Andrew Cordle

The 7 Deadly Sins of Leadership: Sin #3 – Hypocrisy

The word “HYPOCRITE” means “one who acts in a manner that is not in person“. In plain language, a hypocrite is one who says one thing but does another. Hypocrisy has to do with repetitious behavior, the “act“. An actor plays the entire performance as another person, never in their “own skin“, so to speak. In leadership, repetitious behavior – the “ACT”, is what the followers, employees and stockholders notice.   There are three significant areas where we find these deadly sins of leadership:   THE OFFICE MORAL CULTURE: Your private moral life should be YOUR business, not the company’s, but it’s not. What you do in secret, if discovered, will impact the business and the perception the public has of the company. Those are facts.   Recently I spoke with five unemployed CEO’s. Four of them lost their jobs because of a climate of sexual promiscuity at the executive level. When your romantic interests get the most bandwidth among employees and co-workers, someone is out of focus. Again, someone has lost sight of the big picture. You were either hired to steer the business or you started the company to perform a service or produce a product. Unless your business is a brothel in Las Vegas, you had better keep your moral compass strong. Keep your focus clear of physical temptations. Now, your love life is YOUR business. I’m just telling you that office affairs are dangerous, divorces are expensive and reputations can get stained.   FINANCIAL HYPOCRISY: In the corporate world, financial integrity is even more respected than private life morality. I suppose that’s partly due to the over-importance we tend to place on wealth. But as a leader you want people to be able to say that they trust you with their spouse, their kids, and their wallet! Cooking the books, double standards, outright lies and deception – all testify to the greed that is in our hearts. The headlines abound with even highly-respected financial institutions world-wide who have been victimized by greed.   You must learn to view your business as an institution of trust. People know that underhanded things occur in nearly all businesses, even in trusted institutions as banks, churches, law-enforcement, and schools. But when hypocrisy is exposed, it is not so much the presence of wrong as it is the deception and cover-up that agitate the common man. Again, it’s understood that flawed humans run our businesses and institutions. It is also understood that hypocritically deceiving the public or attempting to deceive the employees is nothing but an exit strategy or a career killer.   LOYALTY TOWARDS EMPLOYEES: The final hypocrisy is that of the boss playing “C.Y.A:” The disloyalty of a boss towards his employees in an attempt to blame or finger-point to draw attention away from his affairs, his financial failings, his inept leadership, or his plain old human mistakes....