Christopher Bauer's Ethics Nexus

Ethics Training: Are We Expecting Too Much From It or Too Little?

One of Chris MacDonald's ever-thought provoking blog posts ("What's More Important: 'Social Responsibility' or Basic Honesty?") quoted and led me to Peter Foster's recent post ("Trading Honesty for 'Social Responsibility"). Though admittedly not the central idea of Foster's post, the quote that caught my eye was this:

"It is surely also intriguing that the current financial crisis should have come after an explosion in the business ethics industry and the steady rise of the corporate social responsibility movement up the corporate hierarchy. You would be pushed to find any financial institution involved in the current debacle who was not dedicated to the very latest in independently monitored and internationally benchmarked governance practices, complete with high-sounding “codes” and commitments to carbon neutrality and fighting child poverty. And wasn’t the regulatory side of corporate governance meant to have been rendered cast iron by Sarbanes-Oxley? "

Of course there is plenty to ponder in this comment - as well as the rest of the article - but what stuck out to me was the recently-familiar implication that ethics and compliance training programs are simply not an effective piece of the response to the ever-rampant ethics problems to which we seem to see no end.

I think we all know by now that Enron had what could reasonably be called a model ethics code and that Sarbanes-Oxley hasn't miraculously made corporate fraud a thing of the past. Okay. But does that really tell us anything about whether we are expecting too much from ethics programs? I don't think so...

So, are we expecting too much from ethics training programs? Absolutely - if you think that these programs are supposed to somehow keep criminally-minded fraudsters from plying their trade. No ethics training program I know would have kept Bernie Madoff from being Bernie Madoff any more than they would have kept Al Capone from being Al Capone. However:

1. I know of no credible ethics training program that claims to magically convert the criminally-minded into the saintly. (And if you know of one, I'd suggest that their own ethics need some serious adjusting...)

2. A well-conceived and appropriately implemented ethics training program ought to help those wishing to do the right thing to be more easily and persistently able to do so.

3. Such a well-developed ethics training program ought to also help those honest folks more easily recognize and respond to the inappropriate actions of others, thereby reducing the potential impact of wrong-doers, whether or not that wrong-doing was intentional or a matter or either poor training or bad judgment..

4. The how-can-a-company-attending-to-ethics-still-have-Enron-like-problems question doesn't really wash in the fist place. Why? Because research shows repeatedly that the percentage of ethical problems caused by truly criminally-minded folks is barely even a blip on the statistical screen. A number of those folks will always be out there and, true, ethics training or a "high-sounding code" is unlikely to do a lot about them. However, for the overwhelming majority out there who really want to do the right thing, an appropriately conceived and delivered ethics training program can be extremely beneficial. Don't buy it? Look at the research from the Association of Certified Fraud Examiners, the Ethics Resource Center, and others showing - over and over again - that companies with ethics programs sustain dramatically lower fraud loss costs, etc. Quibble if you like that most of the data are correlational but I don't believe that significantly dampens the findings - it still makes the case that attending to ethics is related to improved employee behavior.

So, are we expecting too much from ethics training? Sure, if you want it to do more than it reasonably can. However, I think the far bigger problem is companies who merely give it lip-service or, perhaps, a half-hearted effort at implementation because they see it as either irrelevant or probably ineffective. With that attitude going in, any program's effectiveness will be hobbled right from the start. Once organizations see the the huge ROI of programs that are actually well designed, appropriately targeted, and fully implemented, I think they often come to see that they've actually previously been expecting far too little from ethics training.

Your thoughts?

Who's Responsibility Is Corporate Social Responsibility?

I don't focus much on corporate social responsibility (CSR) in this blog. Now and then, though, issues in CSR find their way into my thinking about business ethics in general and the updating of a recent Weekly Ethics Thought on our over-reliance on 'tone at the top' got me thinking about a parallel issue in corporate social responsibility.

It seems I'm reading more and more complaints from consumers and employees alike, all feeling angry that corporate leaders are not 'allowing' CSR to flourish as it should. While I share their distress in large part, I find myself chafing at comments suggesting this lack of corporate support for CSR within organizations somehow prevents those complaining from fulfilling their personal vision of what CSR is all about. It seems to me that this attitude fundamentally means that they're bailing on their personal responsibility for promoting the values they espouse.

1. As for employees - as with all things ethical - a lack of 'tone at the top', however unfortunate, never prevents local action within an organization. There can be departmental initiatives and there can be individual initiatives and all can create tangible results . Obviously, neither of these ought to reduce one's efforts to promote better corporate citizenship on the part of the larger organization. My point is simply that we need to not use poor organization-wide policies or practices as an excuse to avoid making a difference where we can.

What can you do in your particular role and in your particular company? Beats me because we all work in different capacities and in different types of industries. BUT, my money says that you're fooling yourself if you think that you can't figure out how to make some kind of tangible difference with a little thought. Hopefully your efforts will light others up and have some degree of viral impact. However, it seems to me that the only real measure of success is whether or not you are persistently working at ways to bring your stated values - and your business' stated values - to life. Anything beyond that is simply a wonderful bonus.

2. As for consumers - vote with your activism and wallet. Will you make a difference as a single voice? Again, beats me. However, at worst you'll sleep better at night knowing that you've been true to your values and, in all likelihood, you will have actually been a part of a larger movement that will hopefully have a collective impact on the business or industry about whom you are concerned.

Is an appropriate 'tone at the top' hugely helpful in creating and sustaining appropriate CSR efforts? Obviously so. However, to use the lack of such tone as a reason not to work towards a smaller scale difference strikes me as being essentially similar to complaining about the government but refusing to vote.

GREAT Ethics Video Clip From The Los Angeles Schools!

It's gotta be tough figuring out how to make a commentary video on the importance of ethics education actually be cute, let alone cute and effective at the same time. However, the Los Angeles Unified School District has made it happen. I gather that this has been out for a while but I just stumbled onto it now.

Give it a look... Great stuff, I thought!