This is the first column in a series on Reputations and Your Career launched
on July 27, 2007.
There are many reputations that collectively make up your overall reputation.
First in line for discussion is a reputation for fairness. What is fairness and
how does it impact our work, our careers and our lives?
Our usual introduction to fairness is as a child. You often hear younger
children
proclaiming, "That's not fair!" to parents and their friends when something
doesn't go their way. As children, though, life is inherently unfair. We are
under the control and guidance of adults and sometimes the only answer they can
give for their actions is, "because I said so." As we grow older the
concept of fairness grows. We know when someone is not playing fair. We can tell
in the ways they act and talk. We learn that fairness is an important concept
in interpersonal relationships, especially work, and those that transgress it
are shunned, even though they might rise to high levels. While they might achieve
great success in their work, they pay for their lack of fairness in other ways.
How do you build a reputation for fairness? In some ways, what you
don't do is as important as what you do.
First, fairness means treating every person equally as an individual.
We all have people we like and people we don't. We can find ways
to gather people around
us that we respect, but the moment we start denigrating others, solely to
enhance our own position, we are failing a fundamental fairness
test. Firing someone,
or getting them fired, simply because we don't like them is wrong. If you
can truthfully point to poor work performance or other behaviors
that prevent them
from doing their job, that is another issue. Too often, though, people will
exaggerate issues or create them out of whole cloth, simply to
remove someone they don't
like.
If we allow our favorites to break rules, while simultaneously punishing
others for the same infractions, we are also no longer being fair.
If we forgive the
failings of our friends, but harshly condemn those same failings in our enemies,
we are being hypocritical, as well. Transgressions are the same, no matter
who commits them. To act otherwise shows a lack of fairness in
how you deal with
others.
Don't punish others for thoughts, politics or culture that might be different
from yours. I have often seen situations where a difference of opinion on a
non-work related issue colors a work relationship. We cannot possibly agree
on everything,
but if those opinions do not effect work or the work environment, they must
not be used to punish others.
Taking responsibility for your own actions and mistakes is the epitome
of fairness, If you are actively trying to blame your failures
on others, or hiding your mistakes
so that someone else takes the blame, you are not being fair. Yet, this happens
all the time. Some of the worst examples are when people withhold the information
that their part of a project is behind schedule or failing. It is only when
others, who are depending on them, try to assemble the whole that
your failings are discovered.
The unfairness lies in the fact that your lack of openness has left your co-workers
with no time to develop new options, no way to try and salvage the situation.
You have truly abandoned them.
Do you see yourself in any of these examples? All of us, from time
to time can forget the importance of fairness in our work and in
our lives, but I believe
a reputation for fairness is one of the core elements that make up a great
reputation. When you treat others fairly, they are more inclined
to return the favor. When
you make decisions based on facts, not politics or surface likes and dislikes,
those around you will feel free to do their best work. When you treat others
as individuals you will develop a level of trust that allows everyone to perform
at a higher level.
Lack of fairness creates infighting, fear and animosity between people.
When you develop a reputation for fairness, people will seek you
out and do whatever
is necessary to work with you. Together you will grow in skills and responsibility.
Ignore fairness, though, and you will face a dog-eat-dog world where you fight
your co-workers for scraps instead of developing something great together.
- END -
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