Denial "AND LIE" anagram for business

lake constance 2500K (Photo credit: tom_focus)

The following wise words are a recent favourite of mine.

In the original German by Martin Walser:

Wer mehr sagt, als er tut, predigt. 
Wer weniger sagt, als er tut, lügt. 
Wer sagt, was er tut, ist eitel. 
Wer tut, was er sagt, ist gut.

German writer Martin Walser during a book presentation in Aachen, Germany (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

I was given this by my colleague Andreas as we passed through the beautiful town of Wasserberg am Bodensee on our way to a meeting in Munich on a day that could almost have argued for climate change on its own .

In this sleepy village, Walser started his highly politicized literary life.  Until then, and like you now (perhaps), with Lake Constance looking glorious from the train, I had never heard them.

They came up as we discussed important company values and corporate culture (or we had been discussing) and this is certainly why I these words stuck.

In English (freely and not very poetically translated):

He who tells, more than he does, preaches.
He who tells, less than he does, lies.
He who tells, what he does, boasts.
He who does, what he says, is good.



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It is easy for us to tell others how they should do things, especially in our consultancy hats, and in our marketing hats; that we should always over-deliver on our promises. In reality, this is not always possible, so it smacks of hypocrisy or "holier than thou" - so we will try to keep the preaching to a minimum!


Sometimes we screw things up, and we find it hard to admit but I noticed;

denial is an anagram of "AND LIE" !

So we think it's better to admit the truth, ask for forgiveness and re-double our efforts.

When we are guilty of telling of our deeds and victories (and we do - see for example here), then we should restrain ourselves, but better to boast than to lie.

When we do deliver what we say we will deliver (and we aim very high) we may  feel a little self-righteous or act pleased with ourselves - and perhaps we should not - but surely we may feel good inside and we think that's fine.

If you can accept us " flaws and all " please get in touch.

If you can suggest more that we can aim for in terms of words and deeds - let us know in the comments and/or link up with me on Disqus and Engag.io.

So let me get you started with a great example from scripture (at risk of preaching:)
(wisdom is available from the bible to the schoolyard and it is welcome whatever the source  )


 - another James 2:18 wrote : 
Yea, a man may say, Thou hast faith, and I have works: shew me thy faith without thy works, and I will shew thee my faith by my works.