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Tuesday, June 12, 2018

Mhatma Gandhi's Seven Deadly Sins

Mahatma Gandhi's Seven Deadly Sins
© 1990 Dr. Stephen R. Covey 
excerpts from The Seven Habits and Principle-Centered Leadership
Mahatma Gandhi said that seven things will destroy us. Notice that all of them have to do with social and political conditions. Note also that the antidote of each of these "deadly sins" is an explicit external standard or something that is based on natural principles and laws, not on social values.
Wealth Without Work
Pleasure Without Conscience
Knowledge Without Character
Commerce (Business) Without Morality (Ethics)
Science Without Humanity
Religion Without Sacrifice
Politics Without Principle
Wealth Without Work
This refers to the practice of getting something for nothing - manipulating markets and assets so you don't have to work or produce added value, just manipulate people and things. Today there are professions built around making wealth without working, making much money without paying taxes, benefiting from free government programs without carrying a fair share of the financial burdens, and enjoying all the perks of citizenship of country and membership of corporation without assuming any of the risk or responsibility.
How many of the fraudulent schemes that went on in the 1980s, often called the decade of greed, were basically get-rich-quick schemes or speculations promising practitioners, "You don't even have to work for it"? That is why I would be very concerned if one of my children went into speculative enterprises or if they learned how to make a lot of money fast without having to pay the price by adding value on a day-to-day basis.
Some network marketing and pyramidal organizations worry me because many people get rich quick by building a structure under them that feeds them without work. They are rationalized to the hilt; nevertheless the overwhelming emotional motive is often greed: "You can get rich without much work. You may have to work initially, but soon you can have wealth without work." New social mores and norms are cultivated that cause distortions in their judgement.
Justice and judgement are inevitably inseparable, suggesting that to the degree you move away from the laws of nature, your judgement will be adversely affected. You get distorted notions. You start telling rational lies to explain why things work or why they don't. You move away from the law of "the farm" into social / political environments.
When we read of organizations in trouble, we often hear the sad confessions of executives who tell of moving away from natural laws and principles for a period of time and begin overbuilding, over-borrowing, and over speculating, not really reading the stream or getting objective feedback, just hearing a lot of self-talk internally. Now they have a high debt to pay. They may have to work hard just to survive - without hope of being healthy for five years or more. It's back to the basics, hand to the plow. And many of these executives, in earlier days, were critical of the conservative founders of the corporations who stayed close to the fundamentals and preferred to stay small and free of debt.
Pleasure Without Conscience
The chief query of the immature, greedy, selfish, and sensuous has always been, "What's in it for me? Will this please me? Will it ease me?" Lately many people seem to want these pleasures without conscience or sense of responsibility, even abandoning or utterly neglecting spouses and children in the name of doing their thing. But independence is not the most mature state of being - it's only a middle position on the way to interdependence, the most advanced and mature state. To learn to give and take, to live selflessly, to be sensitive, to be considerate, is our challenge. Otherwise there is no sense of social responsibility or accountability in our pleasurable activities.
The ultimate costs of pleasures without conscience are high as measured in terms of time and money, in terms of reputation and in terms of wounding the hearts and minds of other people who are adversely affected by those who just want to indulge and gratify themselves in the short term. It's dangerous to be pulled or lulled away from natural law without conscience. Conscience is essentially the repository of timeless truths and principles - the internal monitor of natural law.
A prominent, widely published psychologist worked to align people with their moral conscience in what was called "integrity therapy." He once told me that he was a manic-depressive. "I knew I was getting suicidal," he said. "Therefore, I committed myself to a mental institution. I tried to work out of it, neutralize it, until I reached the point where I could leave the hospital. I don't do clinical work now because it is too stressful. I mostly do research. And through my own struggle, I discovered that integrity therapy was the only way to go. I gave up my mistress, confessed to my wife, and had peace for the first time in my life. ""
Pleasure without conscience is one of the key temptations for today's executives. Sometimes on airplanes, I'll scan the magazines directed at executives, noting the advertisements. Many of these ads, perhaps two-thirds of them, invite executives to indulge themselves without conscience because they "deserve it" or have "earned it" or "want it," and why not "give in" and "let it all hang out"? The seductive message is, "You've arrived. You are now a law unto yourself. You don't need a conscience to govern you anymore." And in some ads you see sixty-year-old men with attractive thirty-year-old women, the "significant others" who accompany some executives to conventions. Whatever happened to spouses? What happened to the social mores that make cheating on spouses illegitimate behavior?
Knowledge without Character
As dangerous as a little knowledge is, even more, dangerous is much knowledge without a strong, principled character. Purely intellectual development without commensurate internal character development makes as much sense as putting a high-powered sports car in the hands of a teenager who is high on drugs. Yet all too often in the academic world, that's exactly what we do by not focusing on the character development of young people.
One of the reasons I'm excited about taking the Seven Habits into the schools is that it is character education. Some people don't like character education because, they say, "that's your value system." But you can get a common set of values that everyone agrees on. It is not that difficult to decide, for example, that kindness, fairness, dignity, contribution, and integrity are worth keeping. No one will fight you on those. So let's start with values that are unarguable and infuse them in our education system and in our corporate training and development programs. Let's achieve a better balance between the development of character and intellect.
The people who are transforming education today are doing it by building consensus around a common set of principles, values, and priorities and debunking the high degree of specialization, departmentalization, and partisan politics.
Commerce (Business) Without Morality (Ethics)
In his book Moral Sentiment, which preceded Wealth of Nations, Adam Smith explained how foundational to the success of our systems is the moral foundation: how we treat each other, the spirit of benevolence, of service, of contribution. If we ignore the moral foundation and allow economic systems to operate without moral foundation and without continued education, we will soon create an amoral, if not immoral, society and business. Economic and political systems are ultimately based on a moral foundation.
To Adam Smith, every business transaction is a moral challenge to see that both parties come out fairly. Fairness and benevolence in business are the underpinnings of the free enterprise system called capitalism. Our economic system comes out of a constitutional democracy where minority rights are to be attended to as well. The spirit of the Golden Rule or of win-win is a spirit of morality, of mutual benefit, of fairness for all concerned. Paraphrasing one of the mottos of the Rotary Club, "Is it fair and does it serve the interests of all the stakeholders?" That's just a moral sense of stewardship toward all of the stakeholders.
I like that Smith says every economic transaction. People get in trouble when they say that most of their economic transactions are moral. That means there is something going on that is covert, hidden, secret. People keep a hidden agenda, a secret life, and they justify and rationalize their activities. They tell themselves rational lies so they don't have to adhere to natural laws. If you can get enough rationalization in a society, you can have social mores or political wills that are totally divorced from natural laws and principles.
I once met a man who for five years served as the "ethics director" for a major aerospace company. He finally resigned the post in protest and considered leaving the company, even though he would lose a big salary and benefits package. He said that the executive team had their own separate set of business ethics and that they were deep into rationalization and justification. Wealth and power were big on their agendas, and they made no excuse for it anymore. They were divorced from reality even inside their own organization. They talked about serving the customer while absolutely mugging their own employees.
Science Without Humanity
If science becomes all technique and technology, it quickly degenerates into man against humanity. Technologies come from the paradigms of science. And if there's very little understanding of the higher human purposes that the technology is striving to serve, we become victims of our own technocracy. We see otherwise highly educated people climbing the scientific ladder of success, even though it's often missing the rung called humanity and leaning against the wrong wall.
The majority of the scientists who ever lived or living today, and they have brought about a scientific and technological explosion in the world. But if all they do is superimpose technology on the same old problems, nothing basic changes. We may see an evolution, an occasional "revolution" in science, but without humanity we see precious little real human advancement. All the old inequities and injustices are still with us.
About the only thing that hasn't evolved are these natural laws and principles - the true north on the compass. Science and technology have changed the face of most everything else. But the fundamental things still apply, as time goes by.
Religion Without Sacrifice
Without sacrifice, we may become active in a church but remain inactive in its gospel. In other words, we go for the social façade of religion and the piety of religious practices. There is no real walking with people or going the second mile or trying to deal with our social problems that may eventually undo our economic system. It takes sacrifice to serve the needs of other people - the sacrifice of our own pride and prejudice, among other things.
If a church or religion is seen as just another hierarchical system, its members won't have a sense of service or inner work-ship. Instead, they will be into outward observances and all the visible accouterments of religion. But they are neither God-centered nor principle-centered.
The principles of three of the Seven Habits pertain to how we deal with other people, how we serve them, how we sacrifice for them, how we contribute. Habits 4, 5 and 6 - win-win interdependency, empathy, and synergy - require tremendous sacrifice. I've come to believe that they require a broken heart and a contrite spirit - and that, for some, is the ultimate sacrifice. For example, I once observed a marriage where there were frequent arguments. One thought came to me : "These two people must have a broken heart and a contrite spirit toward each other or this union will never last." You can't have a oneness, a unity, without humility. Pride and selfishness will destroy the union between man and god, between man and woman, between man and man, between self and self.
The great servant leaders have that humility, the hallmark of inner religion. I know a few CEOs who are humble servant leaders - who sacrifice their pride and share their power - and I can say that their influence both inside and outside their companies is multiplied because of it. Sadly, many people want "religion," or at least the appearance of it, without any sacrifice. They want more spirituality but would never miss a meal in meaningful fasting or do one act of anonymous service to achieve it.
Politics Without Principle
If there is no principle, there is no true north, nothing you can depend upon. The focus on the personality ethic is the instant creation of an image that sells well in the social and economic marketplace.
You see politicians spending millions of dollars to create an image, even though it's superficial, lacking substance, in order to get votes and gain office. And when it works, it leads to a political system operating independently of the natural laws that should govern - that are built into the Declaration of Independence: "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 . . . . "
In other words, they are describing self-evident, external, observable, natural, unarguable, self-evident laws: "We hold these Truths to be self-evident." The key to a healthy society is to get the social will, the value system, aligned with correct principles. You then have the compass needle pointing to true north - true north representing the external or the natural law - and the indicator says that is what we are building our value system on: they are aligned.
But if you get a sick social will behind the political will that is independent of principle, you could have a very sick organization or society with distorted values. For instance, the professed mission and shared values of criminals who rape, rob and plunder might sound very much like many corporate mission statements, using such words as "teamwork," "cooperation," "loyalty," "profitability," "innovation," and "creativity." The problem is that their value system is not based on a natural law.
Figuratively, inside many corporations with lofty mission statements, many people are being mugged in broad daylight in front of witnesses. Or they are being robbed of self-esteem, money, or position without due process. And if there is no social will behind the principles of due process, and if you can't get due process, you have to go to the jury of your peers and engage in counterculture sabotage.
In the movie The Ten Commandments, Moses says to the pharaoh, "We are to be governed by God's law, not by you." In effect, he's saying, "We will not be governed by a person unless that person embodies the law." In the best societies and organizations, natural laws and principles govern - that's the Constitution - and even the top people must bow to the principle. No one is above it.

Sunday, June 10, 2018

BE CONSCIOUS OF YOUR CONSCIENCE by Harvey MacKay

BE CONSCIOUS OF YOUR conscience



I have always been a fan of comics, or what I call the funny pages.  Recently I was looking at The Family Circus” by Bil Keane.  The littlest boy has a cupboard open and is looking at various boxes of food when his older brother sees him and says, “Conscience is like Mommy tellin’ you not to do somethin’, but she isn’t there.”
Or as I like to say, act like your mother is watching.  All the time.
Conscience is that little voice inside that tells us what we already know is right or wrong.  Unfortunately for some, when it is talking, they aren’t listening.  And that’s when the trouble begins.  Whether in our personal life or business life, it’s important to heed that little voice.
Perhaps you remember the lesson that Jiminy Cricket taught to Pinocchio:  “Always let your conscience be your guide.”   It may seem pretty elementary, but our consciences are actually formed as children, long before many other personality traits are developed.
Investor’s Business Daily identified 10 traits for getting ahead in business – 10 traits for turning your dreams into reality.  They included many things you would expect:  a positive attitude, a definitive goal, a courageous spirit, an inquisitive mind, a strong heart, an analytical brain, a focused eye, a fearless approach and a disciplined tongue.  Number 10 on the list was a clear conscience.
Like “The Family Circus” cartoon, they harkened back to the lessons of childhood.  Don’t forget the rules you learned in kindergarten.  Play nice.  Be dependable.  Tell the truth.  If you can’t get to the top by being true to yourself and straight with everyone around you, your success will be hollow – and probably short-lived.
Read the headlines:  business scandals, political scandals, religious scandals, sports scandals, entertainment scandals – Have we lost all our sense of right and wrong?
I don’t think so, or these stories wouldn’t be so shocking.  But as business people, we need to be critically aware of our role in keeping things honest.  People are watching, and given the 24-hour news cycle and the reach of social media, we need to understand that taking chances with the truth is never worth the risk.
Consider these lessons from two highly principled leaders.
Once when U.S. President Harry Truman was asked what principles guided his career, he said that he let his conscience be his guide.  Then he elaborated:  “My father used to say, ‘That is all you can do.’  … What more can a man do?  Do the best you can.  Sometimes you come out successfully, sometimes you don’t.  You have to have luck and ability and be ready to meet the situation as it comes.  All this happened to me.  I never thought I would go to the United States Senate, but then I never thought I would go to the White House either.”
Indian leader Mahatma Gandhi said he had a formula for achieving balance both in one’s personal life as well as in the modern world.  His prescription called for recognizing and avoiding the seven big sins of life:  wealth without works, pleasure without conscience, knowledge without character, commerce without morality, science without humanity, worship without sacrifice, and politics without principle.
Do you detect a theme here?  Most of them relate to having a clear conscience.
Make no mistake; customers are watching how businesses perform through an ethical lens.  Businesses cannot hide their questionable practices for long – they will be exposed.  Trying to mend a bad reputation is a lot harder than maintaining a good one.
Just ask the big bank that’s in the news for questionable sales practices.  Or the airbag maker whose defective products are hurting people instead of protecting them.  Or the movie mogul who went from the top of the heap to the bottom of the barrel after multiple accusations of inappropriate behavior surfaced.
But you don’t have to make national headlines for your true colors to be exposed.  Doing business with this shopkeeper might be a challenge.
An eager-beaver salesperson was trying to have a country storekeeper carry his product, and finally tried to bribe the fellow with a bottle of champagne.
“Oh, my conscience wouldn’t let me take a gift,” the storekeeper protested.
“What if I sell it to you for one dollar?” asked the salesperson.
“In that case,” replied the man, “I’ll take two.”
Mackay’s Moral:  Putting profit before principle is always bad business.

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