Engaging Ethics in the Workplace

This week I have had the opportunity to consider how I engage ethics in the workplace. It is clear that ethical behavior is not just based on individual choice. Ethical behavior is also social and collective. I understand that some people have a hard time accepting organizational factors because of the emphasis it takes away from personal moral responsibility, but the organizational factors cannot be denied. The idea that we have to have one or the other – organization or individual – is a false dichotomy. Identifying that there are organizational factors does not negate the importance of individual choice and behavior. This is a both/and situation.

Organizations are made up of people and those people are put in environments as representatives of those organizations where they have to make decisions. At times it may be hard for individuals to discern what the most appropriate behavior or choice might be. Employers and leaders of organizations are responsible for the conduct of their employees and the choices that are made and therefore have a responsibility at the front-end to create an environment where ethical behavior is the expectation and the norm. Creating this environment is challenging – no doubt – but so is directly affecting individual behavior.

As I considered organizational ethics, I decided to ask around the non-profit where I work about a code of ethics. It turns out, we have a code of ethics we sign when we start our employment. We sign it at the same time that we sign the employee handbook. In my six years here I have never heard it mentioned again. I asked other co-workers if they knew anything about it and none did! Some remembered signing it – but no one could remember anything about it. Of course our HR person knew and the director knew- but no one else. I did get a copy of the code and used it to consider some information on organizational ethics.

Some background: The organization where I work is a non-profit community center that has been serving the same community for nearly 80 years. We have 8 program areas serving mainly women and children of all ages – literally from 5 to 105! We have around 30 employees with a mostly flat organizational structure. There is a very active Board of Directors and an Executive Director who answers to the board. Then there are four of us who are considered supervisors. We all supervise a different number of people who range from 4 hour a week employees to full-time. We all have a variety of educational and ministry background depending on our positions. We are located in west Georgia in a city of nearly 200,000.

Our Code of Ethics is made up of twenty bullet points mostly beginning with the words “I will…” or “I will not…”  Most of the points have to do with virtue ethics - personal rectitude and being a person of integrity. Examples of those statements include: “I will act in accordance with standards of professional integrity” and “I will accurately represent my education, training, experience and competencies as they relate to my profession.”

A few of the statements could be based in duty ethics including: “I will abide by Open Door Community House, Inc. policies related to public statements” and  “I will not engage in or condone any form of harassment or discrimination.” And there were a couple of statements that could be evaluated by a results-based approach.  One of those statements reads: “If I know that a colleague has violated ethical standards, I will bring this to my colleague’s attention. If this fails, I will report that activity to the director.”

I can think of several things that might make it easier to consider ethics in my workplace. The first suggestion would be for employees to be reminded of this code! If this is something we’re intended to follow and pay attention to, it is important we know it exists! There are several practical ways I can imagine using to remind employees of the code and why it is important.

I also think there are some points that seem vague and some that seem very specific. The vague ideas need to be clarified and made relevant to the work employees are doing. I think it would be helpful to spend time talking about how the points mentioned in the code of ethics could directly relate to the choices made and work done by employees. It might even be helpful to guide employees in some sort of case study analyses considering ethics in a variety of situations. The very specific items make me wonder if some of the things were added because of specific circumstances that either happened here at this organization or at another local or similar place. It would be helpful to know the history of our code of ethics – where it came from and when changes have been made.

It is clear that organizations have culture and ethics are a part of that culture. It is the responsibility of leadership to model and cultivate that culture, but the responsibility of everyone to participate in making ethical choices that contribute to an ethical organization. 

I thought this was an interesting info-graphic. 

Source: http://www.ocregister.com/jannorman/strong-413335-ocregister-http.html