Honesty in business, good or bad?
 

If you're in a meeting with someone. An internal meeting. No sales pitches, nothing like that but a project meeting, or staff meeting, whatever. Do you think it's a good thing to be totally honest?

Meaning, do you find yourself having to babysit people you work with and tip-toe around what you really mean so you don't hurt their feelings or do you prefer to be straight out, unemotional and direct with people?

I ask because I honestly find it very hard to find people that truely like honesty. When I was younger, I had a boss that was incredibly direct with everybody. I found that so refreshing. Most people in the company didn't like him, they said he was mean. But in my view, he knew the difference between business and personal, and he never mixed them. I've always tried to use this in my life since then when dealing with people. I might be no-nonsense when it's business time, doesn't mean I won't party with you later. but some people can't do that.

Where do you honestly place yourself? In the business and private are seperate category, or do you mix them?

Re: Honesty in business, good or bad?
 

There's direct and then there's tactless. I prefer the direct approach, but not to the point of being crass or mean.

One can evaluate without devaluing an employee.

I much prefer being able to associate with those with whom I do business, both on a professional level and socially, once I get to know and trust them.

"Be direct, with a little finesse" I always say.

always be a straight shooter

I'm very blunt and to the point. Clear the air early and you can avoid worse problems down the road.

You can be honest without being asshole. I know it's hard, but it can be done. :)

Money talks and bullshit walks.. don't beat around the bush..this is business..if it means money in your pocket...then you want your point on the table asap.

I'm exceptionally blunt and my wife constantly tried to tell me to tone it down. When dealing with associates, friends or whatever else, I say too fucking bad. Like me or hate me, you WILL respect me. I don't demand respect, I command respect.

When dealing with my staff however, things are different. There is NO one answer to this question.

I'll use hockey coaches as a comparison.

First you have Mike Keenan. Straight shooter. Sometimes berating. Garners both alot of respect and hatred. His motto-Work hard or you won't work for me.

Next you have Roger Neilson. Players coach. Loved by virtually everyone who plays for him. I'm not in the dressing room, so I can only assume that he caudles his players. His motto-Work hard and I'll praise you, don't work hard and I'll tell you what you're doing wrong.

The problem with both of these is that not everyone is the same.

When I managed a retail store a few years back I treated my staff differently based upon themselves. Each and every individual is motivated in different ways, by different things.

If you come down on one person, they'll whine and pout and inevitably become a bad employee. Praise that same person for something they DID do well, and they'll try harder in the other aspects of their job.

If you praise the wrong person for something they DID do well, they'll assume they're the be all-end all and start to slack off. Come down on that same person and they'll look at themselves in the mirror and see that their was a reason for the discussion and they'll correct themselves and work harder.

Either one of those employees is acceptable because there IS a way to motivate them. If you find an employee that is motivated by NEITHER of those approaches, they found themselves unemployed.

Also, I hated staff meetings. They are an utter waste of time unless it's strictly for spitballing purposes. They either turn into a verbal slugfest with the most vocal employees taking the lead or a love fest in which absolutely NOTHING is accomplished. The people that have the most to say, probably won't say anything in that enviroment.

I instead made a point of speaking with each employee monthly to evaluate them and have them evaluate me. Given an open line of communication usually illicits a good work enviroment, thus everyone's happier. If there is an internal problem somewhere, you will see a pattern develop throughout these conversations. i.e. Everyone complains about the same person or the same thing.

Then you take that person aside and discuss the problem with them. NOT in a meeting where an ambush is waiting for them.

Just my 2 cents. Or 4.

It is possible to be direct without being rude. I don't have a single way of dealing with anyone - bosses or subordinates.

Of course, I don't suffer fools gladly, either. That's what makes working for myself so damned wonderful.

I think honesty is extremely important in business and should always be the first choice policy. That being said, sometime employees don't need to know everything. Sometimes giving an employee the whole picture can lead to decrease in morale etc. You have to really consider all possible situational outcomes before deciding how much of a "need to know" your employee needs to know. IMHO

Always be honest, but be nice. CONSTRUCTIVE criticism, not DESTRUCTIVE criticism. :bonk:

This is all good stuff. I see that everybody pretty much sees it the way I see it. But I'm telling you, we must be the exception in this world. I did interviews for interns a few months ago. We took two. In the interviews, we told them honestly that they'd be doing some work for us, most of it would be basic and boring but if they do well, we have a couple of projects that they could maybe work on. We're not here to babysit or anything like that. We're all people that take action here. If you have a problem you can't figure out, find a solution or at least come up with some ideas before bringing them up to us. They both agreed, both said "That's good, I like it like that".

What ended up happening is one was lazy and un-motivated to do anything, and kept bringing up the point of "Well it's not like we're getting paid for this", the other was an emotional wreck.

In the last month, we decided to give them some motivation, so we handed them one of our free sites to manage. They were happy about it. We told them we take care of the bandwidth on it, you update it, promote it, so everything. Any sales made from the banners is yours. They worked on this for half a day and then I don't think they've really done much on it.

What I'm getting down to is everybody seems to want to be on top of the game, but nobody wants to do the journey there.

I completely agree! Honesty is very important, tricks should not be played, but an employee doesn´t need to know everything inside your mind. Some things need to be kept only for yourself. Or kept to yourself and your strategic partners.

Interesting topic!

Bruno Dickman