Leadership #02 - Integrity

"Integrity" means a lot to leaders. Almost everyone knows what does it mean and why it is important to a leader (actually to all) and there is no need to further elaborate on this.

I would like to talk about an attribute of integrity: "no double standard". A leader should rule and manage the team, the department or the corporation based on the unique standard (whether on measurement of success/failure/performance/etc.). No matter how good a leader he/she is, his/her reputation or credit as a leader will be completely ruined when he/she demonstrates once in his/her lifetime, double standard in leading others.

However, it is easier to say it loud as a maxim than execute leadership with unique standard. That's why "leaders" are rare. Once upon a time, I worked for a company with full of dissatisfactory employees in my department because of the inconsistent standard of measurement exercised by the leader. Let's call the leader as Mickey. Personally, Mickey was a nice, experienced and intelligent executive. But he leaded the department using double standard. On one hand, he advocated and enforced the best practice of process and control at projects (for better quality) requiring proper process, control and documentation standards. But on the other hand, for some of his preferred projects, he allowed those projects proceeding without process and control, as long as the projects could be completed on time. The so called process and control within the organization became a fake.

This kind of "one organization, multiple standards" from a leader is not only lethal to the leadership, but it also affect the entire organization. On one hand, the subordinates' trust towards the leader will be jeopardized. Besides, such mistrust will spread accross the organization like diease.

In Chinese, there is an idiom about double standard: "只許州官放火，不許百姓點燈" (the rough meaning is: The official is allowed to do what he wants, but not the citizens) , which best describes the case of double standard.