How do I get some swagger at work?

Not all that long ago, I had been working for a product and services company. It was a great company. The people that worked here were all A-players. My coworkers were super competitive and wanted to be the market leader. And that enabled us in management to hire top-tier talent, to hire superstars.

Speaking of superstars, a Sales Director that worked for me, who we will call Bart, walks into my office one day. He says, “Hey, I just got off the phone with Wonderful Widgets Incorporated. Again, they are countering our offer, and they want us to take another 10% off the proposed contract before they sign. I know you are probably good with that, but since this is going to bring us below 15% on our profit margin, you said you wanted me to run things by you…so, I’m running it by you.” 

My response to Bart, “Approved, but don’t tell them that. Instead, tell them, actually remind them, that we already are giving them a generous discount, and they were supposed to sign the contract last week…but we have given them five extra business days to sign…which is due TODAY.” 

Bart looks at me with a quizzical look on his face, and says, “sooo…you are approving me to take another 10% off, or you aren’t?” 

I tell Bart, “I am; just don’t tell them. Tee-up to them that the current deal is the deal, and see how they respond…and if you think they are going to walk, then give in to their terms and take off another 10 points.” 

Bart just looks at me, not so much with judgment, but rather just with confusion. I can see the question he’s thinking of, and he’s not asking, so I just tell him what I want him to do. 

“Bart, tell them you asked me for ten more points; I said no…which I am saying to you…I’m saying NO, so I’m not lying, Bart, right? (that was rhetorical, by the way…I didn’t expect him to answer). If they say they won’t sign the contract, tell them, ‘let me try again with the Sales Manager and see what I can do.’   Then, Bart, hang up the phone, play hearts on your computer for 10 minutes, call them back, and tell them ‘GOOD NEWS…we have a deal.’  Got it?” 

Bart verbalizes a confident “YES,” but non-verbally, he’s saying, “I’m so confused.” 

I think most of us have been there before. We want to get ahead at work, or we want extra accolades, or we want that extra commission at the end of the month. For me, it was kind of a combination. If Bart brought in the deal that was teed-up to Wonderful Widgets Incorporated, and he didn’t have to shave off ten extra points, here’s what was in it for me:  $1400 extra dollars in my commission check, 4% closer to my profit quota for the month, my boss would think I was a superstar for being such a shrewd negotiator and getting that extra profit for the company – and, not only would he think it, but he would say it at the next all-Company meeting that we would have. But even though I was asking Bart to lie, it wasn’t an egregious lie. It was more of “blurring the lines .”Heck, if you took my selfish motives out of what I was asking Bart to do, there were some really altruistic things I was doing: I was getting Bart that much closer to quota for the month, I was getting Bart that much closer to the President’s Club trip at the end of the year, I was getting the company that much closer to their revenue and profit goals for the year. Now, all of a sudden, it’s gone from blurred lines to a justifiable action – to not just get me ahead at work, but to get Bart ahead at work, and to get my company, which employs a lot of people, ahead at work. 

We’ve all done this, in some shape or form, right? We expense our cell phone every month for the max allowable by the company, but really we roped in our family plan into that as well. But the company allows us to reimburse that much, numerically anyway ….so I’m not really doing anything wrong, or that wrong? Or we use a lazy, and hidden, vacation day as a “cough cough, sick day.” But we’ve earned it right; we earned those sick days. Maybe you, as an attorney, should have billed for 52 minutes, but you rounded up to 60 minutes – not just because it’s a nicer and rounder number, but you think you remember sending a couple of texts to your client…that had to cover the missing 8 minutes to get us to bill for 60 minutes, right?

We’ve all been there. And we have all done it.

I want to share an old, pithy truth from an ancient document: “Honesty lives confident and carefree, but Shifty is sure to be exposed.”

This is HUGE, and if you – if we get this – it will change your life at work; and, I would argue, it will change your life.  

Nothing feels better than knowing you have nothing to hide. Nothing feels better than your actions are congruent with your values, your ideologies, and your beliefs. Nothing feels better than knowing everything you have done is on the up and up. When you are acting this way, there is a confidence, a carefree attitude, an unrivaled swagger.

Let me state the opposite of this…nothing will keep you up at night more than when your behavior and actions are incongruent with your values, ideologies and beliefs. Nothing will make you more anxious than knowing what you have done doesn’t align with what you say you do. Nothing will create more unpredictability in your job than when you are not towing the ideological line, and you are acting shifty – which, you will be fearful about; because there’s a good chance that it (you) will eventually get exposed. And, yes, this applies to all of the small stuff. I would say for the majority of us, me included, it’s the smaller stuff we do that’s not groovy. We aren’t embezzling, or cooking the books, or having multiple sexual affairs in the company. It’s the smaller stuff. BUT, it will keep you up at night.

Let’s make this more sticky…. How often do you think I worried about Bart sharing with someone else in the company that I told him to go and lie to that customer? A lot. Did I get the extra $1400 in commission that month because the customer took the deal that Bart bluffed them on? I did. Did it feel good? It did. Did it put food on the table for my family and me? Honestly, no. I don’t even know where that extra money went. In my 401k? On a new suit and tie that I didn’t really need? I don’t know…I don’t remember. What I do remember is thinking in my head, over and over and over again, this:

“I wonder if Bart told anyone about that time he asked for my advice about the customer who wanted another 10% off? I wonder what Bart thinks about me? I wonder if he thinks I’m full of it when I stand up in front of the company and talk about company values, and integrity, and how much we care about our customers?   I wonder if Bart thinks that I think it’s okay to not be honest – which I don’t believe it’s okay; but I kind of do, because I certainly was dishonest then, and told Bart to be dishonest. Yuck. What do I think about me?”   

Friends, nothing feels better and wears better than honesty at work. Nothing will give you more swagger. As an attorney, you get called up by your client, and he says, “Hey Alan, you charged me 60 minutes on this billable conversation we had last month…can you explain that?”  How you feel before and during that conversation is totally different than if you had billed him for 52 minutes. How you feel when someone from the accounting team comes in and questions you on your cell phone bill reimbursement, it’s totally different depending upon how honest you were. If you were honest, when the accountant walks in and questions you, you automatically think in your mind, “well, Bob is just doing his job, and auditing folks as he should, and I have nothing to hide.”  Confident and carefree, right? But if I slipped in 4 gigs for extra data to cover my daughter’s usage, I’m sweating underneath my collar and I’m nervous ANYTIME Bob walks within eighteen feet of my office. 

News flash – our dishonesty, even the small non-egregious ones, are more telepathic than we think. Our coworkers pick up on our embellished junk, our kids do, people do. Our shifty behavior is going to be exposed. 

So what do you do if this is you, and chances are this is YOU, and it’s the guy sitting next to you at work? What do you do if you want more confidence at work, if you want to have a more carefree attitude at work, if you walk to get that swagger that I talked about, because nothing wears better than when your actions are congruent with your beliefs? (1) Be honest with yourself, and do an inventory of where you are blurring the lines at work. What’s not egregious, but an embellishment and/or exaggeration? What’s a white lie? What do you hope you don’t get called out on in your expense report? What do you hope the customer never asks you? What conversation have you had with a direct report that you hope never gets publicized? What sales tactics, or billing procedures, or services projects, or quality control, or financial advice are you doing that adds a bit of sweat under your color if other people know about it. What are you justifying to yourself to allow yourself to behave that way at work that is easy to talk through in your head, but if it were a live conversation with your boss would have you wanting to crawl under a rock?   Be honest with yourself. (2) Apologize. Say you’re sorry. That doesn’t mean you have to go and tell every single person and/or coworker every white lie that you have ever committed, and not to say it doesn’t – maybe you feel called to do that. But for starters, apologize for the obvious ones. Ask for forgiveness. I have gone back to Bart and apologized for that interaction years ago. Guess what…he remembered every detail! Of course, he did. What I was saying I believed in (honest business, treating our customers with respect) didn’t line up with my actions. It’s confusing in the least, and, at worst, crystal clear – that I’m a fraud and a hypocrite. Like I said before, those embellished shady business practices or expense report questionables are telepathic…you, me, we aren’t fooling anyone. So when you come clean, apologize, and chart a new course with your behavior, you are also charting newfound respect for yourself from the colleague you are apologizing to. Lastly, (3) find accountability. Maybe that’s a friend at work. You two can make a pact to hold each other accountable. And, maybe, it will save your reputation, your job, and your important friendships. Personally, for me, I have a group of guys that I meet with on a regular basis and I tell the last 10% to. I tell them where I am potentially “blurring the lines,” so they can jump in and help me from making any egregious errors. 

This is a game-changer, for you, for me, for us. If we can get our actions aligned with our ideologies, our values, our beliefs, nothing is going to give us greater confidence…nothing is going to give us a more carefree attitude. Nothing is going to better script our legacy. Nothing is going to give us more swagger than when we realize our character, not accomplishments or acquisitions, builds our legacy. Not an extra $1400 on a commission check, or an extra four gigs of data paid for on your Verizon bill, or an extra 8 minutes billed to a client that you really don’t deserve. Nothing more than honesty is going to give you swagger. Honesty determines our legacy. Honesty will give you swagger.