Conversations For Transformation: Essays Inspired By The Ideas Of Werner Erhard

Conversations For Transformation

Essays By Laurence Platt

Inspired By The Ideas Of Werner Erhard

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Putting Integrity Into Being Unreliable

Napa, California, USA

May 8, 2025

"Distinctions have a short half-life, and need to be recreated from time to time."

...

speaking with Laurence Platt in Encounters With A Friend #7 (Half-Life)

This essay, Putting Integrity Into Being Unreliable, is the companion piece to Deal With "Your Body" Not "Health Issues".

It is also the twenty fifth in a group of twenty five on Integrity:

It was conceived at the same time as

I am indebted to Werner Erhard and to Dr Michael C ("Cole") Jensen, Jesse Isidor Strauss Professor Emeritus of Business Administration, Harvard Business School whose paper, Putting Integrity into Finance: A Purely Positive Approach, inspired this conversation, and to Sanford "Sandy" Robbins who contributed material.

It works for me when the people I'm around, are count-on-able, reliable. That is likely true for all of us also. We all know it. We put a premium on reliability and on being reliable. When we are that way intentionally, it's likely because we've realized its worth. We've realized life works better when we are reliable / count-on-able. And if we haven't yet put a premium on it, it's appreciated even if it just happens when it happens. All told, we notice that being reliable has worth, whether intentional or accidental. When both we and the people with whom we interact are reliable, life works better - you can put that in the bank.

Recently I found myself in a prolonged, protracted situation when dealing with something new, arduous, and unwanted which was going on with my body, when I realized I could not be counted on to be reliable - and you could say I consider myself to be reliable. I would make promises and plans with people, and then more often than not, cancel them at the last minute when what I was dealing with could not be ignored and demanded my attention. I said I'll do something, I said I'll make something happen, and for me there was no second-guessing. What I said I'll do / what I say will happen / what I promise, isn't a trivial gesture on my part. Yet when it came time to deliver, I reneged, I broke my promise, I canceled - again and again and again. It was not who I am.

It works when we can rely on each other to keep our promises. Everything works better that way. When I'm reliable / when you're reliable, things just work better. So I place a premium on being reliable. I've lived my life by it ie on being reliable - until one day when I saw I was no longer count-on-able ie I was no longer reliable. It was a new adventure for me, a new adventure I didn't like one bit, one I struggled with (ie at first). I was in completely new territory.

I began confronting that series of arrangements I had made, all of which I had canceled - and all of which at the very last moment too (which is really the most inconvenient time for people). So I deemed myself to be "unreliable". I repeatedly said I would be somewhere and / or do something, and repeatedly, neither happened. I realized I had to find a way both to make promises that I did not break, and to take a closer look at the relationship between integrity and broken promises. I wondered if it was even possible to stay in integrity if I was on a tear of breaking promises. I began warning people when I made a promise that given what I was dealing with with my body, I may not keep it. The latter had "unreliable" painted all over it. That's what I had an issue with.

Keeping The Language Tight

In the interests of being clear, and certainly in the interests of speaking accurately, consider looking newly at the following distinctions. I'm about to rework a few of them, ones I've used countless times myself which, when I look at how certain I was when I deployed them earlier in my life, there's more than a little chagrin for me upon realizing how naïve I was in speaking them the way I did. I've put these corrections in place now simply because they're tighter ie they work better than my earlier versions. For example, earlier I would have spoken about breaking your word. No, you break your promise; you are your word. I used to say integrity is keeping your word. No, integrity is honoring your word. Breaking promises does not necessarily violate integrity. No kidding!

So you are your word. But you give your promise. Your word can't be broken. It's your promises that may be. And you can (discovering this for myself was a huge breakthrough for me) break your promises, yet still have integrity (say whut?). For starters, try on both "word" and "promise" for size (it is getable).

•	You don't break your word. You break your promise. You don't keep your word. You keep your promise.
•	Breaking your promise never has integrity. And if you declare in a timely manner you'll be breaking your promise, then breaking your promise always has integrity.
•	Keeping your promise is not a better kind of integrity than declaring in a timely manner you'll be breaking your promise. Declaring in a timely manner you'll be breaking your promise, is integrity.
•	It's out of integrity to make yourself wrong for breaking your promise. It's out of integrity to make yourself wrong for not honoring your word.
•	Honoring your word allows you to be in integrity - even if / when you break your promise. Integrity is a matter of honoring your word. Nothing more. Nothing less.

When you honor your word, there's integrity even when you break your promise, if you say you're not going to be keeping your promise. It's so simple. Be authentic even in the face of not keeping your promises. I promise I'll come and visit with you, but an earthquake closes a bridge on the road between us, so I can't come and visit with you, so I can't keep my promise. Now if integrity's only a matter of keeping my promises, then I'm out of integrity. Oh dear ... could it be that it's the earthquake and not I, who's the arbiter of my integrity? But when I let people know I won't be keeping my promise ie when I honor my word, when I let you know I won't be coming to visit with you, I'm still in integrity even though I haven't kept my promise. So if I am unreliable (either because others say it about me or because I deem myself to be unreliable, and thus out of integrity as well), I'm now putting integrity into being unreliable.

Footnote: Six Definitions Of Word:

Like I said earlier: integrity is a matter of honoring your word. Nothing more. Nothing less. If that's so, then what do we mean by "your word"?

With permission, I've transcribed Werner's six definitions of word verbatim. Memorize them. They are:

Word‑1.

What You Said:

Whatever you have said you will do or will not do, and in the case of do, by when you said you would do it;

Word‑2.

What You Know:

Whatever you know to do or know not to do, and in the case of do, doing it as you know it is meant to be done and doing it on time, unless you have explicitly said to the contrary;

Word‑3.

What Is Expected:

Whatever you are expected to do or not do (even when not explicitly expressed), and in the case of do, doing it on time, unless you have explicitly said to the contrary;

Word‑4.

What You Say Is So:

Whenever you have given your word to others as to the existence of some thing or some state of the world, your word includes being willing to be held accountable that the others would find your evidence for what you have asserted also makes what you have asserted valid for themselves;

Word‑5.

What You Stand For:

What you stand for is fundamental to who you are for yourself and who you are for others. What you stand for is a declaration constituted by

1)	who you hold yourself to be for yourself as that for which you can be counted on from yourself (whether specifically articulated by you or not), and
2)	who you hold yourself out to be for others as that for which you can be counted on by others (or have allowed others to believe as that for which you can be counted on).

Word‑6.

Moral, Ethical And Legal Standards:

The social moral standards, the group ethical standards and the governmental legal standards of right and wrong, good and bad behavior, in the society, groups and state in which one enjoys the benefits of membership are also part of one's word (what one is expected to do) unless

a)	one has explicitly and publicly expressed an intention to not keep one or more of these standards, and
b)	one is willing to bear the costs of refusing to conform to these standards (the rules of the game one is in).

Postscript:

The presentation, delivery, and style of Putting Integrity Into Being Unreliable are all my own work.

The ideas recreated in Putting Integrity Into Being Unreliable were first originated, distinguished, and articulated by Werner Erhard in the Leadership Course.

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