Integrity became our founder’s most important core value when he adopted the Certified Financial Planner® Code of Ethics in 1999. The CFP® Board takes a traditional approach to integrity as a core value, using terms such as trust, honesty and candor in its definition.
We operated under this definition of integrity for many years until being introduced to a different, much deeper understanding of integrity in 2019 by a leadership consultant.
As a result, our thoughts on integrity evolved into an engineering/operations perspective on the subject1. For example, if one removes half of the spokes from a bicycle’s wheel, the wheel will collapse under the weight of the rider. It can be said, “The wheel is not whole and complete. It lacks integrity.” As a result, the bicycle is unrideable. It doesn’t work.
Therefore, at Sandene Strategies, integrity means:
Being whole and complete with one’s commitments, on time.
“We honor what we say, what we know to do, what is expected and what we say we stand for.”
This is of utmost importance when interacting with our clients, but it’s just as important when interacting with each other.
In an organization, if people don’t do what they say they’ll do, or what is expected, operations and processes won’t function properly. Eventually, this behavior becomes their, “way of doing business.”
In a nutshell, if integrity is missing, things don’t work.
This is the high standard we demand you hold us to. we hold ourselves to.
1 Jensen, M.C., Christensen, Karen, “Integrity, Without it, Nothing Works,” Rotman Magazine, Fall 2009, Pages 16-20.