At work, especially in the project context, we rely on each other's Word. When someone tells you something, you need to know that you're hearing what the speaker believes to be true. We can each help to create a more Truth-Full working environment by telling the Truth ourselves, especially when the prospect of telling the whole truth seems scary.
If you tell the truth
it's harder to gossip.
(This is a good thing.)Mark Twain wrote, "If you tell the truth you don't have to remember anything." This is one of many advantages of telling the truth. Here's a list of the advantages of telling the truth over spinning, shading, stretching, misleading, or even lying.
Telling the truth requires less creativity because you don't have to make anything up.
Telling the truth reduces medical expenses by keeping your blood pressure in the normal range.
If you tell the truth you don't have to worry whether what you're saying now is consistent enough — or too consistent — with what you've said in the past.
If you tell the truth it's less likely (though not impossible) that anyone will accuse you of not telling the truth.
If you tell the truth you have to do much less record-keeping — it's easier to remember what you told to whom and when.
You hardly ever feel guilty about telling the truth.
If you tell the truth you don't have to worry as much about whether what you're saying is working.
If you tell the truth you don't have to worry about what to say when you get caught.
If you tell the truth you don't have to learn any fancy ambiguous words to mislead people.
The plain truth is usually shorter than anything else.
If you tell the truth you get practice telling the truth, which can pay off when telling the truth is really hard.
If you tell the truth it's more likely (though not certain) that others will tell you the truth.
If you tell the truth your nose won't grow much beyond its current length.
If you tell the truth it's harder to gossip. (This is a good thing.)
If you tell the truth you don't have to worry about keeping a straight face.
If you tell the truth you have less need to explain to yourself — or your kids — why it's sometimes OK not to tell the truth.
If you tell the truth, people have a chance to find out about problems while there's still time to do something about them.
If you tell the truth it's easier to sleep at night.
If you're known as a straight shooter, fewer people will ask you to shoot crooked.
If you tell the truth often enough, when you say something, people are more likely to actually believe you.
I'm sure you can add a few more of your own. If you wonder what they are, you can find out. Top Next Issue
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Related articles
More articles on Ethics at Work:
- Virtual Termination with Real Respect
- When we have to terminate someone who works at a remote site, sometimes there's a temptation to avoid
travel — to use email, phone, fax, or something else. They're all bad ideas. Terminating people
in person is not only a gesture of respect. It's good business.
- Managing Personal Risk Management
- When we bias organizational decisions to manage our personal risks, we're sometimes acting ethically
— and sometimes not. What can we do to limit personal risk management?
- Approval Ploys
- If you approve or evaluate proposals or requests made by others, you've probably noticed patterns approval
seekers use to enhance their success rates. Here are some tactics approval seekers use.
- On the Appearance of Impropriety
- Avoiding the appearance of impropriety is a frequent basis of business decisions. What does this mean,
what are the consequences of such avoiding, and when is it an appropriate choice?
- Availability and Self-Assessments
- In many organizations, employees develop self-assessments as a part of the performance review process.
Because of a little-known effect related to the Availability Heuristic, these self-assessments can be
biased against the employee.
See also Ethics at Work and Ethics at Work for more related articles.
Forthcoming issues of Point Lookout
- Coming December 11: White Water Rafting as a Metaphor for Group Development
- Tuckman's model of small group development, best known as "Forming-Storming-Norming-Performing," applies better to development of some groups than to others. We can use a metaphor to explore how the model applies to Storming in task-oriented work groups. Available here and by RSS on December 11.
- And on December 18: Subgrouping and Conway's Law
- When task-oriented work groups address complex tasks, they might form subgroups to address subtasks. The structure of the subgroups and the order in which they form depend on the structure of the group's task and the sequencing of the subtasks. Available here and by RSS on December 18.
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