[SPEAKER_00]: Hello everyone and welcome to the Power Being Relitless Ethics podcast.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm Michael Hanks and today we're going to be talking about ethics and leadership.
[SPEAKER_00]: Now, I know what some of your think in ethics that sounds like a corporate training video I had to skip through, stick with me, okay?
[SPEAKER_00]: Because what we're talking about today is an checklist.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's a way of being.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's a difference between a leader or people have to follow and a leader people choose to follow, okay?
[SPEAKER_00]: Let's start with a definition, because words matter.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm not just talking about honesty.
[SPEAKER_00]: Integrity comes from the same root work and tagger, a whole number.
[SPEAKER_00]: To have integrity means to be whole, undivided.
[SPEAKER_00]: The same person in the boardroom, that you're at the dinner table.
[SPEAKER_00]: The same person in public, that you are in private.
[SPEAKER_00]: That's the foundation.
[SPEAKER_00]: and it's quiet work.
[SPEAKER_00]: Nobody throws a party when you make the right call that no one saw.
[SPEAKER_00]: There's no applause for the invoice you didn't.
[SPEAKER_00]: Hey, the rumor you didn't spread or the credit you didn't steal.
[SPEAKER_00]: But here's the thing about a foundation.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's visible.
[SPEAKER_00]: Okay, the foundation, it's invisible.
[SPEAKER_00]: Okay, and there's an old line of wisdom that captures this perfectly from Proverbs 109.
[SPEAKER_00]: People with integrity walk safely, but those who follow crooked paths will be exposed.
[SPEAKER_00]: Read that again.
[SPEAKER_00]: Those who follow crooked paths will be exposed.
[SPEAKER_00]: Not might be will be.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's almost like a law of nature.
[SPEAKER_00]: You can't build success.
[SPEAKER_00]: on a cracked foundation for a while, but the cracks always show eventually, always, it's, imagine building a house, okay?
[SPEAKER_00]: Imagine building a house on the sand, where it's real
[SPEAKER_00]: That house isn't going to stand too all, okay?
[SPEAKER_00]: It's just like those, those cracks.
[SPEAKER_00]: It'll stand for a while, but those cracks are going to show just like this house.
[SPEAKER_00]: You might can actually build it, okay?
[SPEAKER_00]: But eventually, the foundation's going to give out.
[SPEAKER_00]: To whereas if you took it, you built it on dry land, you took, you smoothed the ground, you worked the foundation, you built it strong, that house's going to stay longer, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: Now, let's look at Proverbs 27, the godly walk with integrity, blessed of their children who follow them.
[SPEAKER_00]: I love that this isn't just about you.
[SPEAKER_00]: Your integrity cast a shadow over the people who come after you, your kids, your team, the young professionals watching how you handle yourself.
[SPEAKER_00]: You're not just building a career, you're setting a pattern that outlives you.
[SPEAKER_00]: leaders have to be held to a our standard.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'll never, okay, so when I was at the temporary age, say, I'll never forget my boss telling me to lie if I have to.
[SPEAKER_00]: We were talking about some job orders and I did a lot of the client.
[SPEAKER_00]: I was honest with him, but she told me to do that.
[SPEAKER_00]: Now, here's what would happen if I would have lied to the client, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: Short term, yes, we would have made more money, but long term they would have
[SPEAKER_00]: and they're going to cancel the sale and brought in our competition.
[SPEAKER_00]: You see, when you can always do this with integrity.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's always just like the cracks in the side, well, the house illustration that I illustrated for you, it's always going to come to like what you do.
[SPEAKER_00]: Always.
[SPEAKER_00]: I chose not to lie.
[SPEAKER_00]: Number one, not because of the money, not because, you know,
[SPEAKER_00]: of the long-term business.
[SPEAKER_00]: I chose not to lie, because that's my core value integrity first.
[SPEAKER_00]: That's my very first one now.
[SPEAKER_00]: I don't care how much I make.
[SPEAKER_00]: I don't care how much an employer pays me.
[SPEAKER_00]: My core values are not for sale.
[SPEAKER_00]: When I was hired into a job, and I give you my core values,
[SPEAKER_00]: That's right then when you make that deal and say, okay, we're gonna hire you and we agree on salary and we share cans and we sign the paperwork.
[SPEAKER_00]: I will not deviate from those core values.
[SPEAKER_00]: If you don't like that, don't hire me.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's simple.
[SPEAKER_00]: And having integrity is always simple.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's always simple.
[SPEAKER_00]: How will I ask you a reflective question, okay?
[SPEAKER_00]: Instead with this for a minute, are you the same person in the meeting that you are in the parking lot afterward?
[SPEAKER_00]: Now let's talk about the elephant in the room here.
[SPEAKER_00]: We live in a result-driven world.
[SPEAKER_00]: And let's be honest, results aren't bad.
[SPEAKER_00]: Results matter.
[SPEAKER_00]: If you lead a team of company, a church, a household, you have a responsibility to produce.
[SPEAKER_00]: Nobody's impressed by good intentions and a failing organization.
[SPEAKER_00]: But here's where it gets dangerous.
[SPEAKER_00]: When results become the only thing that matters, ethics becomes the first thing to go.
[SPEAKER_00]: I've seen it.
[SPEAKER_00]: Okay, maybe you have, too.
[SPEAKER_00]: The leader who says, we'll fix the culture once we hit our numbers.
[SPEAKER_00]: The manager who looks the other way because the top performer gets the results.
[SPEAKER_00]: The executive who tells the team, I don't care how you get it done, just get it done.
[SPEAKER_00]: The, that phrase right there, I don't care how is where integrity dies.
[SPEAKER_00]: Okay?
[SPEAKER_00]: Because how you do something is never separate from what you do.
[SPEAKER_00]: The means shape the ends always.
[SPEAKER_00]: Here's some great wisdom, okay?
[SPEAKER_00]: Found in Ecclesiastes chapter 7 verses 4 through 5.
[SPEAKER_00]: Do not seek from the lower of the highest office nor the seat of honor from the king.
[SPEAKER_00]: Do not pretend to be righteous before the people and do not show off your wisdom before the king.
[SPEAKER_00]: What's happening here?
[SPEAKER_00]: The writer is warning against ambition.
[SPEAKER_00]: That's all show.
[SPEAKER_00]: I get stressing for the position, the title, the seat of honor while pretending at virtue.
[SPEAKER_00]: He's saying, don't perform righteousness, be righteousness.
[SPEAKER_00]: and ecclesiasties 41-13, a good name and doers forever.
[SPEAKER_00]: Think about that.
[SPEAKER_00]: Quarterly results don't endure forever.
[SPEAKER_00]: Stop price, they rise and they fall.
[SPEAKER_00]: Trophies gather dust, but a good name, a reputation built on doing right.
[SPEAKER_00]: That outlasts all on it.
[SPEAKER_00]: So, the tension every host leader feels the pressure to win now.
[SPEAKER_00]: Versus the call to win right.
[SPEAKER_00]: and the relentless leader choose this to win, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: Even when winning, right, a slower.
[SPEAKER_00]: Let me give you a picture of this, okay?
[SPEAKER_00]: I want you to picture two leaders running similar companies, okay?
[SPEAKER_00]: Both are faced with a tough year.
[SPEAKER_00]: Both have a chance to cut a corner.
[SPEAKER_00]: Maybe shade the truth to investors.
[SPEAKER_00]: Shepa product, they know it and ready.
[SPEAKER_00]: Leader number one takes the shortcut.
[SPEAKER_00]: The numbers look great for two quarters.
[SPEAKER_00]: Everyone celebrates, then the truth surfaces.
[SPEAKER_00]: As it always does, and trust collapses overnight.
[SPEAKER_00]: The talented people leave first, because talented people always have options.
[SPEAKER_00]: What's left is a hollow shell with good numbers and no soul.
[SPEAKER_00]: Leader number two tells the truth, takes the hit, has the hard conversation with the board.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's a brutal season.
[SPEAKER_00]: But something interesting happens.
[SPEAKER_00]: The team watches their leader take the harder road for the sake of honesty.
[SPEAKER_00]: And they decide, I'll run through a wall for this person.
[SPEAKER_00]: That's the long game and the long game always wins.
[SPEAKER_00]: Here's your reflective question for this segment.
[SPEAKER_00]: Where in your leadership are you currently tempted to trade what's right for what's fast?
[SPEAKER_00]: Just be honest with yourself here.
[SPEAKER_00]: Let's talk about trust, because trust is the secret engine of all great leadership.
[SPEAKER_00]: You can have the best strategy in the world, but if your people don't trust you, they'll execute it halfway, they'll hold back, they'll protect themselves instead of taking risk for the mission.
[SPEAKER_00]: Why?
[SPEAKER_00]: Because nobody goes all the end for a leader, they don't trust.
[SPEAKER_00]: Trust is the currency.
[SPEAKER_00]: And here's the uncomfortable truth.
[SPEAKER_00]: Trust is earned in drops and lost in buckets.
[SPEAKER_00]: You build it slowly when get promised at the time, one honest answer at a time, one moment of talking, taking responsibility instead of passing blame.
[SPEAKER_00]: And you can lose all.
[SPEAKER_00]: a single dishonest moment.
[SPEAKER_00]: Scripture has so much to say about it.
[SPEAKER_00]: Listen to this.
[SPEAKER_00]: Luke 1610, who ever can be trusted with very little, can also be trusted with much.
[SPEAKER_00]: And whoever is the dishonest with very little will also be dishonest with much.
[SPEAKER_00]: This is one of those verses that should be printed all the wall of every leadership office.
[SPEAKER_00]: It tells us that faithfulness
[SPEAKER_00]: The way you handle the small thing reveals exactly how you handle the big thing.
[SPEAKER_00]: There's no, I'll start being honest when the stakes are higher.
[SPEAKER_00]: The stakes are always the size of your character.
[SPEAKER_00]: And then there's this from Romans 12 and 9.
[SPEAKER_00]: Don't just pretend to love others, really love them.
[SPEAKER_00]: Hate what is wrong, whole tightly to what is good.
[SPEAKER_00]: Don't just pretend, again and again, we see this thing, no performance, no mask.
[SPEAKER_00]: The leader who pretends to care eventually gets found out because people can smell authenticity from a mile away.
[SPEAKER_00]: Here's a principle I want you to hold on to.
[SPEAKER_00]: People follow who you are long before they follow what you say.
[SPEAKER_00]: There's a wonderful piece of wisdom from the book of Tobit here,
[SPEAKER_00]: Do to know one, what you yourself dislike.
[SPEAKER_00]: Give some of your food to the hungry and some of your clothing to the neck it.
[SPEAKER_00]: Give all your surpluses on, arms, and do not let your eye be grown your giving.
[SPEAKER_00]: What strikes me here is that ethics in this passage isn't abstract.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's deeply practical and deeply generous.
[SPEAKER_00]: The father is teaching a son that integrity shows up and how he treat the vulnerable.
[SPEAKER_00]: In your generosity, in the absence of grudging heart, a leader's character is revealed not in how they treat the powerful, but in how they treat the people who can do nothing for them.
[SPEAKER_00]: Let me set with you in front of another reflective question.
[SPEAKER_00]: Who on your team can do nothing for your career?
[SPEAKER_00]: And how do you treat them?
[SPEAKER_00]: And that answer tells you more about your leadership than any performance of you ever will.
[SPEAKER_00]: Now, here's something we don't talk about enough.
[SPEAKER_00]: You can't have lasting ethics with that humility.
[SPEAKER_00]: Wow, because the leader who thinks they're above the rules is the leader who eventually breaks them.
[SPEAKER_00]: Pride whispers, you've earned the right to cut this corner.
[SPEAKER_00]: The normal rules don't apply to someone at your level.
[SPEAKER_00]: And that whisper has destroyed more careers than a competence ever has.
[SPEAKER_00]: The most dangerous moment in any leader's life isn't failure and success.
[SPEAKER_00]: Because success can make you believe your own legend.
[SPEAKER_00]: Listen to this warning.
[SPEAKER_00]: Pride goes before destruction and holiness before fall, Proverbs 1618.
[SPEAKER_00]: And the antidote, Philippians 2-3, don't be selfish.
[SPEAKER_00]: Don't try to impress others, be humble.
[SPEAKER_00]: Thinking of others as better than yourself.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's thanking of yourself, less.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's the leader who can say I was wrong.
[SPEAKER_00]: Three words that build more trust than a thousand polished speeches.
[SPEAKER_00]: And from a crazy ask these three 17, my child, performing your task with humility, then you will be loved by those and God accepts.
[SPEAKER_00]: There it is, humility makes you loved, not just respected, loved and loyalty grows in the soil of love, not fear.
[SPEAKER_00]: Let me give you another illustration here, okay?
[SPEAKER_00]: Here's a story.
[SPEAKER_00]: I've always loved about a respected leader who made a serious mistake.
[SPEAKER_00]: It calls to his organization.
[SPEAKER_00]: When it came time to address the team, everyone expected to spend excuse, to scapegoat and steady step and said, this was my call, I got it wrong.
[SPEAKER_00]: Here's what I've learned, so this is how we're gonna move forward.
[SPEAKER_00]: You know what happened?
[SPEAKER_00]: The team didn't lose respect for him, they gained it, because they realized they were following someone who valued the truth more than his own image.
[SPEAKER_00]: That's the paradox of humility.
[SPEAKER_00]: The leader who's willing to be small becomes the leader of people trust more.
[SPEAKER_00]: Leave you with a reflective question here.
[SPEAKER_00]: When was the last time you said I was wrong to someone you lead?
[SPEAKER_00]: You can't remember.
[SPEAKER_00]: That might be the most important thing you can take from today.
[SPEAKER_00]: Now we've got to talk about courage because here's the hard reality.
[SPEAKER_00]: Ethics that cost you nothing is that really being tested.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's easy to become honest when honesty is rewarded.
[SPEAKER_00]: The real test comes when telling the truth might cost you the client, the job, the friendship,
[SPEAKER_00]: the standing in the room.
[SPEAKER_00]: This is where so many leaders quietly followed.
[SPEAKER_00]: That in some dramatic moral collapse, but in a thousand small surrenders, the thing they didn't say, the wrong, they didn't name.
[SPEAKER_00]: The line they let someone else cross before because confronting it felt too expensive.
[SPEAKER_00]: But the relentless leader knows that integrity without courage is just a nice idea.
[SPEAKER_00]: Scripted full of people who paid a price to do right.
[SPEAKER_00]: And we're told, they strong and courageous do not be afraid, and do not panic before them for the Lord your God will personally go ahead of you.
[SPEAKER_00]: He will neither fail you nor abandon you, do to moderate me 31-6.
[SPEAKER_00]: That promise matters because courage doesn't mean you feel in no fear.
[SPEAKER_00]: It means you act rightly in spite of fear, trusting that you're not alone in it.
[SPEAKER_00]: And here's a powerful reminder from Daniel.
[SPEAKER_00]: Frayer of three young men who refused to bow to a false image, even under the threat of death.
[SPEAKER_00]: But with controlled hearts and humble spirits, may we be accepted to do with us in accordance with your kindness and accordance with your great mercy, as the prayer of the day in 16 not.
[SPEAKER_00]: These were young leaders who decided that some things are worth more than survival.
[SPEAKER_00]: Their integrity was tested by fire, literally, and they chose faithfulness over comfort.
[SPEAKER_00]: Most of us won't face a fiery furnace.
[SPEAKER_00]: But we'll face a meeting, a phone call, a email we need to send, a truth we need to speak.
[SPEAKER_00]: And in those moments, we get to decide what kind of leader we are.
[SPEAKER_00]: Here's a reflective question.
[SPEAKER_00]: What truth have you been avoiding because speaking it would cost you something?
[SPEAKER_00]: The cost of speaking it is real, but the cost of saying silent is usually our, your integrity.
[SPEAKER_00]: So let's bring it home.
[SPEAKER_00]: What's the playoff and what's the playoff and all this?
[SPEAKER_00]: Why be relentless about ethics when the world seems to reward the apps?
[SPEAKER_00]: And here's the answer, ethical leadership compounds, trust builds on trust, loyalty builds on loyalty, the team that watches you do right over the years don't, doesn't just respect you, they become like you.
[SPEAKER_00]: You're not leading an organization, you're shaping people.
[SPEAKER_00]: And people built on a foundation and integrity become leaders.
[SPEAKER_00]: who build others the same way.
[SPEAKER_00]: There's a beautiful promise here.
[SPEAKER_00]: The Galatians six times, don't get tired of doing what is good.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's just the right time.
[SPEAKER_00]: We'll reap a harvest of blessings if we don't give up.
[SPEAKER_00]: If we don't give up, that's the relentless part.
[SPEAKER_00]: Ethics isn't a spread.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's a life line of showing up and doing right.
[SPEAKER_00]: Harvest season after harvest season.
[SPEAKER_00]: And consider this wisdom, Proverbs 113, the integrity of the upright guides them.
[SPEAKER_00]: But the unfaithful are destroyed by their duplicity.
[SPEAKER_00]: Your integrity isn't just a moral standard.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's a guidance system.
[SPEAKER_00]: When you don't know what to do integrity points the way is simplifies the complicated.
[SPEAKER_00]: When you're already decided who you are, you've already decided what you'll do.
[SPEAKER_00]: And one more for Ecclesiastes, 32-14, who are fierce, the Lord will accept his discipline.
[SPEAKER_00]: And those who rise early to see Kim will find favor.
[SPEAKER_00]: The leader who rises early, who does the quiet discipline, unseen work of staying faithful will find favor, not always the favor of the crowd, but the favor that lasts.
[SPEAKER_00]: You will stand at the crossroads again.
[SPEAKER_00]: Probably this week, the shortcut will look appealing.
[SPEAKER_00]: the pressure for results will be real.
[SPEAKER_00]: And in that moment, nobody else may know what she choose.
[SPEAKER_00]: But you'll know, and the kind of leader you're becoming will know.
[SPEAKER_00]: Choose to be whole.
[SPEAKER_00]: Choose to be the same person private that you are in public.
[SPEAKER_00]: Choose the longer road, the harder truth, the humble apology, the courageous conversation.
[SPEAKER_00]: Choose to treat people, the powerless for the same dignity, you get the powerful.
[SPEAKER_00]: Do it once, and it's a decision.
[SPEAKER_00]: Do it, relate, and it becomes who you are.
[SPEAKER_00]: And when you leave like that with integrity, courage, humility, and faithfulness, you will have to demand a way in your trust.
[SPEAKER_00]: You'll learn it, slow, and surely permanently.
[SPEAKER_00]: That's the power of being relentless.
[SPEAKER_00]: Before we close, take one of those reflective questions with you today.
[SPEAKER_00]: Just one, and let it work on you.
[SPEAKER_00]: Let us pray.
[SPEAKER_00]: Father, thank you for the gift and the white of leadership.
[SPEAKER_00]: We don't take it lightly.
[SPEAKER_00]: You place people in our care, decisions in our hands, and influence in our lives, and we want to steward it all well.
[SPEAKER_00]: Make us leaders of integrity.
[SPEAKER_00]: Make us whole, help us be the same people in the unseen moments that we are in a spotlight, where we've been divided, make us undivided.
[SPEAKER_00]: Give us courage, Lord.
[SPEAKER_00]: Courage to speak the truth when silence would be easier.
[SPEAKER_00]: Courage to do the right thing when it calls to some.
[SPEAKER_00]: courage to stand firm when the pressure pushes us toward the shortcut.
[SPEAKER_00]: Cloth us in humility, guard us from pride that comes with success.
[SPEAKER_00]: Give us the strength to say I was wrong in the grace to lead with open hands instead of much fierce.
[SPEAKER_00]: Teach us to be a trust the way you do.
[SPEAKER_00]: Patiently, faithfully, one cat promised at a time.
[SPEAKER_00]: Let the people who lead know they are safe with us.
[SPEAKER_00]: Value by us and sing by us.
[SPEAKER_00]: Above all,
[SPEAKER_00]: Make us faithful, not perfect, but faithful, steady, relentless, and doing good.
[SPEAKER_00]: May we not grow weary, knowing that in the right time, we'll reap a harvest if we don't give up.
[SPEAKER_00]: Help us to lead in a way that honors you, blesses the people around us and leads us good name that endures long after we're gone.
[SPEAKER_00]: We ask all this with humble and trusting hearts.
[SPEAKER_00]: In Jesus' name, we pray.
[SPEAKER_00]: Amen.
[SPEAKER_00]: God, thank you so much for tuning in and listening.
[SPEAKER_00]: Don't forget to add me, it's Michael Hanks, published out their own Facebook,
[SPEAKER_00]: Hey, and you know what, if this, you know somebody needs this share it with them, okay?
[SPEAKER_00]: Come back next time because we've got more relentless truth to walk through together.