Integrity equals: adherence to moral and ethical principles; soundness of moral character; honesty.
I never thought about the amount of integrity and how it affects an organization until recently when I read this article: http://www.moneyweb.co.za/mw/view/mw/en/page292681?oid=527025&sn=2009+Detail+no+image&pid=287226
The article made the amazing point that companies with higher integrity had less misconduct, higher financial strength, stronger long-term shareholder returns, and overall higher business performance, all of which I feel are major goals of the company.
Considering leadership, if a company's leader is more focused on hiring people with high integrity, everything else will fall into place. If leaders can motivate employees to make the right decisions, the company can reap the benefits. Instead of asking a potential employee what they did in a time of conflict, why not ask about a time they felt they acted with integrity? Instead of worrying about a task, why not worry about how ethically (or unethically) the task is accomplished? I feel that if integrity (and ethics) were more of a concern at the bottom of an organization, they can climb their way to the top and stop unethical behavior from the core.
Posted By: Melissa Beechy
After looking over this post for awhile, it occurred to me that the Leader-Member Exchange Theory can be used in a way in this topic. Although it would benefit the company to hire people with high integrity, I also believe that leaders can serve as a sort of role model through the LMX theory.
ReplyDeleteThe LMX Theory is about the interaction between the leader and the follower. I believe that the interaction can make a huge impact on the follower in terms of integrity. There are 3 phases in the LMX theory, Stranger, Acquaintance, and Partnership. The interaction in the first phase is based off of rules and contracts. The second phase is where the leader and follower begin to have more social interactions, sharing more resources and personal or work-related information. I think this phase is a great opportunity for leaders to begin the development of the follower in terms of their ethics and integrity. When getting to know the leader better, the follower will take note of the different actions the leader is taking throughout the organization. Then, the 3rd phase is marked by high-quality leader-member exchanges. At this point, the leader and follower really trust and respect each other. This is also a great opportunity to implement the importance of ethics into the interaction. There is a high degree of reciprocity between the two, which could mean that each one will be ethical as long as the other is as well.
In summary, I think that the topics of integrity and ethics is a mutual concern for both a leader and a follower.
posted by: Kelly Yuen