The Pandemic of Dishonesty That Led To The Pandemic Of COVID-19
/by Peter Kozodoy
2020 has certainly brought its fair share of loss, grief, and shock.
But unfortunately, the most threatening atrocity to our society hasn’t been the coronavirus itself; instead, it is the viral spread of confusion and misinformation that has made a difficult situation into an epic global failure.
Now, even with guidelines in place, a broad swath of the population has decided to ignore social distancing and eschew masks. The question is, why? And, what can we take away from this mess that will help us act with unity when the next catastrophe inevitably strikes?
The Real Killer Started Long Before COVID-19
Sure, Connecticut has done well overall, but we still must ask, why did we have an explosion of cases here, in a country that’s supposed to have the brightest minds in the world and the most organized system for dealing with adversity?
The answer is that the American public has been lied to so many times, been subject to so many half-truths and conflicts-of-interest, that we’ve grown immune to authority. In a world where doctors can be bought, drug makers put profits over people, and politicians have a greater incentive to protect their re-election than protect their constituents, it’s no surprise that many folks across our society looked at this disease with skepticism.
And, to make matters worse, few leaders were willing to be completely forthright, honest, and transparent about what was emerging from Wuhan, China…especially in the beginning, when some leaders were reluctant to admit that COVID-19 was coming at all, and in a spectacularly devastating way.
“We filled the honesty-void with different, biased versions of what would come true.”
The greatest gift we humans have is the power of imagination. We’re creative beings, able to conjure wild stories and then consider those fantasies as potential futures. The problem is, if we’re not given the facts—with clarity and objectivity—then we naturally enter into this proclivity for fantasy and fill the void with our own version of what’s really happening out there.
In this case, our leaders did not step up early enough to sign warning bells with cool objectivity, clear data, and fact-based projections of what could come next. We didn’t get the honesty we deserved—nay, needed—in order to logically assess what was coming our way.
To make matters worse, the news media saw the clouds parting and the sun coming out—their moment to shine, their moment to woo millions of eyeballs that would become glued to explosive stories about horrific numbers and sensational updates (with all the colorful adjectives that we emotional beings simply can’t resist).
Therefore, we ran amok. We bought toilet paper en masse. We filled the honesty-void with different, biased versions of what would come true. To some, that meant staying home and washing their hands obsessively. To others, it meant calling up some friends for a stress-busting game of beach volleyball.
But no matter which direction we ran, we didn’t run together. And that’s because we had no leadership—no one to lay this thing out honestly, transparently, objectively, so we could see with our own eyes that we were in good hands and that there was a plan and that there was no reason to do anything but what we were being asked to do.
Only One Thing Can Combat Dishonesty, And That’s Honesty
In this country we get the power of supporting individuals and organizations with our vote. In the private sector, we do so with our wallets—we literally vote by spending money with companies who share our values.
This past year, CEOs in a variety of sectors have done wonderful things, from Zoom’s CEO offering his software for free to students to Allstate deciding to refund customers because—naturally—less people are driving and needing insurance.
We should look for the same level of self-awareness and honesty in all our leaders from the private sector to the public sector. These leaders will be easy to spot: they’ll be the ones thinking rationally about what’s happening, admitting what they know and don’t know, showing their data, and explaining in detail why they’re making the decisions they’re making.
It’s not rocket science, but it is the most effective way that we humans learn to trust one another. When we see for ourselves what others are doing, we can trust what they say and what they recommend.
If we indeed learn from this pandemic, we—as a global society—will be positioned to ensure that such a horrendous (and avoidable) disaster never plagues us again. But the lesson isn’t about epidemiology, or science, or how to prevent viruses from spreading; instead, the lesson is about how we must build trust before we can ever hope to act as a unified team.
Without uniting in action against a common enemy, we will never win. And the truth is, all it takes to win together is a return to that best policy we’ve all known about since preschool: honesty.
Peter Kozodoy is the author of Honest to Greatness: How Today’s Greatest Leaders Use Brutal Honesty to Achieve Massive Success. He is an Inc. 5000 serial entrepreneur, TEDx speaker, and business coach who works with organizations and their leaders. His articles on leadership and entrepreneurship have appeared in Forbes, Inc., The Huffington Post, PR Daily, and more. He has served on the boards of the Greater New Haven Chamber of Commerce and Junior Achievement in Connecticut, and holds a BA in Economics from Brandeis University and an MBA from Columbia Business School. Visit PeterKozodoy.com for more.
