To the Hamptons!

Hamptons

(Image from orangecirclestudio.com)

One of my favorite Seinfeld episodes is my inspiration for this blog post. One of my best friends and I use quotes from Seinfeld all the time, and one of the greatest is “To the Hamptons!” We both know exactly what the other means. This phrase is uttered in the episode called “The Wizard,” and George Costanza’s story arc essentially deals with how people act and react when you KNOW the other party is lying. It’s a game of chicken and one of who will “blink first.”

In real life, at the office, I see this scenario play out every day. People say things that I know are false. They do things and then flat out deny involvement. When describing these scenarios, I always say, fine, let’s go the Hamptons. I then have to play the game of asking pointed but innocuous questions (usually to which I know the answer to) until the truth is finally revealed or we come to an impasse.

Why does this happen? Why don’t I just come out and call the person a liar and prove it? That is a great question. One to which I don’t have an answer to. Just trying to keep civil working relationships I suppose.  I know you’ve been in this situation as well. How do YOU handle it? Are you the type of person that will call them out on the lie to their face? Do you gather evidence proving the falsehood and bring it to their supervisor? Do you try to work with them? Or, do you just ignore the lie and let them think they got one over on someone?

Maybe a better question is why do people feel the need to lie about things that are so easily proven false? Let’s take my kids for example.

Me: “Did you take the garbage out?”
Kid: “Yes.”
Me: {looks at empty curb} “Are you sure?”
Kid: “Yes.”

I’m not sure what the point is. Trying to avoid work? Trying to avoid punishment? Trying to look like you didn’t forget? Trying to look like you are not able? I suppose there are a hundred different reasons people do this.

The way I handle this at home is to tell my kids that honesty is always the only answer. You will get in FAR greater trouble by lying than telling me something I don’t want to hear. I try and bring this to work as well. It’s not quite as easy, since not everyone I work with reports to me, but I do let everyone know that bad news is just bad news. We didn’t get something accomplished? Yes, I will ask why. Yes, I will ask how we can do better. Yes, there may be repercussions. But if you tell me a blatant falsehood, then trust is gone, and that’s the worst end result I can think of.

Tell me what you think. Have you ever gone to the Hamptons? Why? What side of the “game of chicken” were you one and how did you handle it? Leave me your thoughts in the comments.