Stephen Covey’s Seven Habits of Highly Effective People is an all time favourite book of Krishnan and I. The first time we heard about the book was in 1991 and I still have the dog-eared copies of the book. Copies, because we each bought one so we could read it at the same time and not wait for one to finish :):). True book worms !!
Over the years we have used the Seven principles in both our personal and professional lives. Then in 2006, we found a new title from Stephen M R Covey – The Speed of Trust. Stephen Covey’s little boy who asked soul stirring questions was a young man and had delved straight into the major topic of Trust.
Here’s an infographic from The Speed of Trust, Franklin Covey Institute, that explains how one builds trust. Both character and competence are required to build trust. If someone has a great character, has integrity but is not competent, we wouldn’t trust him/her. Likewise, someone who is uber competent, but has a shaky/shady character, again we wouldn’t trust him/her.
Now think of some public figures and apply this framework.
Take Kamal Haasan, the “ulaganayakan” (World leader, loose translation). He is the walking, breathing, living encyclopedia of acting. Give him any role and no one can deliver it better than him. He can speak any language even though he hasn’t been to school … if a character demands that he learn a language, he will. Some of the real life characters that he has portrayed onscreen, are so real, that we would see Kamal’s face when we think of the real life character. He literally defines the competence standards in acting just like his predecessor Sivaji Ganesan.
BUT, what about his character ? I don’t know where to begin.. should we talk of how he treated his successive wives/girlfriends? or how he allegedly misbehaved with the daughter of his live-in girlfriend? Even if you were to forgive him for these, one can never forgive him for his political escapades. What a mess !
The end result is no one trusts Kamal Haasan. Everyone still trusts Sivaji Ganesan because he had integrity, was honest and a truly great guy on and off screen. Yes he had his dalliances but never ill treated his wife, never left her and no one ever heard of him being rude or ungrateful. And Kamal Haasan will just be a couple of chapters in Sivaji Ganesan’s acting encyclopedia.
Let me take an example closer home, we have a male Househelp at home… he works all seven days and practically lives in our condo complex. We try and give him a day’s off, but he still lands up saying no one else gives him leave so he might as well do our house work everyday. From a competence perspective, he is the best cleaner that I have come across – the floors are sparkling, the windows are clean, difficult-to-enter spaces are also devoid of dust.
But, the man wants “everything”. He sees two flasks, he will ask for one. He sees two laptops, he will ask for one. He is forever in the “asking” mode. Just saying no to him, tires me out. And the lies … I am yet to find him saying something truthful. Even for a change, he wouldn’t speak the truth. Just recently he took a month off to go visit his father. When I asked him how long will he be gone, he said, ten days or at best 15 days. He was gone for 30 days :):). His grandmother has died a few times to enable his leave. His house has been built a few times, again to enable his leave.
Am more than happy to let him take time off, even a month is fine by us. I just wish he tells the truth for once. The end result is, we just don’t trust him. He hasn’t stolen a single thing and he won’t but I still won’t trust him !
Some of you may get the drift of where I am going with this… yes, my biggest example will be Mr. Narendra Modi, our beloved Prime Minister. But he deserves a full blogpost. So that will come next. Wait for it 🙂
#Trust #Character #Competence