Cheat At Work, Cheat At Home

In this week’s Success Newsletter,

Findings of a new study that shows the link between infidelity at home and cheating at work.

First a quick update:

The Breakup Test

Are you heartbroken, angry, lost, lonely, confused, depressed, hung up, or pining over your ex? Do you know how your ex is truly affecting you and do you want to benefit from personalized advice, action steps and revelations? Take my free breakup test and get your own personalized report.

Are You Being Treated Poorly? Who Is Controlling You?

Do people treat you badly? You teach others how to treat you. You have conscious control; you can set your boundaries, so why do you let others treat you poorly? Are you a people-pleaser? Watch my video.

Now, let’s talk about the findings of a new study that shows the link between infidelity at home and cheating at work.

Would you hire someone who has cheated on his or her partner?

Conversely, would you date or marry someone who has cheated or committed fraud at his or her business?

For many years I have taught the principal, “The way you do anything is the way you do everything.”

I concede that this is a black and white statement. However, a recent study reveals that perhaps this is actually the case: your personal conduct is linked to your professional conduct. In other words, if you’re the type of person to cheat at work, you’re most likely to be the same type of person who will cheat on a partner; in fact, you’re twice as likely to cheat at work if you cheat at home!

Researchers John M. Griffin, Samuel Kruger, and Gonzalo Maturana from the University of Texas, Austin, used information of users from the 2015 hacked database (now in public domain) of the website Ashley Madison.

Ashley Madison is a website that advertises itself as a dating service for married people to have “discreet encounters”; it clearly focuses on marital infidelity.

The researchers investigated four groups of business professionals who were paid users of Ashley Madison: police officers, financial advisers, white-collar criminals, and senior executives (CEOs, CFOs et al.) Sifting through the records of more than 11,000 people in these job categories, they found that those who were paid users on the site designed for marital infidelity were more than twice as likely to engage in professional misconduct – colleague complaints, class action lawsuits, financial misstatements (pump and dump operations), insider trading, Ponzi schemes, and other types of financial fraud.

Occasionally, the public learns of someone who has openly committed both company betrayal and spousal betrayal: In 2010, Robert Moffat, Snr VP of IBM and married father of four children, pleaded guilty and was sentenced to six months jail for insider trading; he had an affair with Danielle Chiesi and gave her insider information about IBM’s earnings prior to their release and about a pending spin-off.

Does the personal behavior and attitudes of executives contribute to corporate cultures that tolerate sexism and sexual harassment? Is personal conduct an informative signal about professional conduct, and vice-versa?

Infidelity at home and infidelity at work are both about the same thing: betraying the trust that other people have placed in you, and breaking the commitment and promise made by you to serve others – your spouse, children and colleagues or employees.

Of course, it can be argued that a person might convince himself that it is okay to cheat on taxes but not cheat on his wife, and yet both actions reflect his character and morality. The researchers in the study acknowledge that there are “situational factors in ethical decision making. Potential individual influences include cognitive moral development, moral disengagement, Machiavellianism, relativism, and religion.”

Nonetheless, behaviors at work and behaviors at home are both a reflection of your character – the inner values that determine your outer actions. Character can be distinguished from personality – while character is your inner values – personality is your external appearance, emotions and behaviors.  A charismatic, friendly and extroverted person can still be dishonest, disloyal and fraudulent.

The character traits of integrity, loyalty, trust and honesty come into play when referring to cheating at work or at home, and they can be summed up by the character trait of virtue – ‘The moral excellence evident in my life as I consistently do what is right.’ We all know what is right and what is wrong; we all have the ability to choose to do right or wrong. The character trait of loyalty can be described this way: ‘Using difficult times to demonstrate my commitment to those I serve.’

If you seek clarity or insights about signs that your partner is cheating, listen here or read the top ten red flags of cheating.

If you need help to overcome a betrayal or infidelity, book a one-on-one session with me. 

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I wish you the best and remind you “Believe in yourself -You deserve the best!”

Patrick Wanis Ph.D.
Celebrity Life Coach, Human Behavior & Relationship Expert & SRTT Therapist