[December 27, 2016] It was a hot summer day at Fort Benning, Georgia when my class was to take an exam on how to survive a chemical attack by a determined enemy. It was rumored to be our school’s most difficult test and that could explain why two Second Lieutenants were cheating on the exam; both were caught red-handed and thrown out. Lesson? Real leaders never cheat.
One thing that military leaders are taught that goes to the heart of real leadership and that is to never do anything that is illegal, immoral, or unethical, nor tolerate those who do. This is similar to the Cadet Honor Code of the U.S. Military Academy at West Point which reads, “A Cadet will not lie, cheat, steal, or tolerate those who do.” The reason is simple … leaders depend upon the trust and confidence of those who follow and cheating destroys it. Military leaders depend upon it to keep our soldiers alive on the battlefield.
Whether it be an academic examination, a personal relationship, or a marriage or friendship, cheating is never acceptable in any moral sense. From the perspective of leaders, trust is of the upmost importance and nothing destroys trust more quickly than cheating. The old Dutch saying that “Trust arrives on foot but leaves on horseback” is a stern warning to us all.
Cheating is enticing. It offers quick and easy solutions to a variety of problems. Its allure is strong and all of us have fallen for it at some point in our lives. Those of us who learned from it know that when we cheat on something even so small as a test to get our driver’s license, that we also lose something and that loss can mean we lose our ability to control our own futures.
There are many self-help books that go into great detail on how to build leadership skills. The fundamental principles can be reduced to the idea that trust and confidence is the bedrock of all leadership and all relationships. This is neither new nor difficult to understand. But the magnetism and the “wanting” associated with cheating can be too strong.
Playing by the rules, keeping promises, avoiding agendas, removing ambiguity are just a few ways that good leaders build trust. We can do this by consciously doing the right thing even when it means we will suffer the consequences.
Several of my Second Lieutenant friends failed that test on chemical warfare that day but were given a chance to retake it later. Their penalty was small compared to those caught cheating. They knew that real leaders never cheat.
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