The Cost of Deception: How Strategic Lies Undermine Business Integrity

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What happens when businesses prioritise short-term gains over long-term integrity?

In the second episode of a special mini-series inspired by their upcoming book, Whose Side Are You On? Disloyal Bonding and Strategic Lies, Bob and Jeremy explore the hidden dangers of strategic lies in the corporate world.

When businesses prioritise short-term gains – whether to boost senior executives’ desire for bonuses or prepare for a sale – they often sacrifice long-term customer trust and company reputation.

Listen as they share real-world examples of how offering special deals to win back old customers can alienate loyal ones, ultimately eroding the value of your services. Plus, hear about a cheese producer who thrives by standing firm against deceptive practices, proving that integrity can be a game-changer in business.

Bob & Jeremy also explore the world of advertising, where quantity often trumps quality. They share a personal story of being pushed to sell large volumes of ineffective ads and how this relates to the broader theme of corporate dishonesty.

Whether you’re a small business owner or part of a larger organisation, this episode is a must-listen if you want to understand the fine line between smart strategy and ethical integrity – and learn how to protect your business for the long run.

Whose Side Are You On? Disloyal Bonding and Strategic Lies is released on 1st October 2024. Pre-order your copy now on Amazon.co.uk!

For more info, free resources, useful content & our blog posts, please visit realitytraining.com.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:21):
Hello and welcome to part two of our four-part series
on our book Whose Side Are youOn?
Dislaw Bonding and StrategicLies.
In today's episode, we're goingto focus in on the last part of
that title strategic lies.
Ie brands that come up withpolicies and strategies that are

(00:44):
not entirely true and yet areused to increase and develop
their performance, and whatthese things might be doing to
their people, to their customers, and what damage these things
might actually do.
So, jeremy, tell us what wemean by strategic lies.
Give us an example.
Tell us what we mean bystrategic lies.

Speaker 2 (01:05):
Give us an example.
So, listener, imagine you're asuperb salesperson with
boundless integrity and you dothe job right.
You believe in your company andyour product and you're selling
an interesting musicsubscription service and you
receive an email from someonehigher up saying hi, looking at
performance, we will miss thisquarter unless you all do

(01:27):
something.
I've made the decision.
You are to follow exactly whatI tell you to do.
I want you to contact allcustomers who have canceled
their service, theirsubscription service, because we
were trying to hold rate and tooffer them a further incentive,
as detailed below.
You, as the salesperson, lookdown.
You click the link.
It's ridiculous.
This is less than what existingcustomers pay per month.

(01:49):
We're doing this just to bringin a load of numbers and get
over the line.
Only weeks ago, you wereholding rate.
You're now being asked to becompletely disloyal to the
integrity of the service, thesubscription and everything you
stand for.
That is a classic,strategically planned load of
disloyal bonding.

Speaker 1 (02:06):
So just to be clear on that, the original
conversation would have gonesomething like hello, I'm not
happy with the amount I'm payingfor my subscription, I want to
cancel it.
The person they spoke to wouldhave said, well, I can give you
a 10% discount to stay with us.
And the customer said, nope,that's not enough, can cancel.
And the person they spoke tohas nowhere to go, nowhere else
to go.
They've offered the full 10%,so they cancel the subscription.

(02:30):
Two weeks later, the phone goesyou're not going to believe
this.
We can offer you a further 10%to come back to us.
So that's a strategy, becauseyou could have offered that in
the first call and kept thecustomer and they would have
been happy or maybe gone to 15%.
But actually you've called themback and tried to get them back

(02:51):
with you through a furtherdiscount, which is ludicrous if
you think about it.

Speaker 2 (02:56):
Well, even if the customer hadn't wanted to stay,
you believed your musicsubscription service was worth
the rate.
And some customers maydisappear, go to an inferior
competitor and return andrealize it's worth it.
That's the point Everything hasits value and it's worked out
price.
And if we all chopped andchanged, it'd be ludicrous.
And this is often beingdirected by people who do not

(03:18):
own these companies.
They're simply trying tomaximize their own bonuses and
salaries for the duration of thetime they're employed there.

Speaker 1 (03:26):
Now, if you look at large organizations, the larger
brands that we know, retailersand large service organizations,
what you have is many, manydepartments with policies and
systems that have been built upover years and years.
So when the customer writes inwith a complaint that triggers a

(03:47):
response of this type and out,it goes to you and a letter
comes to you saying oh, we're sosorry you're complaining about
this thing.
Let me offer you an additionaldiscount and we apologize for
any inconvenience caused.
That's a lie, okay, because ifit was something they were
genuinely apologizing for, theywould change the action that

(04:09):
caused it because they wouldn'twant it to keep on happening,
but because it's a printed out,pre-printed, templated response.
It's something they're used toand they're happy to wear the
discount on it and therefore itis a strategy of telling lies to
customers just to keep them andit's a retention strategy.
And that is a lie and it'scoming right from the very top,

(04:31):
and the reason for it is thatvery senior people are bonused
for customer numbers.
The city loved that kind ofthing and that has given them
the incentive to say lie topeople just to keep them.

Speaker 2 (04:43):
It could be.
A company that is planning tosell has been acting with a
tremendous integrity and theyjust need another 20,000
customers on the books to beable to increase the value of
the business.
So they throw all integrity outthe window.
They sell the business toanother music subscription

(05:03):
service.
They become consumed, theowners and directors all take a
cut in the salary and you as anindividual are asked to be
completely disloyal to the brand.
And then suddenly you'retoupied into some new
organization and you don't knowwhere you stand.

Speaker 1 (05:15):
Now some of you will be saying well, don't all
organizations do this at somepoint?
Isn't this the point ofcommercialism?
Well, no, there are manyorganizations who don't discount
their products and services atall.
They stand by their prices,they believe they're worth every
penny and they sell on thatadvantage and benefit that you
get.
And if you want it, then you'llpay the money for it.
And what we have is lots ofother people who are discounting

(05:37):
it, just to keep the numbers up.

Speaker 2 (05:39):
I think, importantly, if you're listening to this and
you're a one person band oryou're an SME, take heart in
vast amount of SMEs that havetremendous integrity.
I mean, if you want an exampleoff the fly, you just have to
take an interesting cheeseproducer, stinking Bishop, who
could make fortunes more if heexpanded his business.
But he chooses the price of hischeese.

(06:00):
He doesn't overproduce, doesn'toversell.
If you won't pay the rate forthe cheese, you don't get it.
It's a predictable income andthere's integrity.
Cut in.
There isn't any discounting,dealing with different buyers of
supermarkets no, it's fixed,it's full of integrity.
So apply this to your ownbehaviors as well, because
otherwise you'll become a sortof flip and flop type person who

(06:21):
loses the integrity andswitches around in your strategy
.

Speaker 1 (06:24):
Now the other point is that if this is a strategic
lie, if this policy that you aregetting your people to enact is
essentially a dishonestpractice, you may have managers
praising people for being moredishonest and censoring and
disciplining people who areactually demonstrating integrity

(06:46):
and honesty.
And think about that.
What's that doing for thereputation of your organization?
Now, as a senior person, youmay not care, because your
tenure is only going to be twoor three years.
You're going to make your moneyand disappear.
Well, that is what is drivingdown the integrity of businesses
.

Speaker 2 (07:01):
So years ago, an example of where I had this
personally was the company Iworked for, which was a media
organization with advertisingwanted to float.
We were given a direction tocompletely ignore the quality of
the advertisements we wereselling.
It was just the quantity.
And there were people whocouldn't do this, including me
having detailed conversations,helping businesses with their

(07:23):
marketing and individuals, andyet the people who were praised
were the people who sold thevast volume of low cost, low
quality advertisements,ironically, which they'd have
had poor response on becausethey were the wrong adverts for
the types of businesses.
They were A classic example ofeverything being thrown out the
window so that the people at thetop can sell, take their divvy

(07:46):
and off, Just to say.

Speaker 1 (07:48):
Whose Side Are you On ?
Dislaw Bonding and StrategicLies is out on the 1st of
October.
We have whole chapters onexamples of strategic lies and
how to change that dynamic andthat policy.
But please look out for us onthe 1st of October and get your
copy so you can start makingsome positive changes to your

(08:08):
organization Exclusively onAmazon.

Speaker 2 (08:10):
You can get a Kindle version or you can buy your own
paperback copy.
Thank you,