Personal integrity

Introduction

In leadership, personal integrity is something that should be a normal characteristic. However, it tends to be unfortunate that many people do not show personal integrity. In leadership, there are many characteristics that we normally look for such as humbleness, integrity, honesty, courageous, passionate, empowering, genuine, and confident. Personal integrity refers to the quality of being honest with you and also others and living a life aligned with your moral principles and not just liberty (Thornton, 2013). When developing personal integrity, it requires examining one's beliefs and value system and taking the conscious steps to behaving in a manner that are consistent with your personal moral code. In this reflective research paper, we focus on the importance of personal integrity. The paper will provide a definition of personal integrity and offer examples of honorable behavior and living by the ethical codes. I will also consider the origin of my sense of right and wrong and how they depend on the family, personal, or cultural values. In the paper, I also focus on the role of honesty in professional and personal life and provide examples of professional dishonesty. Finally, the paper will answer whether honesty matter in today’s world.

Personal integrity, honorable behavior, and ethical code

Personal integrity refers to the quality of being honest and also having strong moral principles and the moral uprightness. It refers to the personal choice of upholding oneself to consistently ethical and moral standards. In ethics, integrity is the truthfulness and honesty or the accuracy of one’s actions. Integrity always means doing what is good and right irrespective of the immediate consequences (Anderson, 2012). Personal integrity implies the incorruptibility and trustworthiness that we are incapable of being false to a covenant or trust. Personal integrity is the possession of firm principles involving the quality of possessing and steadfastly adhering to the professional standards or high moral principles (Anderson, 2012).

Integrity normally involves standing for something and especially standing for the values and caused that confer identity. Integrity tends to be the foundations of a person’s character (Thornton, 2013). A person of integrity is one who is willing to bear the consequences of her convictions even when it is difficult and when consequences are unpleasant. Personal integrity involves holding true to the set of core beliefs, set by the individual.

The word honorable has to do with the actions of people that are fair, honest, and worth of respect. A Person, who is honorable is one who believe in truth and doing the right thing and also tries to live up to the high principles (Thornton, 2013). Telling the truth is usually honorable. An example of an honorable behavior is shaking another person’s hand when you lose the game when you smash into someone’s parked car; it will be honorable to leave a note for them to contact you.

Ethics is a system of moral principles. Ethics usually affect how people make decisions and lead their lives. It concerns what is good for the society and individuals and also describes as the moral philosophy. Life tends to be full of rules and is also full of standards and values. One need to find their own and to be ethical involves living this value system out in our daily lives. When being ethical and also following an ethical code, when one is in a test, those who take their code to heart, it does mean something to them and will support and act from the code. Thus, the code will guide them and also provide strength.

The personal ethics refers to the ethics that an individual identify with in respect to situations and people that they deal with in everyday life. Being ethical refers to be in harmony with the standards or rules of the noble practice or conduct (Thornton, 2013). The ethical code refers to a comprehensive system of wrong and right. It is the set of guidelines that help one make decisions based on their conscience. When using the ethical code, an individual can be able to distinguish between wrong and right; hence, determining their daily actions and emotions.

Professional dishonesty and consequences

Dishonesty usually arises through lying, unethical behavior, or stealing (Anderson, 2012). Professional, dishonesty tends to be very common today in the workplace. Brian Williams is a decent, honest man and an excellent reporter and also anchor. Brian William portrayed unethical behavior when he made a fictional story about being in a helicopter hit by a grenade during the war in Iraq in 2003 (Woiceshyn, 2015). William did admit that he was on a different helicopter, and he apologized to the crew members and viewers of the 159th Aviation Regiment. Williams repeatedly lied and fabricated his fake courageous personal involvement in the news stories that he reported. In spite of whether it is a lie or an exaggeration, it involves a breach of trust and breach of his public trust. William is a trusted public figure, and he is in the position of trust and responsibility. However, when trust broken, one almost never regains it.

The Williams saga is a good illustration of professional dishonesty and describes why dishonesty is destructive and unethical. Honesty is not only about telling the truth. As a moral principle, it means not faking the reality so as to gain a value whether it is an insurance payout, promotion, a positive evaluation by others, or fame (Woiceshyn, 2015). In Williams’s saga, that is what he was seeking that involved evaluation by his boss.

Honesty is a virtue that helps people lives a good life. Honesty normally serves our self-interest through helping people achieve values such as productive employees, loyal, and the reputation of being trustworthy. Honesty is good because the achievement of values normally requires knowing and also adhering to the reality (Anderson, 2012). In this life, everyone wants to know whether the food that they are eating is poisonous or not. People want to know the employee who deserves a promotion and the person that is worth your commitment and trust. When people decide to fake, it tends to cut the connection between our values and the reality. Anything that people obtain through faking the reality or through lying cannot be a value. An incompetent employee or a less competent employee is not as productive as a competent one, and a liar is not worthy of our trust.

In regards to honesty, if William weighed the issue, he thought why he would not lie if the chances of being found were small, and lying would cause a nice payoff (Woiceshyn, 2015). It might be his reasoning when he enhanced his reputation as a courageous reporter who was willing to take very high risks to serve his audience. As seen in William’s saga, lying tends to be destructive. There is nothing like a victimless dishonesty or 100% certainty of not being found out (Thornton, 2013). William was the victim in the case as he lost the values of his reputation for trustworthy and objective reporting and his career as a news anchor. Williams did lose his job as an anchor of the NBC Nightly News because of perpetuating one fiction (Poniewozik, 2015). After conducting an internal investigation, the network did found other examples of Williams’s inaccurate statements on the late-night programs and in public appearances (Poniewozik, 2015).

The false claims made by William were destructive to him as faking to gain value normally require continual cover-up so as to maintain the original falsehood. Keeping up with the network of lies can be tiring to a person’s mind, taking effort and energy away from achieving the real values. It also adds the destructiveness of someone’s feelings of remorse and guilt from achieving values trough lying and having to worry that no one finds out. In Williams’s case, there were some eyewitnesses to the helicopter trip in Iraq; thus, it was just for some time before the truth surfaced. Williams did not grab the principle of honesty. Honesty tends to allow people to see the long-term consequences of lying and see its destructive impact clearly; thus, allowing us to make concert choices.

Role of personal integrity

Integrity normally demands that there is the harmonious interaction between our deeds and our actions. Integrity requires courage (Anderson, 2012). Courage is the firmness of the spirit that enables us to try things, to persevere, accept challenges, and to overcome fears that may prevent us from doing what we should do (Thornton, 2013).

Most people tend to lie every single day and hide their real feelings and thoughts about what is happening. To my understanding, integrity requires the best effort at all times to be honest and transparent. I believe in considering myself as a person of integrity; I should be the same person in all situations. A person of integrity is one who does not hide their opinions or reactions, and they do not manipulate others through deception (Carroll, 2013).

Personal integrity plays a great role in my life. Living with integrity tends to make life easier than living a dishonest life. Making an unethical decision is normally easier in the short term; however, it will eventually take its tool. One time I tried lying to my parents about my performance in school. At first, I thought that it would be easier because I would escape attending remedial classes. However, one time, my mother met with the class teacher in a mall, and the teacher asked my mother why I was not performing well in school. My mother was shocked because according to me, I had aced all my tests. While I was trying to keep to my lies, I found it difficult to keep lying now and then. I also lived in fear of getting caught which soon happened with my mother and teacher encounter in the mall. Something I understand clearly is that living with integrity tend to bring peace and wholeness because one's conscience can rest easily.

Personal integrity also plays the role of building trust. Because of integrity, it is possible for other people to count on you since they trust you (Anderson, 2012). People tend to have trust in me because they know that I will do what I say I will do. I am a social person, and I tend to value the relationship that I have with my friends. Because of the trust that I establish with my friends, friends are usually comfortable opening up to me and also turning to me in times of crisis. My choice of living with integrity, it helps me to keep my relationships healthier, satisfying, and also stronger.

Why honesty matters in today’s world

Honesty tends to be one of the most beneficial habits that a person can acquire. Honesty enables a person to reap multiple benefits in life. In today’s world, honesty matters (Carroll, 2013). We live in a time where other people consider the moral values of people. The society normally loves those people who are honest with them and also loyal towards them (Nickel, 2014).

People can build a relation if the person is loyal and honest with them. It is not possible for an individual to step forward and make relations with the person who is dishonest because they can betray you at any time. The same also applies to business. Businesspeople normally want to get into business with those people they know can deliver services as expected. No business person will want to do business with a service provider who will keep lying to them and are not trustworthy. Thus, honesty tends to matter a lot in today’s world.

Honesty also matters because it is the keystone of a successful relationship that tends to form the society. If there were no honesty, there would be nobody who will be able, to make friendship or form bond with other people (Nickel, 2014). People tend to use the method of telling the truth so as to build friendships and also create a better world. Honesty is essential in forming country relations as it results to good contribution, import and export business, and also confidential discussion. Honest is also essential to develop the country, and people will need an honest government and organizations. Hence, honesty matters because lying tend to take autonomy and power away from other people through denying them the ability to make informed choices.

Conclusion

The most important quality that an individual can develop that enhances every part of their life is the value of integrity. Integrity tends to be the core quality of a happy and successful life. Having integrity will mean being totally truthful and honest in every part of your life. When an individual makes the commitment to becoming an honest people, they are doing more in ensuring their happiness and success in life. Integrity is normally a value just like intelligence and courage and it is a person’s choice of values to live by the values that for their personality and character. People who have high integrity tend to do the highest quality of work in everything that they do. It is because they realize that everything that they do is a statement about who they are in person.

Reference

Anderson, A (2012). Success will come and go, but integrity is forever. 

Carroll, A (2013). Business ethics. Routledge

Nickel, J (2014). Building the foundation of honesty, integrity, and transparency Canadian Urological Association Journal, 8(2)

Poniewozik, J (2015). Why Brian William lost his job, and why he has a new one. 

Thornton, F (2013). 7 Lenses: Learning the Principles and practices of ethical leadership. Leading in Context LLC

Woiceshyn, J (2015). Lessons from Brian William’s dishonesty.

Sherry Roberts is the author of this paper. A senior editor at MeldaResearch.Com in graduate paper writing service if you need a similar paper you can place your order from custom research paper writing service.