I Like Integrity. Do You?
I was ambushed a week ago, my nap time – reliably scheduled for the midday presentation at our quarterly meeting – interrupted by a surprise burst of useful information.
The topic wasn’t all that promising. It had something to do with contracts for consulting work, and how we need to make sure our clients and ourselves have a precise understanding of what we’re supposed to deliver. Dull enough, but the presenter was clever enough to toss in some real world examples of how misunderstandings come about. ("Oops. Wait. Oh, yeah. We’ve screwed it up that way before.") So much for the traditional quarterly meeting nap. This guy had my attention, because I could see myself making the kinds of screw-ups he was talking about. Luckily, an opportunity to tune out and catch up on my sleep wasn’t far behind: a PowerPoint-based presentation on ethics.
You’re probably thinking that ethics presentations and PowerPoint are a couple of far-too-obvious targets. No one in corporate circles has come up with anything compelling to say about ethics in a while, other than that they are in favor of ethics, and everyone and his aunt seems to be into bashing PowerPoint. This next presentation fell solidly into the 'So What' category. It was a lot of motherhood and apple pie, and there was nothing to discuss, disagree with – or listen to, for that matter.
Now, I admit it. I’m in the minority that has not joined the anti-Microsoft bandwagon. First, I’m too much of a fan of the integrated desktop, which Microsoft invented. Next, I don’t see Microsoft dominating much of anything in the coming post-PC world, so I don't feel so threatened. But most importantly I’m extremely skeptical when people blame software for their dull presentations.
But this ethics presentation was a ‘So What’ of the worst sort, and it was heavily dependent on PowerPoint. Slide after slide of black and white bullets with loaded words like ‘honesty’, ‘integrity’ and ‘values’ put there like some kind of auto-generated morality checklist. All of this language really does tie in to ethics, and even the biggest cynic there knew our firm is obsessed with ethics. It might have something to do with the spectacular collapse of our former rival Arthur Andersen & Co. during the Enron debacle, but we all knew that Deloitte takes the topic seriously. Still, the ethics presentation drew a bunch of passive head nods and no (yes, that would be zero) questions from an audience of 300.
In his zeal to include all the right catchphrases, the presenter omitted all of the stories and examples that could have brought this to life. Were there any real examples of ethics failures? Everyone's fascinated by crime, but the presenter blew his chance here. Could we have role-played a difficult situation and indulged in a bit of instructional discomfort? Make me sweat and I won't doze off. What did the inside of Martha Stewart’s cell look like before she decorated it? Instead, he plugged those key words into his slide and tried to speak to them. The result wasn’t riveting. It was abstract and irrelevant.
But he (and not evil Microsoft) had set himself up for failure. What can someone say about a bullet point that reads: “Integrity”? The presenter turned to look at his slide and shrugged. “What can I say about integrity.” Well, absolutely nothing interesting, and that's the point. You can say that we believe in integrity. Integrity is important. It’s part of our values system. We should all think about integrity when we do stuff on the job. We must all support integrity. Integrity is related to honesty. We value honesty. Integrity is the foundation for lasting business relationships.
Yada, yada, yada. Wake me up for cocktails.
The lesson I took from all of this seems to be that those motherhood and apple pie messages don’t leave room for any friction or elaboration. You can’t disagree with any of this, unless you’re prepared to advocate dishonesty, and you can't really discuss it. Great presentations, on the other hand, don’t pre-empt discussion and at least give us something vivid to knock some ethics into our skulls. This is harder to do. But I know that if my only to-do as a listener is to raise my glass to honesty and integrity, it will be an ideal time for an insomniac such as myself to catch up on more important things.
Like all the sleep I missed over the weekend.
The topic wasn’t all that promising. It had something to do with contracts for consulting work, and how we need to make sure our clients and ourselves have a precise understanding of what we’re supposed to deliver. Dull enough, but the presenter was clever enough to toss in some real world examples of how misunderstandings come about. ("Oops. Wait. Oh, yeah. We’ve screwed it up that way before.") So much for the traditional quarterly meeting nap. This guy had my attention, because I could see myself making the kinds of screw-ups he was talking about. Luckily, an opportunity to tune out and catch up on my sleep wasn’t far behind: a PowerPoint-based presentation on ethics.
You’re probably thinking that ethics presentations and PowerPoint are a couple of far-too-obvious targets. No one in corporate circles has come up with anything compelling to say about ethics in a while, other than that they are in favor of ethics, and everyone and his aunt seems to be into bashing PowerPoint. This next presentation fell solidly into the 'So What' category. It was a lot of motherhood and apple pie, and there was nothing to discuss, disagree with – or listen to, for that matter.
Now, I admit it. I’m in the minority that has not joined the anti-Microsoft bandwagon. First, I’m too much of a fan of the integrated desktop, which Microsoft invented. Next, I don’t see Microsoft dominating much of anything in the coming post-PC world, so I don't feel so threatened. But most importantly I’m extremely skeptical when people blame software for their dull presentations.
But this ethics presentation was a ‘So What’ of the worst sort, and it was heavily dependent on PowerPoint. Slide after slide of black and white bullets with loaded words like ‘honesty’, ‘integrity’ and ‘values’ put there like some kind of auto-generated morality checklist. All of this language really does tie in to ethics, and even the biggest cynic there knew our firm is obsessed with ethics. It might have something to do with the spectacular collapse of our former rival Arthur Andersen & Co. during the Enron debacle, but we all knew that Deloitte takes the topic seriously. Still, the ethics presentation drew a bunch of passive head nods and no (yes, that would be zero) questions from an audience of 300.
In his zeal to include all the right catchphrases, the presenter omitted all of the stories and examples that could have brought this to life. Were there any real examples of ethics failures? Everyone's fascinated by crime, but the presenter blew his chance here. Could we have role-played a difficult situation and indulged in a bit of instructional discomfort? Make me sweat and I won't doze off. What did the inside of Martha Stewart’s cell look like before she decorated it? Instead, he plugged those key words into his slide and tried to speak to them. The result wasn’t riveting. It was abstract and irrelevant.
But he (and not evil Microsoft) had set himself up for failure. What can someone say about a bullet point that reads: “Integrity”? The presenter turned to look at his slide and shrugged. “What can I say about integrity.” Well, absolutely nothing interesting, and that's the point. You can say that we believe in integrity. Integrity is important. It’s part of our values system. We should all think about integrity when we do stuff on the job. We must all support integrity. Integrity is related to honesty. We value honesty. Integrity is the foundation for lasting business relationships.
Yada, yada, yada. Wake me up for cocktails.
The lesson I took from all of this seems to be that those motherhood and apple pie messages don’t leave room for any friction or elaboration. You can’t disagree with any of this, unless you’re prepared to advocate dishonesty, and you can't really discuss it. Great presentations, on the other hand, don’t pre-empt discussion and at least give us something vivid to knock some ethics into our skulls. This is harder to do. But I know that if my only to-do as a listener is to raise my glass to honesty and integrity, it will be an ideal time for an insomniac such as myself to catch up on more important things.
Like all the sleep I missed over the weekend.
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