Integrity – honesty, sincerity, truthfulness, trustworthiness

If a leader expects to be followed, it is essential that he/she be trustworthy. The followers must know that the leader is truthful. Honesty is essential in any meaningful relationship. Integrity connotes a wholeness in character; what you see is what you get; wholeness leaves nothing to be desired.

A difficulty in our culture today is that individuals feel they own the truth, and my truth can be different from your truth or there are degrees of truth. Followers want to believe that their leader speaks the truth; otherwise, following the leader could not be reasonable. Therefore, they believe anything that is uttered. They believe that there are different truths and what is true for this country might not be true for another, but our (my) truth is the true truth.

I believe there are few “truths” and they are Universal. Gravity works. Food and water are essential for life. Death comes to us all. Our founding fathers in the USA also stated succinctly in the Declaration of Independence the truths they believed to be self-evident – “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness,” These “truths” seem to cover our lives from birth to death. Not much more is needed and a leader’s task seems clearly to be defined – they only need to make sure all men and women are free to live.

I remember a day when the media – newspapers, in particular – printed “news.” I learned in journalism class that news was just the facts, only the facts, the who, what, when, where, why, and how. Everything else was opinion and belonged on the editorial page. Today it seems that opinions are expressed as news and truths, and believers, followers, accept the leader’s opinion as truth. It seems we have traveled a great distance from truthfulness and the integrity of our leaders is suspect. It seems an honest politician has become an oxymoron. And equally sad is the apparent lack of follower expectations that our leaders even try to be honest about their life choices. Integrity would be such a refreshing quality for a leader!