “Practice of Personal Integrity” I hopped on the bus to get to the office and when the bus came to a stop, a homeless man came up to me and asked for change. I remember being late, focused on all the things I had to get done, and a bit agitated, as I pasted a sheepish grin on my face and said, “Sorry, I don’t have any money!” and scampered across the street before the light changed. When my foot touched the curb on the other side, something happened that is embossed in my memory forever. I put my hand in my pocket and felt a little more than a dollar’s worth of change, clinking like little soothsayers beneath my fingers. Oh my… The realization washed over me like a cold fog. I lied to a homeless person. Does it get any worse than that?!
I’m not proud of this story. It’s not representative of the person I know I am, want to be, or hope to show the world. But it happened. I’m human. We humans blow it sometimes. But even in the re-telling of this story, the fact that my actions that day were so incongruent with my perception of myself, causes my stomach to clench.
We humans blow it sometimes.
I was talking to a dear friend of mine who used to be a senior leader for one of the world’s largest retailers. This company has enjoyed a great reputation for being people-focused and caring about their employees. Many books have been written about their culture, and yet I knew that during my friend’s tenure at the company she had been miserable. When I asked her about it – why the discrepancy between what I’ve read about the organization and her experience – she said, “That’s true at the store-level. At corporate, it’s a different story. Behind the scenes the same rules don’t apply.”
I could share countless other stories that I’ve heard from friends and participants (or participants who have become friends), about values-driven organizations that have bullies at the helm, about bosses who tout the virtues of transparency only to blind-side their teams, about departments that invest in emotional intelligence training for their employees but show little or no empathy during layoffs, about people-centered companies that treat their vendors like second-class citizens, the list goes on.
It’s no wonder that cynicism seems to be at an all-time high, loyalty at an all-time low, and that more than 70% of American workers are not engaged (according to Gallup’s “State of the American Workplace ). With so much incongruency, we don’t know what to expect, to believe, or to trust.
With so much incongruency , we don’t know what to expect, to believe, or to trust.
I don’t write this from a place of judgement (I’m the person who lied to the homeless guy, remember?), because we’ve all been there. There’s not a perfect person on this planet and certainly not a perfect organization, but the price we pay for incongruencies is often bigger than we realize. It’s easy to see that when others sense incongruency that they won’t trust us – won’t want to do business with us. But what if others don’t know? What if, like in my example, the only one who knows is you?
What if others don’t know? What if the only one who knows is you?
In OnStage Leadership , one of the things we work on is showing up “powerfully”. When I talk about “power”, I refer to one’s intrinsic ability to influence – it does not come from position or title. It is rooted in self-efficacy, self-belief, and our ability to navigate the impact we have on others. When we take action that is incongruent with who we are and what we believe, we feel it. Even if no one else knows, we cannot hide from ourselves. Even if we have a host of reasons to excuse our behavior, reasons do not alter facts. Inside we know the truth. When we’re in breech of our own integrity, we start to mask ourselves off and hide. We dissipate our power and lose the ability to truly connect and therefore influence.
When our actions are incongruent with who we are and what we believe, we feel it. We cannot hide from ourselves.
In this world there are things that we can control and things that we cannot. We can control our own incongruencies. Are you telling yourself the truth? Are you supporting policies that are incongruent with your values or your organization’s values? Are you taking responsibility for your actions and reactions? Are you practicing what you preach? Do your actions match your insides? Are you or aren’t you congruent?
You know when you’re not. We all do.
Are you telling yourself the truth?
Today I encourage you to pay attention to how congruently you are showing up in the world. Congruency is a big step toward being your most authentic and powerfulself.