Caveat Emptor (Part 2)

Ethics comes from the Greek roots 'éthiké' meaning the ways and habits of a group of people and would translate into the actual customs and practices characterizing specific cultures. We are all familiar with the term “culture.” Ethics is a part of culture. Culture = identity.

With the above being said, let’s continue our discussion of that 62 page ethical report shall we? Overall, yes we have done well in some areas, but in others the report clearly indicates there is hard evidence that the expectation of workplace ethics to continue to decline is well founded.

The percentage of employees who say their business has a weak ethics culture increased to 42 percent in 2011, a seven percentage point surge and the highest level since 2000. As we all know, where cultures are weaker, misconduct is more prevalent.

One of the major drivers of ethics culture are the senior executives. Executives must set the standards for the organization and mirror them. Do you think that the executives at ENRON would have tolerated questionable practices if they knew how it would look as the subject of a story on the front page of The New York Times? Doubtful. Remember, unethical behavior doesn’t have to be illegal or even clearly unethical to have a negative impact on the organization.

Confidence in senior executives and supervisors fell 62% in 2011. This matches the historic low in 2000, and down 6 percentage points from 2009. Fewer employees believe their direct supervisors act as ethical leaders: One-third of employees (34%) say their managers do not display ethical behavior, up from 24% in 2009 and the highest percentage ever. This clearly supports the assumption that the decline in workplace ethics is under way. Of significant concern is that 56% of reports of misconduct reported by employees are received by supervisors, and 26% higher management! The survey additionally revealed that retaliation is linked to employees’ reporting of misconduct. “Where employees did not experience retaliation, they were less likely to consider reporting misconduct to an outside source.”

To quote ERC "The findings are clear: the reduction of ethics risk is the result of two primary drivers. The first driver is the presence of a well-implemented ethics and compliance program. The second driver is employees' perception that they work in a strong ethical culture."

To have an "ethical culture" here's the metrics:

1. Ethical leadership setting the tone at the top.
2. Supervisor reinforcement of ethical behavior.
3. Peer commitment by supporting one another in doing what is right.

In closing, I have a couple of questions to throw out there:

• Should ethics be rewarded?
• Or should they be expected?
• Do we punish those that cross the ethical line?
• Should we reward those that walk the ethical line?
  

There’s a universal paradox; “You are free to choose; you are not free from the consequence of your choice.”