Creating a Sustainable Ethical Culture 586.1
Suppose Amy’s bonus depends on achieving aggressive sales goals and she knows she can pump her numbers by instructing Bob, a subordinate, to ship goods to a large customer that weren’t ordered.
Whether she will choose to engage in this scheme and order Bob to participate, and whether Bob will do so, is not only a matter of personal character but of corporate culture.
Decisions of employees like Amy and Bob are strongly influenced by their perceptions of the company’s character and operational values. In most organizations, you get what you reward and encourage what you allow.
Amy is more likely to avoid deceptive conduct if she believes integrity and honesty are ground rules rather than rhetorical ornaments and if she’ll be more severely sanctioned for deceptive conduct than missing her numbers. Similarly, Bob is likely to say no to his boss if he’s convinced the company wants him to and will support him if he does.
In today’s precarious environment, leaders have a duty to assess their organization’s culture and do whatever is needed to strengthen or create a sustainable ethical environment that generates trust and promotes honesty, fairness, and unflinching accountability as well as legal compliance.
This can’t be accomplished by lofty rhetoric or even strict ethics codes. Words and rules must be translated into expectations and made believable by the modeling of senior executives and by adopting performance-review criteria, compensation systems, and promotion decisions that reward ethical judgments and punish ethical shortcuts.
This is Michael Josephson reminding you that character counts.
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Comments
I'm glad I found you some time back when I saw you on a P.O.S.T. video on ethics for one of my Criminal Justice classes. Even though I know in practice more and more companies, industries, and agencies are corrupt, when I stand up and try and do something right and know I will be penalized for it (or find out too late) and corruption will win out, it helps that other people out there (you) try to do the right thing and offer words of encouragement.
The company I used to work for had a hotline for complaints. I had already gone through a project manager (the main problem), a supervisor, the branch manager, a vice president and finally the hotline. In the end, I refused to do something illegal and was penalized. It was covered up and the company that publicizes its integrity and honesty will most likely never be held accountable for the damage, not only to myself, but its clients. A perfect example was the director of human resources response when I told him the project manager had lied. "Well, why didn't you just quit?" The company's entire mentality is to protect itself, and the honesty/integrity theme is nothing more than "Perception Management."
This week I had to go for requalification to meet state standards and licensing. There was a problem at the site and we (other licensees) were not going to be able to requalify. The instructor took everyone's money and started signing off on their paperwork. They all walked out with signed-off paperwork and the easiest morning of their lives. I just walked out. In the industry I work in, I've gotten so used to people expecting you to commit felonies and cover up things and go along that it didn't surprise me anymore. The instructor seemed puzzled and I told him, "but I didn't qualify." And he said, "But don't you need it?" Well, yes I do. He said I could qualify in a couple of weeks and he'd put "today's date" on the paperwork. But I was the one who would be saying everything on the paperwork was true when it wasn't. I told him I couldn't do that either.
I was going to go back in a couple of weeks and do it the right way, but I've decided to just get my deposit back and try somewhere else (even though I know they all do it).
It really hurts to have lost everything and to keep fighting for the right thing and still get treated like dirt by the people who talk so much about honesty and integrity. Thanks for being there with at least a few words of comfort.
Posted by: Taylor | September 26, 2008 2:21 PM
San Diego elected officials, board members, department directors and all senior staff need to post this comment on their desk or a place where it can be seen and re-read every single day.
Posted by: Jean Emmons | September 28, 2008 10:47 AM
I thought that the timing of your piece was very good, especially given the economic turmoil that many of us find ourselves surrounded by lately.
In many companies, both public and private, there is enormous pressure to "fit in" in order to survive. Often, decisions that once seemed unthinkable to those with families now seem commonplace as the pressure to cave in, conform and just go along seems the order of the day just to survive one more day.
To add insult to injury, the media reports daily about companies that placed greed above ethical business practices being rewarded through taxpayer financed bailouts.
I often feel like a fish swimming upstream in the current business environment that is rife with unethical practices and short-term thinking.
I can't tell you how fervently I hope that messages from people like you, Michael, translate themselves into a sea change that sweeps across our business climate like a tidal wave.
Posted by: Steve | October 2, 2008 5:19 PM
Too often we fail to meet our own ideals/ethical values because of peer pressure/work pressure, real or imagined. If change is to be, then change starts with me. By deciding to be ethical, regardless of the cost, we set an example, not only in our own lives, but in the lives of those we touch.
Posted by: Random | October 2, 2008 11:59 PM