Why integrity has become a business advantage, not just a personal value

In a time when trust and leadership can make or break an organization, integrity is no longer just a personal value. It has become a real business advantage.

On this episode of Business Trends Today, we’re joined by Keith Wyche, a seasoned executive, board director, keynote speaker and author of the upcoming book Uncommon Leadership. Wyche has held roles at companies including IBM, AT&T, Pitney Bowes and Walmart, where he helped guide major transformation during a pivotal period of growth and disruption.

The motivation behind Uncommon Leadership

Wyche says the idea for Uncommon Leadership came from an unexpected source: his 15-year-old grandson.

About two years ago, shortly after Wyche retired from Walmart, the two were talking about the news and the steady stream of headlines about CEOs, pastors and other leaders getting in trouble.

“He said, ‘Pops, this isn’t what leadership is. You’re not like this, are you?'” Wyche said.

The conversation pushed Wyche to think about how far leadership has drifted from what he calls the servant leadership model toward something more self-serving.

Why integrity has become more uncommon

Wyche says integrity can slip when leaders become more focused on power and performance than service.

“If you’re performing well and getting the results, people, board members are willing to look the other way,” Wyche said.

Why performance alone is not enough

Strong results don’t automatically translate into strong leadership, Wyche says, because performance by itself doesn’t create followership. 

“To be a leader, you have to create followership,” Wyche said. “And to do that, you have to be people focused.”

The best leaders and the uncommon leaders he talks about in his book understand that if you invest in people, you get results. Wyche also clarifies that followership has nothing to do with followers on social media. Followership refers to the people a leader is directly responsible for, the ones who look to that person for direction. 

Why younger generations expect different leadership

Wyche also points to generational impact. Many younger employees, including Gen Z and millennials, did not have the best examples of leaders with integrity growing up. He points out that leaders in politics, faith institutions, and nonprofit organizations have exposed younger generations to many failures in leadership. He says that exposure shapes what they expect, and don’t expect, from the people leading them.

“I guarantee you that it’s not what they were taught in school or taught even by their parents,” Wyche said. “So they’re questioning what’s really leadership all about.”

Wyche says people tend to emulate the leaders they come up under, for better or worse. Early in his own career, he became what he calls a “Theory X” leader because he reported to one, before learning that is the wrong way to lead people and influence.

No matter the generation, Wyche says people share one basic expectation of the people leading them.

“At the end of the day, everyone wants to feel respected, heard, and valued.”

How to lead through uncertainty

Wyche led major transformation efforts at Walmart, including the shift from a brick-and-mortar retailer toward e-commerce. He says that experience taught him how to keep people’s trust during periods of major change.

The first step, he says, is to simplify the vision into something tangible. The second step, which he says most leaders miss, is connecting people

At Walmart, that meant explaining to employees at every level where they fit into the larger transformation.

“When you connect people to the vision, you get their heart and their minds,” Wyche said. “You create that followership, and they can see what’s in it for them.”

Wyche says too many companies focus on mission statements and short-term results instead. He has a chapter in his book built around one idea in particular.

“People follow leaders, not instructions,” Wyche said.

The listening gap

Wyche says most leaders simply don’t make time to listen, and that listening is a discipline that has to be practiced deliberately.

When he was working in stores, he said he would regularly ask employees two direct questions: What are the three things I’m asking you to do that make no sense at all? And if you had my job, what three things would you do differently?

“Those questions just really open up a floodgate of answers and innovation that you’d be surprised at,” Wyche said.

That same people-first approach applies as AI reshapes the workplace. Wyche says leaders should remind teams that while AI is here to stay, it is still only a tool. People will still be needed to manage it, apply judgment and bring the human connection that technology cannot replace.

“AI is a great tool, but at the end of the day, you need someone managing that tool,” Wyche said.

Planting trees you’ll never sit under

The final chapter of Uncommon Leadership is called “Planting Trees You’ll Never Sit Under,” and Wyche says it reflects the question he asked himself as his own career wound down: what did he want to be remembered for?

“I want to be remembered as someone who valued people and appreciated that the most important thing on my balance sheet was human capital.”

He says a leader’s job isn’t just to lead the team in front of them today. It’s to develop people who go on to extend that leadership long after the leader is gone.