What’s something hard to find and almost impossible to recover once lost? Your integrity. When we think about integrity, we typically see it as a trait on the same level as honesty or truthfulness. However, we could protect our integrity if we saw it as the sum of our honesty, discretion, and respect, especially in a luxury setting. Luxury settings are unlike anything someone new to the PSP industry has ever encountered. Unknown forces may test your integrity in murky scenarios. Developing good habits around honesty, discretion, and respect can help weather the inevitable storms every PSP encounters.
Honesty
Believe it or not, honesty goes beyond solely telling the truth. Although we all understand honesty means being “free from deceitfulness,” you can add qualities like straightforwardness, sincerity, and frankness. For example, have you caught yourself crossing your fingers when casually questioned by a principal? Has omission ever seemed an attractive solution to an awkward situation? Honesty can shield you from the discomfort of ambiguity and protect you and your principal.
Discretion
Discretion consists of two key ingredients, prudence, and decorum. Prudence is your ability to govern and discipline yourself through reason. Decorum is behavior keeping in good taste and decency. It’s easy to see how reason, good taste, and decency fit inside a luxury setting, especially as building blocks of your integrity. The discipline to know what to say, if, and when is a superpower. Luxury settings create situations outside “the norm” of the social ethics of your everyday family. Mastering discretion helps you govern what is seen but remains disregarded.
Respect
The power to master qualities like honesty and discretion comes from self-respect. But the best part of respect is that it’s contagious. Your esteem for your sense of worth and excellence spreads to others and influences their respect for you. Nurture respect, and you can reinforce honesty and discretion. Once respect degrades, you slide down a slippery slope that PSP careers rarely recover from.
Integrity
Your integrity is your foundation as a PSP. Without it, your career will be short-lived. Like a gem, this multi-faceted trait shines. Integrity means following through, doing what you say you will do. It also means accountability in taking total responsibility for your actions and reflecting upon and owning your mistakes. There’s also a deep respect for others and careful consideration of how your actions affect them. Integrity is the hallmark of every elite PSP.
Honesty, discretion, and respect are the pillars of your integrity. Build good habits around these pillars. Keep your integrity strong, and you can avoid the slippery slopes you find in luxury settings.