Tag Archives: character

Be honest, are you transparent?

8 Comments

Last week I sold my car by advertising it as a private sale.

Two brothers turned up to view it. They were the first and were clearly very keen having asked for my assurance on many occasions on the phone that I will not sell the car until they came to see it.

In fact, they were so keen that I actually started to question the price I had advertised it for(!).

They kicked the tyres and we took it for a test drive. I knew there were certain things that already required repair. I also knew they probably would not pick up on these points.

If I told them, what if they were no longer interested in purchasing the car? Should I tell them, or wait to be asked? If they suspect the faults I will definitely be honest, that’s not lying right?

Honesty is being free of deceit; truthful and sincere when you are asked.

Transparency is being free of deceit; truthful and sincere before you are asked.

I know honesty can also mean being honest, before you are asked. But have you ever thought just how powerful transparency actually is?

The two brothers ended up buying the car, despite me telling them of the faults. Why?

When I told them about the faults quite openly, I empowered them. They had information they felt they didn’t have and were likely not to have.

When I am honest reactively, I know this builds trust. But leaves people questioning, why did I have to ask? What else do I not know?

The word ‘builds’ by itself implies it is not yet built.

When I am honest proactively i.e. transparent, trust goes a longer way to being built.

The same applies to companies. Some companies were selling Payment Protection Insurance (“PPI”) to customers who had already retired! How can this even make sense! They were sold an insurance product they would never make a claim on. These customers never asked the loan providers the question of whether they needed PPI and so they were sold it, bundled with the monthly repayments of the loan.

If a customer had asked if they needed PPI on their loan, in some cases customers were blatantly lied to. Some other loan providers were honest at that point and did not sell it. But the question had to be asked. Is this honesty?

What if companies were actually transparent? What if they said, hey, we could make money by selling you this product, but you know what, you’re not going to get much value from it so we would rather not. What happens?

What happens is you get trust from your customers, quickly.

In both our work and private lives, we should realise that being transparent is the highest level of honesty.

This highest level of honesty brings the highest level of trust.

And the highest level of trust in turn brings the highest level of loyalty.

Which business or individual would not want that?

I’ll let you know when I’m selling my next car…

Share on Facebook

You can’t choose some things in life but you can choose your integrity

3 Comments

Recently, I attended a day conference where all members in the meeting were asked two simple things. We had to raise our hand and promise we will:

A. Come back on time after breaks

B. If we have a question or a point to make that we don’t shout it out. But raise our hand and wait to be chosen to speak

Seemed kind of childish to me. Isn’t this something we use to do as children in a classroom? Did I go through many years of working in corporate life as an adult to only be treated as a child again. I wasn’t having any of it.

On the next break, I enjoyed my tea and biscuits and was in some engaging conversations about the weekend and what was in store for us in the day ahead.

When we were asked to return to the room, I went to use the toilet. As you do. There, I had a great time talking with more friends.

When I returned to the conference room, it was filled with an aura of awkward silence. I squeamishly found my seat, looking at the ground hoping not to draw attention as more members fluttered in to the room feeling anxious from the same imbroglio.

Then we were asked in one of those ‘I’m angry but I’m not going to show it’ voices, “what did you all promise this morning?”.

Come on! Couple of minutes is not the end of the world I thought as I looked around at all the smug faces who actually made it back on time with their necks tall and their chest out.

But the rule was deliberate. It was almost a test. For then we discussed integrity. What is it?

I realised that day that being two minutes late is not the end of the world. But being two minutes late when you say you are not going to be is a whole different experience for your character.

“You can break a promise. But the promise can break you”

Integrity is doing the right thing, even when no one is watching. It’s a promise to yourself based on your beliefs and values.

I realised I had strong values on the big things in life but being two minutes late or for example cancelling plans with your friends after agreeing did not seem that big to me. In fact, my values had helped to justify this as being polite (!) since I had the courtesy to let them know in advance.

However, when you live a life of integrity at all times, in everything you do, you will see a whole different change in your character. Your confidence increases and people start treating you with more respect.

If you say you are going to do something, do it. Try it for a week with every little thing you say. Some may be promises to yourself that no one else knows, and therefore if you break the promise no one else will know. This becomes tempting. But keep them. A promise to yourself is worth much more than a promise to someone else.

This builds a lot of character and people start to trust you when you say something, because you trust what you say.

Try it for the next seven days and see how it makes you feel. I guarantee you will feel very different.

Share on Facebook

Character vs Personality

Image 3 Comments

What is the difference between character and personality?

Something we don’t generally think about.

There is one key difference.

“You can have many personalities, but you can only have one character at any given time”

Let’s think about it. When you are at home, you may be very confident and funny. At work, you may be shy and reserved. With your friends, you may be the person your friends turn to for guidance and you speak calmly. In an emergency situation, you may be very authoritative, loud and decisive. These are all examples of different personalities.

Your character, to love, to care, to have high morals, to not lie, to be trusted is the fundamental of makes you you, that is the same.

Now character can change over time, through external influences (society) and internal influences (making mistakes, experiences etc). But at any one point you can have many personalities but you only have one character.

Or think about it this way. Personality is what other people see. Character is what you see.

Share on Facebook

My happiest time was when I was able to ‘hear’ the sun

Image 3 Comments

So I’ve just got back from spending some time in Berlin! A lovely city, where I met some amazing people.

One night in a bar called King Size in Berlin, I came across a very successful and well travelled businessman and we got talking.

It started with the usual small talk “Have you been here before? What are you doing in Berlin?” etc and we realised we have similar consultancy background in finance and we’re both economists at heart.

This immediately led to familiarity and we talked more openly about how the corporate culture was flawed with inefficiencies that limit the success of true entrepreneurs.

As our opinions and perspectives gelled more and more we opened up more and more talking about cars, watches and other materialistic items that naturally drive us as humans. He told me he had owned every car I could think of, Aston Martin, Ferrari, Porsche and he had even met Patek Philippe to have a custom made watch to his requirements.

No, he was not trying to hit on me as I’m sure some of you are thinking.

But then he said “Prabhmeet, out of all the things I have owned in my life, and my experiences of living and working all over the world, my happiest time was the two weeks I spent with a tribe in Australia. Living and eating just as they did”.

I was amazed.

Here I was standing in a bar, with music playing and people dancing and drinking and I’ve somehow managed to stand next to this one guy who is searching for the same answers that I am. And I have my own experiences and my own opinion.

The conversation then turned to what do you want out of life? What is the meaning of life?

Now you can imagine I’m pretty interested. This 53 year old guy, a business consultant running a very successful international consultancy is telling me the best things in life are free!

I wasn’t convinced. “But I want a Ferrari! I’m pretty sure I will be smiling when I’m driving around in a Ferrari” I say to him. Almost expecting a reaction.

He laughed and said “Yes, you sure will! But for how long?”.

After going through every single car possible hoping the next one will bring him more happiness he concluded that materialistic items will only bring short term happiness.

I’d read about this stuff in books. But never met someone who had actually lived it.

As a true entrepreneur short term happiness wasn’t enough and he wanted more! How do we get long term happiness?

By chance he had met this tribe and spent time with them. And on the first day they welcomed him with a ‘Hello!’ It was only 24 hours later they then communicated further with him.

This was deliberate. In those 24 hours you are allowed to realise and take in everything around you first, he told me. People, the houses, the sky, the sand, the wind.

24 hours is a long time for silence in a desert. You then start looking inwards. Who are you? Why are you standing here in the middle of this desert? What are you feeling right now? Are you happy, sad, hungry, confused? You start thinking about all the important people in your life. What actions or achievements have given you the greatest happiness in your life? A real and lengthy introspection.

“My happiest time was when I was able to ‘hear’ the sun”, he said to me.

I was awfully confused. How much had this man had to drink! I must have said it over in my head about five times, while he just stood there smiling, knowing I was trying to decipher what he had said.

In everyday life we take all these things for granted. A hello is often followed with a full conversation. I personally sometimes even walk down the road surfing the internet or reading messages on my mobile phone, let alone taking in the wind or the sky. We all do it.

We can seek happiness in our lives where we live with an attitude of gratitude. But how many of us really do this? How simple…be grateful for everything. Where’s the catch? But we want more! We fear losing what we have today so we don’t enjoy it today!

When you have done these two levels of thinking of the external and the internal you reach a new state. A state of ‘now what’? We went on to discuss.

So why are you here?

When you look back at your life, there may be three things you want remembered

1. What would people say about your character

2. What difference have you made to OTHER peoples lives

3. What have you achieved?

Are you living your life currently that will make you proud of all of these areas?

If not, what can you start doing now so you can look back and tick off three of these boxes (or any others) happily.

We both concluded that the greatest happiness comes from living a life where you can serve others.

But why does this bring us so much joy? It’s almost like it charges your batteries and makes you feel energised when you do something good for others. It’s not a heaven or hell thing. It’s not to boast and tell others but it just feels good here and now. The rewards are instant. You feel energised and happy.

How does that happiness compare to buying say a new car or clothes? That feels good too right? But is the happiness different? Could there be different levels of happiness?

What do you think?

But how do we actually dedicate our lives to helping others. Not all of us are multi millionaires. We need to work to buy houses, cars and send our children to school.

The serving others concept doesn’t mean that we have to overnight drop everything and all turn in to Mother Teresa.

It means that in everything we do, every person that we meet, every opportunity we have to serve, we embrace it. Happiness can then be found in every day life.

A lot of people ask me “But how do we actually do this”? Make a commitment. Commit yourself for one week to do one good selfless act EVERY day. Just start with a week. And after a week let me know how it makes you feel.

Keep your batteries charged and notice the impact it has on your character and others around you. All three boxes are ticked.

Share on Facebook