Tomorrow evening (March 10^th) I am being honored as the 2020 Wheatley Distinguished Ethics Speaker for Brigham Young University where I’ve been invited to give a lecture on the importance of Integrity and Ethics to a group of prominent business leaders, faculty, and students.  In my lecture I am going to be sharing some experiences I’ve been through in business that required me to hold strong to my values in times when doing so came at a cost.

Sitting here tonight trying to prepare my talk I’ve had to delve into memories of experiences from the past…experiences where I had to learn to speak up when I was terrified to do so, experiences where I had to stand alone for what I knew was right, and experiences where keeping my integrity came at a price… I learned so much going through these experiences in business and they certainly helped me become the person I am today…so for that I am grateful…but they were painful and hard to go through so reliving them isn’t very much fun….but hopefully sharing a few of the experiences I went through in my talk tomorrow can end up helping someone else in their life as well.

Integrity means everything to me.  Nothing in life is worth trading integrity for. It’s genuinely our most valuable asset.  I will always do everything in my power to live my life with the integrity of the woman described in this poem below because living a life worthy of being described like THAT is what AWESOME looks like to me:

She had integrity

In her bones and

Was clothed

In grace.

She was beautiful;

Not only in how

She looked,

But in who she was.

                              -K. Azizian