Can Integrity be Taught?

Back in 1998, my father used to work for a company called IMFA (Indian Metal Ferro Alloys Limited), as a Security Supervisor at their ICCL campus. ICCL stands for Indian Charge Chrome Limited. Charge chrome of Ferro-Chrome (FeCr) is an alloy of Iron and Chromium with 50% to 70% chromium content. Ferro-Chrome is used in the production of stainless steel and is usually more expensive than silver. The ICCL campus, being a production unit, usually had heaps of Ferro-Chrome store in the open which needed security. Usually, thieves would strike a deal with the security personnel and steal the alloy from the company premises, but my father brought their operation to a halt when he joined. There was even an attempt on his life due to this, which he escaped narrowly. 

So, the ICCL factory had this tall chimney kind of a thing which would usually be on fire. It was quite a sight. This one time, my father, my uncle and I were taking a stroll in the colony premises which were adjacent to the factory and presented a magnificent view of the factory with its burning chimney. My father stopped in his tracks, pointed to the chimney and said to my uncle, "Bhai, do you see that factory? That factory is my mother. It puts food on my table. And some people want me to commit fraud with it by letting them steal from the company. How can I do it?" It was, of course, a question of a rhetorical nature. My uncle smiled and we moved on.

My father was an ex-serviceman and his unwavering honesty was a product of the armed forces training and his own personal sense of integrity. And that is what became the foundation of my work ethics. I can proudly say that I am absolutely honest with my job and personal dealings. I am inherently averse to lying and even when I have to lie, I am very bad at it. And I have always believed that integrity is the most important attribute of any employee in any organization. Because integrity flows into all aspects of a person's behavior. Are they putting in enough hours or not? Are they being true to their customers or not? Do they deliver on their promises or not? Do they handle the finances with honesty or not? Integrity is clearly the backbone of a good employee.

In my current job, I handle a team of around 40 professionals scattered across 7 stores in Delhi NCR, so while I rigorously follow up on whether all of them are doing their jobs or not, it isn't possible for me to always be around to notice any lag in their conduct and performance and at times, I have been told by people visiting my stores that they were not attended properly by my subordinates. Now, this doesn't sit well with me. I want my people to be as immaculately honest to their jobs as I try to be to mine. So, I talk about integrity and ethics whenever I am interacting with my employees. And as any decent manager, I try to learn the topics I am talking about. So I read up on the topic.

There's a Forbes article by the same name dealing with this topic in a more b-school kind of a way. Here's the link to that, if anyone would like to read. Essentially, this article debates on whether the ethics classes taught in b-schools or any organizational training seminars can over-write the years of social conditioning people have. Now the premise of this article is a little more complicated than the point I am trying to drive home, especially because it deals more with the ethical dilemma of working for organizations whose approach might not sit well with the employee's personal ethical beliefs. I, on the other hand, am talking about basic personal integrity - related to how you do your job, especially for ground-level employees. Can that be taught?

Reverting back to things I know, let's take a look at my father's code? He viewed the company with the same devotion with which he viewed the country. And it is a proven fact that most combatant military personnel have a similar view of the country. As a matter of fact, the same is instilled in them through rigorous training and (for the lack of a better word) brainwashing. Which is a must for army men because their lives are at stake in line of duty. But if you wanted a similar code of conduct in the people in your employ, could you make that happen?

To get an answer to that question, I looked within myself. What makes me honest? I realized that I was honest because I found it easier than being crooked. And I decided to approach my employees with the same learning. I started trying to demonstrate to my people that being earnest and honest was easier. And many of them actually seemed to understand and imbibe the lesson. We all know that a hard and honest day's work lets you sleep peacefully at the end of the day. I am not sure whether I could manage to change the perspective of someone who was inherently deceitful, but if they keep up their integrity, they'll be better employees and better people for it.