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Those who do not look for themselves fall prey to the conclusions of others. If something is not true for you, according to your own observation, it isn’t true.

Certainly it is valuable to consult those with greater familiarity than yourself, but to supplant what you see for yourself to be true by the uninspected advice of another courts disaster.

In the United States a stop sign at an intersection is an authority to which one must comply. If you coast through that stop sign you are immediately held to account and issued a penalty for wavering – despite the fact that it was three o’clock in the morning and you were the only one on the roads.

In South Africa, on the other hand, a stop sign is a policy to which drivers can apply their own judgment. It tells you that if there are other cars present you must stop. It regulates traffic. But when there is no other traffic, the “rolling stop” is the rule of the day. People are allowed to express their own powers of judgment and observation, and retain their right to be their own authority.

When Authority replaces the initiative of our people, we have lost the plot and have violated the trust we have in their judgment. Our ability to enhance people with effective training that consults and enhances their abilities to observe, evaluate and decide for themselves are well justified, and mark the road forward.

Integrity begins with knowing what you know according to your own observation, and having the strength to voice it in the face of a conflicting Authority.