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Don’t Lie to Me

Don’t Lie to Me

I’ve been following the various political frenzies going on in Greece, the UK, and the US. Then there are the investigations into the markets here, and derivatives, and technical trading glitches, and so forth. There are competing marketing claims from all kinds of sources, and exaggerated claims from nearly everybody (I haven’t yet seen a recording released that HAS NOT gone platinum).

And it seems to me there are three kinds of lies which all to often upset our apple carts or at least spoil the fruit.

1. Egregious Lies
This is Bernie Madoff and Enron and Tyko and every politician who makes a claim he or she doesn’t believe in just to get elected. They know it when they utter it, and they all are just hoping to get away with something. But if anyone with any guts and a bit of clout pokes at it, the result is a collapse of what’s rotted within. The manufacturers know that the medication won’t enlarge what it’s supposed to, and the authors know that their book will not enable you to make a million in real estate or avoid income taxes by claiming you’re a church or a Martian.

2. Rationalized Lies
When we tell ourselves something long enough, we tend to believe it ourselves. We didn’t really star at quarterback on the high school team, but we told the fib once and then had to repeat it for consistency, and since then….. This is why so many prominent people are undone by a faulty résumé which they don’t really need but never bothered correcting. They told everyone so long and so often that they were Phi Beta Kappa that they began to believe it themselves. And they’ve enjoyed the cachet. Or we convince ourselves that it’s important to maintain a certain façade or standing for someone else’s good. We’re really being Samaritans by lying to help our kids or colleagues.

3. Subliminal Lies
We carry around some lies like leeches, clinging to the insides of our souls. We can feel it within ourselves without really examining the rational—that it’s okay to cheat because everyone else is, or it’s okay to overeat because the diet will start on Wednesday, or we can sin or steal or cheat because we’re special and our cause is just. (All narcissists would seem to have a vast reservoir of subliminal lies.) If we received an unjust traffic ticket five years ago, it’s certainly balances the books to cheat on our taxes now. We don’t think about it, our internal “justice” devices takes care of it.

When you tell the truth, there is no taxation on your memory. That is, we don’t have to remember the creative fictions we’ve constructed, and to whom we exposed them. When you lie, you are telling me you respect neither my intelligence nor my character, because you doubt I’ll be able to tell you’re lying and, if I find out, you won’t care.

I’m weary of politicians who start sentences with “What the American people really want,” and claims from manufacturers that they’ll provide an extended warranty that actually maximizes their profit and adds minimally to my protection. It’s disconcerting to hear financial “experts” tell me what happened yesterday when they really have no idea, and can’t reliably tell me what’s going to happen tomorrow.

Most of all, I despise the folks who inform me that “this call may be recorded for training purposes,” when the service never, ever improves.

You can try to sell me a lie, but I’m not buying.

© Alan Weiss 2010. All rights reserved.

Written by

Alan Weiss is a consultant, speaker, and author of over 60 books. His consulting firm, Summit Consulting Group, Inc., has attracted clients from over 500 leading organizations around the world.

Comments: 4

  • Steven B. Levy, Author of Legal Project Management: Control Costs, Meet Schedules, Manage Risks, and Maintain Sanity

    May 14, 2010

    Re “This call may be recorded…”: They don’t say whom they’re training. Sometimes they may be training the lawyers who try to keep the company out of trouble. (There’d be less trouble if they trained the service agents, of course!) Sometimes they may be training the supervisors, who then point out all the extraneous words that create a minor point of human interaction but drive up AHT, average handle time, the mis-measure and holy grail of phone support.

    And occasionally they train the supervisors on how to improve human interaction, AHT be damned. That’s how we get companies like Zappos and Nordstom. The sad thing is that these companies are so rare we know them as exceptions.

    And I think that goes to a point you make regularly: As consultants, we need to be the exceptions, rare and memorable for the quality of both what we deliver as well as how we deliver it. Nordstrom sells more or less the same stuff as Macy’s. They charge a lot more and deliver a lot better service. Nordstrom seems to be quite profitable and attracts a steady stream of customers despite higher prices. And service that actually works.

  • Alan Weiss

    May 14, 2010

    Relationships are everything. Most organizations are just trying to protect themselves.

  • Ed Poll

    May 15, 2010

    And then there’s the lie we tell ourselves … that we are not good enough … which is what impacts our self-esteem and requires external bombardment to help us realize our true value to both ourselves and others. External validation comes from others telling us we’re good. This is a hard way, though, to achieve success because there’s always someone bigger/better, etc. We ARE good enough and need to get that internal barometer fixed.

  • Alan Weiss

    May 15, 2010

    Agree with your point, but if you believe that, it’s not a lie.

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