“The goodness inside you is like a small flame, and you are its keeper. It’s your job, today and every day, to make sure that it has enough fuel…every person has their own version of the flame…so long as your flame flickers, there will be some light in the world.” ― Ryan Holiday, Author
What can be done to create effective business ethics training? As a business ethics speaker, business ethics consultant and author, I will share that the corporate mindset to be ethical starts with “you.” Holiday’s quote from above must resonate with everyone in the company.
So, whether you are the executive leader or the new intern; the CEO of a 12,000-person organization or the proprietor of a 1 or 2-person coffee shop, the atmosphere in which to create effective business training, the “small flame,” if you will, that brightly burns must be carried by everyone.
The ideal of ethical business ethics training
Why do so many corporations try—and then fail to exercise more corporate social responsibility and good business ethics? Largely because they lack an ideal and a goal of what they want to accomplish. “Business ethics” is a term that can be so loose as to have no meaning or it can be specific and focused. As a business ethics speaker, business ethics consultant and author I know from working with numerous corporations, that flowery adjectives applied to corporate ethics generally mean a failure in the making.
Here are 10 principles/outlooks that should be applied to business corporate ethics training no matter the kind of organization:
- Do you plan on arriving at a code of ethics? And, will it apply to everyone in the organization, top to bottom? Most organizations fail this simple, first vision. There is either an equal application or no application.
- Are the principles detailed? In other words, rather than saying “we will treat everyone equally,” why not specify that acts of racial, religious or gender harassment will be met with counseling leading to termination?
- The creation of effective business training must rest on a foundation of feedback. “You” tell us, as much as “we” tell you. In that forum, everyone has the right to express opinions and problems.
- What does the desired ethical training look like? Will that training explain what will happen if someone reports an unethical act? Will it be kept confidential – and how will the report be kept confidential?
- If training is offered in 2022, will it be repeated in 2023? Is the ethics training relevant to your industry using interactive and specific examples with feedback?
- Does the organization live up to its training or do executives and “company favorites” somehow get multiple chances that others have gotten terminated or censured for in the past? What are the consequences for inappropriate choices?
- How well will the code of ethics be disseminated throughout the organization? Will a production worker who is caught bullying a transgender co-worker know the policy equal to a marketing manager?
- Does the organization expect the same of its contract workers and vendors as it does its own employees?
- Is there a firewall applied to the ethics reporting system? Outside of the HR department (sworn to confidentiality), who else might know, for example, of a report of inappropriate behavior such as the solicitation of a bribe?
- What can be done to create an atmosphere of effective business ethics training when past attempts have repeatedly failed? Why would this time be different?
If a potential employee was to be told “We have a highly ethical organization committed to business ethics and corporate social responsibility,” could they answer the simplest of all questions: “Can you prove it?”
Who keeps the flame of ethics alive? Everyone, and everyone must proudly prove it.
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