The Surprisingly Large Cost of Telling Small Lies
boss.blogs.nytimes.com
The Surprisingly Large Cost of Telling Small Lies
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Re: The Surprisingly Large Cost of Telling Small Lies
#2Yeah, the terrible cost is that you end up believing them.
Re: The Surprisingly Large Cost of Telling Small Lies
#3One difficulty with not "lying" to yourself is complexity.
It's often quite demanding to articulate exactly what you know and what you don't. And in the process of trying, you'll often find that your model of the situation is subtly wrong... but it's hard to say exactly how. To really be in contact with reality, you're a scientist, trying to discern truth.
That is, sometimes we lie because it's simpler and less work to articulate. A little similar to advertising hyperbole, lacking nuance. Absolutes are simpler to say, to understand, to reason about.
But the article is just talking about active lying: asserting something that you know isn't true (or, that you know you're not sure of).
Re: The Surprisingly Large Cost of Telling Small Lies
#4The setup for the article theorizes on the cost of lying on the person's stress levels. I'm sure that's a factor, but I think that pales in comparison to the empirical evidence the author has found in her own life -- the benefit of transparency.
There's an episode of How I Met Your Mother where a character always asks "Where's the poop?"[1] when she can tell someone is lying. She had a dog that always made he same face when it was hiding that it had pooped in the house.
I think the truth is that we all know in business there is always some poop somewhere. Whenever we lie, we leave our audience with an uneasy feeling, wondering what the catch is.
When we come right out and tell them what the catch is, we get past that barrier, which builds a relationship of trust from the start and allows the audience to weigh the values of our proposal on its true merits. This is the real power of telling the truth.
[1]: http://how-i-met-your-mother.wikia.com/wiki/Where's_the_poop...
Re: The Surprisingly Large Cost of Telling Small Lies
#5This reminds me of the idea of Radical Honesty. Here's a good feature on it: http://www.esquire.com/features/honesty0707
Re: The Surprisingly Large Cost of Telling Small Lies
#6This article reminded me of the "four agreements": "Be impeccable with your word. Don't take anything personally. Don't make assumptions. Always do your best." Not lying falling under the first.
Re: The Surprisingly Large Cost of Telling Small Lies
#7I really like this. My interpretation is the concept of stealth mode. I do believe there is a small set of use cases for which stealth is justifiable (e.g., patents), but I also feel like too many people are caught up in the cool, mystery factor surrounding stealth.
I've talked to so many people about my idea who have told me to shut up about it, or did I want them to sign an NDA? The answer is NO. I blog about my entire process, if there's a post missing it's because I haven't written it down yet.
Perhaps it's because my idea is driven by a social vision--if it's succeed I don't care who gets there first. You want to steal my idea? Great, let me help you because I'd like to think I'm smart and I've definitely been thinking about this for awhile.
When Buffer radically opened up their pay information, the community reacted in shock. Events like this inspires me. I want to strive for radical transparency in business.
I will make one tiny caveat though. I don't think radical transparency and never lying are the same thing. I do lie as well, and in many cases, I think it's justified. My mother is the worrying type. If she thought I were out at the bar or club, she literally would not sleep until I returned home. I'm lying for her health. Is it a slippery slope? Maybe, but then I have articles like this and wonderful friends who keep me more on the straight and narrow!
FYI you can read about everything related to my idea here: https://medium.com/@bsemaj
Re: The Surprisingly Large Cost of Telling Small Lies
#8"The liar's punishment is not in the least that he is not believed, but that he cannot believe anyone else." — George Bernard Shaw
Re: The Surprisingly Large Cost of Telling Small Lies
#9Don't Fake it So that you Make it?
Re: The Surprisingly Large Cost of Telling Small Lies
#10This reminds me of the idea of Radical Honesty. Here's a good feature on it: http://www.esquire.com/features/honesty0707
I never liked this, because there is a way to tell someone the truth with grace.
The canonical example: "Does this make me look fat?"
The answer is "That cut doesn't flatter you." It's honest, but it isn't harsh.
Further, instead of encouraging vulnerability, it masks vulnerability behind an aggressive facade.
I'd prefer Brene Brown's approach to honesty, myself.