Taking a Closer Look at Integrity

For the past several days, I watched the horrors at Penn State University unfold with a heavy heart. My parents both graduated there as did my sisters and scores of other family members and friends. Academically, PSU is one of the nation's great learning centers and still is. The cloud that has now covered the entire school is tragic at many levels but especially because of the fact no one stopped a predator from destroying so many young lives.

As a child, I remember my grandfather, who had zero interest in football, placing a petition in the entrance of his small clothing store about 20 miles west of the school asking Joe Paterno to not leave for the NFL. I asked him why this was so important and he told me it was because Joepa meant so much to the local economy and there was not a better man with higher mral standards (something my granfather was very big on) to be found.

My dad and I spent countless Saturdays in NJ struggling to get the radio broadcasts from Happy Valley so we could follow the legend of Joepa. My daughter was 2 weeks old when she sat in my lap as I tried to get her to understand the greatness of this program as they demolished U. of Cincinnati on 9/1/1990.

For years, I defined integrity as Joe Paterno and PSU Football and have always defended the program when others tried to challenge it. High graduation records, swift correction of disciplinary issues, refusing to pour it on when playing lesser opponents, all signs of high integrity, or at least that is what I thought.

What I have learned this past week is that no one is perfect. No one can go through life without making mistakes. Accountability is essential at all levels. Whistle blowing is essential to a safe and healthy workplace and should not be frowned upon. All employers, public, private, governmental need to be held to a higher level and looked at through a more powerful microscope than ever before. We all need to taka our jobs even more seriously than most of us now do and demand higher levels of integretity from our organizations and ourselves.