Order Up a Plate of Integrity
I arrived at the Lenoir Golf Club in Lenoir, North Carolina this morning at 6:30am. I was their speaker/program for the morning . I was prepared and ready to talk with these leaders about the importance of balancing the financial side of our businesses with the human side. I was prepared to talk fundamental values and prompt them to self reflect on their own.
Before I spoke and quite out of the blue, I received a serendipitous gift of the “value of values” when member “Rickey” was the lucky recipient of that morning’ s rotary raffle. Next he was given the option of taking a riskier chance with that money for a larger pool. He took his chances and low and behold he won the big pot!
And if that wasn’t enough winning for an early morning Rotary meeting, they raffled off a signed hardback edition of “Liftoff Leadership” 10 Principles for Exceptional Leadership” that I donated…and dang if he didn’t win that too.
Pretty good to be a three time winner at 6:45 in the morning! I wonder what the rest of his day was like?
Well it turned out that Rickey had put 5 dollars into that raffle and was mistakenly given six tickets. He sat down, counted and gave back the 6th.
A small but solid example of integrity and it payed off in three quick wins for him.
I made a point to meet Rickey after the meeting ; we talked and he shared with me that his Mother was the primary reason for his solid foundation of integrity and other meaningful values. He said that no matter what, she was one positive woman .
Rickey recently took over the restaurant at the Lenoir Golf Club so if you are in the area stop by and enjoy the hospitality and great food served by a man of integrity and his great staff!
Thanks Rickey for the simple but powerful example of “doing the right thing”.
A parting word on integrity…if each of us as leaders did the right thing, even when the costs are high, the world would work alot better. We know what is right; let’s lead by example and take a stand for it. We really need integrity in our world today. It starts with you.
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we need a 1000 more Rickey’s in this world to offset the Wallmart’s. a simple story like this goes a long way.
Cedric
It was nice to meet you Tuesday. I will soon send out the photo / cutline to the
local paper. I will send it to you also.
One note about your comments above. Rickey Booker came to me, told me of the error, and gave me an additional dollar for the extra ticket. So, he paid for all 6.
If you have not contacted Don Cook at NCEMC yet, I will be in Raleigh for a meeting next week and I plan to tell him about you.
Wow! What a powerful message you have.
I also loved your golf story. Integrity!
Beverly