Mastering Integrity

How To Be A Person Who Does What You Say You’re Going To Do

Photo by Kyle Kesterson

Most people don’t follow through on half of the shit they say they’re going to do. Don’t be one of them.

Most people are unreliable. That’s not only a personal observation, but a scientific fact. 

In studies conducted by organizational psychologists over the course of 10 years, managers estimated only 50% of the commitments made to them within their organization to be reliable. In other words, they only expected people to follow through on half the promises they made.

Just let that sink in for a moment: The average person won’t follow through on half the shit that comes out of their mouth. Damn. Why do we even talk? Why do we even live? I find this stat to be mind-boggling. 

To anyone out in the world trying to make things happen, this shouldn’t come as much of a surprise. I remember being in my mid-20s in a client meeting for my startup where my partner and I were trying to sell our technology to a big potential client. The client was saying all kinds of positive things about the product. He even stated explicitly that he was going to move forward, that he’d make connections for us, etc. I was very fired up. Super energized. Then we left the meeting and my partner wisely said, “He’s not going to buy.” 

I was dumbfounded—offended, even. What was he talking about? I listed all the ways the client said he wanted to move forward with us. And sure enough, several months down the line, nothing had happened. No connections, no purchase, just a big fat nothing burger. He 100% ghosted us. There was no accountability, of course. We never said anything. We did what you’re supposed to do: let it go. 

That was 10 years ago. Since then, I’ve found that when someone makes a promise to you, there is about a 50-50 chance that they will follow through. 

If an alien came down to Earth and asked me about this, it would be an entertaining conversation. 

“So you’re telling me that when someone makes a commitment to another, half the time they don’t follow through?” 

“Yes.” 

“And not only will they not follow through, but there is no accountability when something is dropped?” 

“That’s correct. If I promise to text you, and I don’t, it’s socially acceptable to completely forget about it and never mention it again.” 

“What?!?! Seriously?!?!”

“Yes. Seriously. That is the culture.” 

Don’t Be That Person Who Never Follows Through 

I can think of a million ways that people don’t follow through on their promises.

Let’s do lunch, I’ll text you.

I’ll get to that email tomorrow.

I’ll help you out with that thing.

Let’s make it happen! 

Yada yada yada. 

When I was a young (and naive) entrepreneur, my mind exploded with how often people failed to do what they said they would do. This really surprised me, especially when I was just starting out and didn’t have any credibility. Following through seemed like such a simple, fundamental thing to do. It seemed like such low-hanging fruit. I couldn’t believe that most people were batting at .500.

I wanted to roll differently. I wanted to make sure that if I promised to do something, it would get done exactly when I promised it would. If it wasn’t completed by then, I would let the person know or renegotiate the commitment. Having integrity was important to me. I wanted to be reliable. I wanted my word to mean something; to carry weight. 

This is such an easy and overlooked key to becoming a more effective person. When you follow through on your word, then your word has power. And when your word has power, you have power. This is such an integral part of being a person who makes shit happen and builds strong relationships. 

Many people have told me that I’m good at building trust with folks. This is a compliment that I take to heart, and I think a big part of it is simply that I’m solid with my word. If I say I will do something, I will do it. There are many things I’m not great at (many, many things!). But following through on my promises isn’t one of them. I am a wizard of the follow-through. Over time, that really builds trust and credibility with people. 

I hold myself to a standard of a 95% follow-through rate. Why 95% and not 100%? Needless to say, no one is perfect. Life happens. Mistakes happen. We get busy and things get buried. Even Steph Curry doesn’t make 100% of his free throws. When it comes to integrity, I wanted to aim for the same elevated but not perfect standard. When I step up to the line, I want an A in completion—which means at least a nine out of 10. I want to be in the top echelon, but I also want to give myself a little slack when appropriate.

Get Honest With Yourself 

We all fall somewhere short of 100% on the spectrum of follow-through. If you’re honest with yourself, where do you land? 

Perhaps this is a silent problem for you, or maybe it’s a problem that you’re aware of and don’t care about. If this is you, and you don’t have a problem with it, then you can stop reading now and go on living your life this way. For some of you, this might be the best path forward. Having a 50% follow-through is easier, lazier, more comfortable, and requires way less work. I would recommend it to most. Just accept the fact that you’re not going to do most things you say, and keep living your life. 

Mastering the follow-through isn’t for the wishy-washy or the faint of heart. It requires you to get off your lazy ass and actually send the email or make the phone call when you’d rather be doing something else. Sometimes, it requires you to say the uncomfortable thing. Unfortunately, I won’t be able to make it to your baby shower. 

Stop and ask yourself: Where are you on this spectrum? On an average week, how many promises do you fail to follow through on? In general, what happens when you make a promise? Do you file it away in the back of your mind, or do you act on it so that you can feel complete and go back to being present? Is being present something that’s even important to you?

Let’s talk about presence and quality of mind for a second. There you are, sitting on the couch, trying to Netflix and Chill, and you get a nagging thought: I should call X, I promised X I would call, I should really call X, why don’t I call X, I must remember to call X, I’m going to really make sure I call X. Round and round it goes. Over the course of an episode, you have reminded yourself 35 times to call X. 

This is what would happen in my mind when I didn’t have a solid system for following through. Now, when my work is done for the day, I enjoy my time with zero demands because everything is finished or at least written down in a place where I will come back to it.

Figure Out Your System  

I’ll share a bit about how I got myself there on a practical level. 

People have different systems for task management. Mine is loosely based on productivity consultant David Allen’s Getting Things Done (GTD) framework, which I recommend checking out if you’re interested. When I make a promise, I’ve trained myself to pull out my phone and text myself that promise—but only if it’s something I can’t do right then and there in less than two minutes. If the task takes less than two minutes, I’ll do it in the moment instead of writing it down.

On any given day, I may make a handful of commitments to myself or others of things I’m going to do. When I commit, that triggers an incompletion in my life that is only complete upon the delivery of that promise. So the moment I commit, I pull out my phone and write the commitment to make sure I get to completion at some point in the future. I have seen time and again in my coaching work that the best CEOs are always making sure they’re moving toward a state of completion. To be complete means that you have followed through with what you promised. Every overhanging incompletion is like an open tab in your mind. When too many tabs are open, it gets messy and overwhelming, and the processing system that is your brain starts to slow down and get glitchy. It’s a serious energy drain on your system. We manage that energy drain of incompletions by writing things down—removing them from our mind so we don’t have to stress about it while it hangs in the balance. 

Then, every two weeks or so, I will take all the texts to myself from the weeks prior and plug them into my master to-do list. Quick side note: if I make a promise that is timely and must be completed within the next two weeks, I’ll go into my master list and type it right in on that day. This is where my framework departs from David Allen’s. In my list, I have all of the dates for the next two years in chronological order. I’ll take the promise I made and I will file it under the follow-through date. If I need to buy eggs, berries, and avocados on Sunday, then I will go to Sunday’s date and write that in. As you can imagine, it’s a long-ass list with several items on most days, and upwards of 20 items on particularly busy days. It’s not perfect. It’s unruly and inflicts pain on me at times. But it’s how I do things at the moment. If you have a better idea for me on how to make this happen, I’m all ears.

Next, I either get the thing done and feel spectacularly complete, or I let the person know that I will need more time, or that I’m not able to do it anymore. This is what integrity requires: completing the commitment in the agreed-upon timeframe, or communicating clearly that you either will not be doing it anymore or that you need to modify or renegotiate the original commitment. 

A simple example of this is your timing when you are heading to a meeting. If you’re on time, no communication is necessary. If you’re running late or can no longer make it, it’s on you to communicate that because you previously committed to be at the meeting at the specified time. We are all late from time to time. But being late with integrity requires communicating with your meeting partner the moment you realize you will not be arriving on time and offering a new ETA. Showing up five minutes late to a meeting with no communication is not high-integrity living. Ghosting is not high-integrity living. Failing to follow through on the promises you make at the meeting is not high-integrity living.

Here’s what my list looks like in practice: When each day starts, I take a look at the items on that day’s list and weigh that against my goals and my top priorities in life and work for that day to make a plan. Today, there are eight items. I take a realistic look at the list, factoring in the planning fallacy (the natural tendency we all have to overestimate our capacity to get things done). Then I factor in how I want to roll today—Am I OK with being super busy and rushed, or do I want a more humane pace? I check in with my body and see what’s feeling right for me today. Then, I quietly get to work. If something isn’t going to be possible, I’ll determine if I can follow through at a later date or I’ll renegotiate the commitment with proper communication. 

Feel free to implement whatever system works for you—the important thing is that you stick with it.  

The Benefits of High-Integrity Living 

If you’re thinking that this seems like a lot of extra work, you’re not wrong. High-integrity living requires more effort, more follow-up, more hard conversations, and more diligence around your to-do list and how you operate. But I can assure you that living with high integrity has all kinds of wonderful benefits.

You get shit done. You feel good about yourself. Other people trust you. You sleep pretty well at night. You save a ton of energy by not having a million tabs open in your brain. And you get to enjoy the sweet feeling of accomplishment and completion on the regular. 

Another benefit of adopting this approach is that you become more discerning with your yes’s and more liberal with your no’s. You understand the true weight and responsibility of a yes. You get better at handling that part of you that wants to make everyone happy. You may feel like a dick at times for being more direct, but ultimately your relationships benefit from the increased level of directness, honesty, and respect. 

With a little practice and discipline, you’ll become confident in your ability to make promises, follow through, and move through the world as a person of high integrity. No more late-night rumination. True peace of mind. More positive outcomes. 

If you want it, you can make it happen. You are totally capable of overcoming the initial laziness, and it is totally worth it. I believe in you!