Integrity, honesty, truth, honor, veracity, uprightness.

It seems so simple doesn’t it? When I on-board new recruiters to Genesis10, we review expectations, and one of those expectations involves ethics. We don’t lie to our candidates or consultants or manipulate or mislead to make a placement. That short term payoff is always costly in the end. How you start the relationship sets the tone for all future interactions, and interactions that start with anything other than best intentions never have a happy ending. They just won’t.

It is our goal to truly understand the candidate and their motivations and strengths and match those motivations and strengths with a client’s needs. Simple. Yet, the human dynamic makes that complicated at times.

It can be hard to resist the urge to rationalize less than honorable behavior or actions. But we can’t say we value integrity and then not honor our agreements because something might negatively impact our personal pocketbook.

I like to think over the years I have honed my skills in reading others. However, I have had a couple recent situations where candidates have told elaborate stories when declining an offer. We are talking car accidents, head trauma causing short term memory loss, family illnesses, etc. While I understand unforeseen circumstances do arise from time to time, they thankfully, are not the norm. And when I have a candidate decline an offer, I will take a simple and honorable, “I have taken another offer” over any sensationalized story.

I have had candidates tell me with pride that they have downloaded their company’s database or taken a confidential work product with an assumption I would value that, when what they are really telling me is that I can assume they will steal from me as well.

The IT community is small. Our personal brand is fragile. We can all take a wrong turn, make a mistake. But we can all choose the honorable path however hard it may seem and in the end, act with integrity.

How have you handled the crossroads in your career when your integrity has been challenged and you have to choose a path? What did you do when tempted or encouraged to act less than honorably? Now, that is the “story” I would really like to hear.

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