1. Convey true claims in product advertisements.
2. Perform assigned duties to the best of your ability.
3.
Provide
products and services of the highest quality.
Doing business ethically requires a commitment from top mangers.
Why ? because it’s the top mangers who uphold the shared and set the cultural
tome ( Go to the Web and check out PRISM developing trust) They ‘re role models
in terms of both words and actions, though what they do is far more important
than what they say. If so managers, for example take company resources for
their personal use, inflate their expense accounts, or give favored treatment
to friends they imply that such behavior is acceptable for all employees.
Top managers also set the cultural tone by their reward and
punishment practices. The choices of whom and what are rewarded with pay
increases and promotions send a strong signal to employees. As we said earlier,
when an employee is rewarded for achieving impressive results in an ethically
questionable manner, it indicates to others that those ways are acceptable.
When wrong doing is uncovered, managers who want to emphasize their commitment
to doing business ethically must punish the offender and publicize the fact by
making the outcome visible to everyone in the organization.
JOB GOALS AND PERFORMACNE APPRAISAL
Employees in three Internal Revenue Service offices were found in
the bathrooms flushing tax returns and other related documents down the
toilets. When questioned, they admitted doing it, but offered an interesting
explanation for their behavior. The employees supervisors had been putting
increasing pressure on them to complete more work in less time. If the piles of
tax returns weren’t processed and moved off their desks more quickly, they were
told that their performance reviews and salary arises would be adversely
affected. Frustrated by few resources and an overworked computer system, the
employees decided to “flush way” the paper work on their desks. Although these
employees knew what they do was wrong, it illustrates the impact of unrealistic
goals and performance appraisals on behavior. Under the stress of unrealistic
goals, otherwise ethical employees may feel they have no choice but to do
whatever in necessary to meet those goals.
ETHICS TRAINING
More and More organizations are setting up seminars, workshops and
similar ethics training programs to encourage ethical behavior. Ethics
researchers estimate that over 40 percent of U.S companies provide some form of
ethics training.
How do you teach ethics? Let’s look at how it’s done at the Boeing
company. Its training program, called “Questions of Integrity: The ethics
Challenge” consists of 54 different ethics situations and four possible ways
for dealing with each. In work group discussions supervisors discuss each
situation, then ask their employees to chose the best outcome by holding up
cards Marked A, B, c or D. For instance one of the situations asks employees.
“when walking through the halls, you constantly hear one of your male co –
workers call any females employee ‘babe’. What do you do ? Possible answers
include:
a.
“Speak
to your co – worker in a non confrontational manner about the sexist comment “
b.
“Tell
his manger that the employee should be fired for sexual harassment”
c.
“Nothing
calling a woman “babe” is a form of endearment”
d.
“tell
your supervisor that you feel this is demeaning in the work place”
INDEPENDENT
SOCIAL AUDITS
An important
element of deterring unethical behavior is the fear of being caught.
Independent social audits, which evaluate decisions and management practices in
terms of the organizations code of ethics, increase the likelihood of
detection. These audits can be routine evaluations, performed on a regular
basis just as financial audits are, or they can occur randomly with no prior
announcement. An effective ethical program should probably have both. To
maintain integrity, auditors should be responsible to the company’s board of
directors and present their findings directly to the board.
FORMAL
PROTECTIVE MECHANISMS
Our last
recommendation is for organizations to provide formal mechanisms to protect
employees who face ethical dilemmas so that they can do what ‘s right without
fear of reprimand. An organization might designate ethical counselors. When
employees face an ethics dilemma, they could go to these advisers for guidance.
As a sounding board, the ethical counselor would let employees openly verbalize
their ethical problem, the problem’s cause and their won options. After the
options are clear the adviser might take on the role of advocate who champions
the ethically “right” alternatives.
Other organizations have appointed ethics officers who design, direct and
modify the organization’s ethics programs as needed.
