Entrepreneurship Success: Keep your word (I)

“Your word is your honour. If you say you’re going to do something, then you need to do it.” – Joyce Meyer

Every day of our lives, we make commitments to people, and they also make to us as well. The people might be socially junior, senior or at the same level with us. The commitments might range from the personal to the official and from the ‘mundane’ to the very serious. It is a multi-dimensional matrix of possibilities that we must contend with. Regardless of the mix however, one thing should remain constant: we must keep our word when we give it and we have the right to demand the same standard from others when they give theirs’ to us.

Without any shred of doubt, one of the fundamental causes of problems in our country is that many people of all ages, social and financial status have, unfortunately, lost the sense of honour in keeping their word. Businesspersons have no remorse failing to deliver goods and services as they promised their clients and customers; Politicians and civil servants have no shame in breaking promises they made to the electorates or the public contract they agreed to.

As an entrepreneur, you will often make commitments to your business associates just as your business associates will frequently make commitments to you. Your raw materials supplier could promise to deliver certain additives to you by a particular date; Your customer might commit to settle a bill on or before the due date on the invoice, etc. Failure of the raw material supplier to deliver by the promised date or that of the customer to make the payment as committed can disrupt your production run and hamper your ability to deliver goods to your customers or in the latter case undermine your capacity to settle your own debt with your creditors thereby negatively impacting on your reputation. Similarly, your failure to pay your supplier as agreed will amount to a default in contract and a breach of trust. Both can make your supplier impose more stringent payments terms on you.

When we make promises verbally or otherwise, we are actually entering into ‘contract’ even if there is no intent for legal relations. The failure to keep our word has negative consequences some of which may be mild, not-so-obvious and into the future whilst others may be dire, obvious and immediate. Some of the negative consequences are:

It damages our relationships: When we fail to keep our word with others, we strain and damage our relationships with them. In addition, it creates conflicts with and lowers our own self-esteem both of which make things difficult that are otherwise easy.

Failing to keep our word is a strong indicator of our values and standards as individuals and organisations. It negatively affects us and our businesses in far-reaching ways than we can imagine. It is a demonstration of our disrespect of others and ourselves. In return, others will also have no respect for us and will deliberately, and rightly too, make everything we try to do with them more laborious.

It kills opportunities for us: Once we fail to keep our word on an issue, people have the right not to believe any other thing from us. This failure that we may, wrongly, take for granted will kill future opportunities for us as the people are not, rightly, disposed to trust whatever it is we may tell them again.

If we promise we are going to do something but fail to do it, our word will eventually hold an utterly negative symbolism of our integrity, thereby losing the trust of others. People will not take our word for what we want them to be. Keeping our word is always easier than facing the fallouts of the failure. We lose opportunities and will need to work several times harder to re-earn the trust we lost.

On the other hand, when we always keep our word, the benefits are momentous. They include:

It opens up opportunities for us: When people trust us, they give us more opportunities. Cosmas Maduka, the Chairman/President of Coscharis Group often discusses how, at critical points in his business career, he enjoyed trade credit support from his Japanese suppliers because he always kept his word. Every person that keeps their word will have limitless opportunities thrown at them.

We get to deepen our relationships: When we always keep our word, the relationships we build with others get deepened. People trust us without conditions and do not doubt what we say. Similarly, they get comfortable with us and don’t question or second-guess us in our interactions with them.

We learn to be alert: To be good at keeping our word, we must be thoughtful and contemplative of everything we are about to say. This means we weigh and consider every thought in our mind before we utter them out as promises to others. We, therefore, don’t take lightly what we say to others or otherwise commit to them.

We develop self-trust and build confidence in ourselves: When we develop the capacity to always keep our word, we develop self-trust and confidence in ourselves. We also eliminate feelings of guilt and regrets that always come with failing to keep our word as well as the shame that comes with it. Similarly, our resolve to keep our word, even when things sometimes go off our plan, helps develop a strong character in us that does nothing but help bring good to us.

It is the right thing to do: Failing to keep our word is wrong as it disappoints, often hurts, others in ways that we do not wish to be disappointed or hurt. Failure to keep our word can cost others their time, money, opportunities and even life. Keeping our word is simply the right thing to do.

This is basically an introduction of the importance of keeping our word. Next week we will take up why we often fail to keep our word and what we can do to strengthen our capacity to always do as we committed.