Is your head spinning with all the financial advice being tossed around these days? I know mine is. So, when I stumble across good financial advice, I want to pass it on. What better way than right here on my blog? Keep reading to find out what is the #1 best piece of financial advice you’ll receive…ever. You’ll never guess where I found it. Well, if you read my blog much you might guess.
Before we get to the post, let me say thanks for being patient with me as I took a sabbatical from blogging throughout November. I’m back and plan to be bringing your springboard as planned from now on (until my next overwhelmed schedule). Now on to today’s family springboard.
Relationships are tough. Sadly, we often take the easy way out when relationships get hard and try to medicate our struggles with money. Maybe we hoard it. Maybe we spend it. Maybe we just fixate on stuff.
Check out the Skit Guys video that really highlights the point and demonstrates the absurdity of it all. Deep down inside we know it won’t help. Sometimes we just need to see how ridiculous we can be to get some sense slapped into us.
I think Black Friday may actually be the biggest shopping day of the year because a whole bunch of people are needing to medicate all their raw struggles and hurts from a day spent with their family. Maybe it’s just the good deals. Or maybe its a convergence of the two.
When struggles come in your marriage or your family, don’t medicate with money. Cast your anxieties on God (Philippians 4:6-7). Then go to the family member and get honest. Deal with the feelings. Yes, be gentle, humble, loving, and tender-hearted (Ephesians 4:32), but deal with it. Trust me, you’ll feel a lot better as you connect to your loved ones than you ever will if you disconnect and buy something.
I hope you had a Happy Thanksgiving last week and that it drew you closer to your family and God. If not, don’t make it worse by hoarding or spending. Go to your family and work on the relationship.
Let’s play a word association game. I’ll list some words and you tell me what comes to mind that they all have in common. Enron. Worldcom. Martha Stewart. And, if you follow my friend Bill Seaver’s podcast, Belkin. When you heard these names together, did you think of deceit, fraud, misappropriation of funds, lying, stealing, cheating?
Ethics is a major issue these days. I love the title of John Maxwell’s book and his reason for giving it this title–There’s No Such Thing As Business Ethics
Rule #1: The Golden Rule
Do to others what you would have others do to you. We’ve all heard it. I know folks have tried to improve upon it by making up The Platinum Rule
. However, that merely demonstrated they did not fully understand the Golden Rule. Obviously, I want others to consider what I want. I should do the same for them. But instead of being distracted by competing rules, let’s just get back to what we’ve always known this meant.
If roles were reversed, would you want the person you are dealing with to do what you are about to do? How do you want people to treat you? With honesty, integrity, kindness, and respect? How are you treating them? Do you want folks to be sincere with you? Do you want others to give you the benefit of the doubt? Do you want others to give their best for you? Are you doing that for them?
Maybe you can’t find an actual bylaw that says what you are about to do is wrong. Maybe the law would never be able to punish you for what you are about to do. However, if you’re treating someone the way you’d hate to be treated, then you’re not being ethical.
Rule #2: The Honesty Rule
Is what you are doing, saying, or representing completely, totally, rigorously honest? I know I’ve been tempted on this before. I want to sell my car but the air conditioner is messed up. It has a short somewhere. Sometimes it works; sometimes it doesn’t. My temptation when someone drives it and the air works is to just let it go. I can always fake it later. “Well you got to drive it, did it work then?” But that is just not honest. There is no way around it. I’m tacitly lying when I do that. Why do you think real estate agents make sellers write up a full disclosure and sign it? Because they don’t want to be involved in some unethical dealing.
Too many people try to come up with loopholes. Like children, they seem to think they can cross their fingers and let a little fib slip. If you want to be ethical, you have to tell the truth. Be rigorously honest, even if it gets you in trouble. Trust me, in time, people will learn to appreciate your honesty.
Rule #3: The Extra-Mile Rule
If I’m just trying to get by with the least possible amount of effort I can give, I’m not being ethical. My boss has hired me to do the best possible job I can give him. He hasn’t hired me so I can do just enough to get by. I need to go the extra mile. I need to give that extra effort. I need to do my best and then some. I need to give a little more, go a little farther, push a little harder.
The fact is, I’m stealing from my bosses when I’m only giving them half the effort they are paying for. Instead, I should be giving to them by giving them more effort than they are paying for. Of course, there will often be a payoff for me in this. When I’m giving more effort, they’ll often see it and start paying for it.
Rule #4: The Time Management Rule
Here’s the heart of it. If my boss is paying me for 40 hours work, but I only gave him 30 hours work stretched into 40, I’m not being ethical. I need to make the most of my time. I need to act like time is money and invest it wisely. If I’m wasting my time in the company, I’m wasting my boss’s/client’s money.
Each moment past is gone forever. I can never relive the minutes I’ve let slip by. I can never give those minutes back to my bosses or clients. Then when I take money for those wasted minutes, I’m practically stealing from them.
Rule #5: The Consistency Rule
Sadly, many folks rank ethics on a sliding scale. It is as if they are being asked the question: “On a scale of 1 to 5, how ethical are you? 5 means completely ethical. 4 somewhat ethical. 3 averagely ethical. 2 hardly ethical. 1 never ethical.” It just doesn’t work that way. We’re either ethical or we’re not.
I’m not saying any of us are perfect. I’m not saying we never make mistakes. I’m not saying we never fail to meet our grand intentions. However, if I’m constantly lying to my employees, I don’t get to declare I’m ethical just because I’ve never lied to my customers. However, I’ll point out if you really think both of those statements are true, you’re probably lying to yourself. Just because you tell the truth the 95% of the time it won’t affect you adversely, you’re not mostly ethical. If you lie when backed into a corner, you’re not ethical.
Remember that this checklist is my checklist for determining if I’m ethical. I have no doubt everyone, no matter their view of spirituality, agrees with the rules I’ve listed so far. Some may not agree with this final rule because it will appear too Christian or Bible based. Sometimes we seem to have the idea that the Bible is for church not our professional lives. I can’t take the Bible out of any of my life. I will point out that if you have agreed with the above 5 rules, you have agreed with very Bible based rules. I have to share my sixth rule because these are my rules for determining if I’m being ethical. You may not want to follow this last one, but I assure you, it will make you ethical if you do.
Rule #6: The Bottom Line Rule
Most often, we associate the bottom line with money because that’s where the phrase originated. However, it has come to mean what is most important. If someone says, “The bottom line is…” we expect them to tell us the most important part of whatever they are sharing. For most folks, the bottom line does have to do with money. For some it has to do with fame. For others with influence and popularity. For some, the bottom line is receiving the credit or passing the blame.
For me, the bottom line comes directly from Matthew 6:33. “Seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness.” I have to ask with every decision is this the next right thing? Is this what God would want me to do? That’s my bottom line. It doesn’t matter how much money it will make me or how famous it will make me. If I can’t be convinced God wants me to do it, then, for me, it just isn’t ethical.
Of course, to truly follow this rule, I have to go back to my honesty rule. It’s amazing the number of ways I can declare God wants me to do something and in the end I realize it was just me wanting to do it. But that is for another post–probably a Monday post.
There you have it. My six rules for determining if I’m acting ethically. I hope it helps you. I hope we can each make an individual difference in our work place, shining the light of ethical living for all to see and leading our business world away from the sad state of ethicless actions by placing doing good things above doing profitable things. In the end, I think we’ll find doing good is actually more profitable anyway.
I was recently listening to one Dan Miller’s excellent podcasts in which someone chastised him for telling folks they could reach their dreams even in troubled financial times. Of course, Miller, using his own life experience, gave an excellent and helpful reply. However, as I was listening to the letter berating him and then heard his first illustration, a thought solidified in my mind.
The letter had been talking about just how hard it can be to achieve early retirement or financial prosperity in difficult economic times. It then said Miller shouldn’t turn a blind eye to the present economic climate and tell folks they can all just achieve their dreams. Miller’s first illustration was Michael Phelps who won eight gold medals at the most recent olympics.
Wait a minute. Winning eight gold medals isn’t about finances. Granted, receiving those medals has given Phelps the inside track on some major endorsement deals I’m sure. But what Miller used as his illustration wasn’t really what the writer was talking about.
Then it hit me. This letter writer doesn’t have the right dream. His dream is about having lots of money. This demonstrates a problem for many today. If your dream is lots of money, you probably won’t ever get it. Of course, even if you have lots of money by other people’s standards, you will always view yourself as falling short.
Financial success will rarely come by dreaming of financial success. If all you dream about is financial success, you will wander around aimlessly trying to latch on to the next scheme that might make you some money.On occasion you may end up with some money in your bank account, but it will all be used up and you will be right back where you were, wandering aimlessly looking for the next cash cow. Real financial success comes from a dream that you follow passionately. That passion will set you apart in whatever field your dream causes you to pursue, which will then cause you to find the financial success. Your dream may be helping folks with cancer. It may be helping folks overcome addiction. It may be playing baseball. It may be manicuring lawns. It may be swimming. It may be making people laugh. It may be any number of things.
Here is the very interesting thing. When your dream is properly aligned, the guy who is only dreaming of financial success may not see you as having achieved financial success. You may not reach Trump status when you pursue your dream. However, because your dream is not about making money the fact that your dream is supporting you at all causes you to be satisfied and fulfilled by your dream.
Let me ask you, do you think if Michael Phelps was not getting endorsement deals that he would be upset about the eight gold medals feeling like it was all a waste? Of course not. He achieved his dream even through tough circumstances. Because his dream was aligned properly, he would probably wonder, what on earth do you mean we can’t achieve our dreams in an economic slump. Sadly, too many people equate achieving their dreams with being rich. They rarely end up rich and they never get their dreams whether the nation is in an economic slump or not.
The economic slump only keeps you from achieving your dreams if they are only about money. The fact is, if your dream is only about money, it’s not a dream worth having. Get a real dream and pursue it with passion.
ELC
P.S. For more great professional advice and some practical tools, click the Dan Miller link above.
