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Most companies have ethics and compliance policies that get reviewed and signed annually by all employees. “Employees are charged with conducting their business affairs in accordance with the highest ethical standards,” reads one such example. “Moral as well as legal obligations will be fulfilled in a manner which will reflect pride on the Company’s name.” Of course, that policy comes directly from Enron. Clearly it takes more than a compliance policy or Values Statement to sustain a truly ethical workplace. Corporate ethical failures have become painfully common, and they aren’t cheap. In the last decade, billions of dollars have been paid in fines by companies charged with ethical breaches. The most recent National Business Ethics Survey indicates progress as leaders make concerted efforts to pay holistic attention to their organization’s systems. But despite progress, 41% of workers reported seeing ethical misconduct in the previous 12 months, and 10% felt organizational pressure to compromise ethical standards. Wells Fargo’s recent debacle cost them $185 million in fines because 5300 employees opened up more than a million fraudulent accounts. When all is said and done, we’ll likely learn that the choices of those employees resulted from deeply systemic issues.
Despite good intentions, organizations set themselves up for ethical catastrophes by creating environments in which people feel forced to make choices they could never have imagined. Former Federal Prosecutor Serina Vash says, “When I first began prosecuting corruption, I expected to walk into rooms and find the vilest people. I was shocked to find ordinarily good people I could well have had coffee with that morning. And they were still good people who’d made terrible choices.” Here are five ways organizations needlessly provoke good people to make unethical choices. It is psychologically unsafe to speak up. Despite saying things like, “I have an open door policy,” some leadership actions may inhibit the courage needed to raise ethical concerns. Creating a culture in which people freely speak up is vital to ensuring people don’t collude with, or incite, misconduct. Elizabeth Morrison of New York University, in Encouraging a Speak Up Culture, says “You have to confront the two fundamental challenges preventing employees from speaking up. The first is the natural feeling of futility — feeling like speaking up isn’t worth the effort or that on one wants to hear it. The second is the natural fear that speaking up will lead to retribution or harsh reactions.” A manager’s reactions to an employee’s concerns sets the tone for whether or not people will raise future issues. If a leader reacts with even the slightest bit of annoyance, they are signaling they don’t really want to hear concerns. There is excessive pressure to reach unrealistic performance targets. Significant research from Harvard Business School suggests unfettered goal setting can encourage people to make compromising choices in order to reach targets, especially if those targets seem unrealistic. Leaders may be inviting people to cheat in two ways. They will cut corners on the way they reach a goal, or they will lie when reporting how much of the goal they actually achieved. Says Lisa Ordonez, Vice Dean and professor at the University of Arizona, “Goals have a strong effect of causing tunnel vision, narrowly focusing people at the expense of seeing much else around them, including the potential consequences of compromised choices made to reach goals.” Once people sense the risk of failure, they go into “loss prevention” mode, fearing the loss of job, status, or at-risk incentives. The Veterans Administration learned this lesson the hard way when trying to address the 115-day wait time in their Phoenix hospital. They set a new goal of reducing the wait to 14 days, which resulted in an alleged 24-day wait. But employees said they felt compelled to manipulate performance records to give the appearance of meeting these goals. As many as 40 veterans died waiting for care at the Phoenix center, some more than a year. Organizations must ensure people have the resources, timelines, skill and support they need to achieve targets they are given, especially ambitious stretch goals. Conflicting goals provoke a sense of unfairness. And once a sense of injustice is provoked, the stage is set for compromise. Maureen Ambrose, Mark Seabright, and Marshall Schminke’s research on organizational injustice clearly shows a direct correlation between employees’ sense of fairness and their conscious choice to sabotage the organization. Consider one organization I worked with whose pursuit of growth created conflicting goals. The head of Supply Chain was given a $3.5 million capital investment to overhaul a plant to triple its production. Some of that funding came from the 25% budget cut in marketing in the same division. At the same time, Sales divided its quota territories to raise topline performance. The intensity of resentment in the salesforce at having to drive revenues with smaller territories was compounded by having fewer marketing dollars to sell more product. The conflicting goals created excess product capacity that was bottlenecked getting to market. Two years later, the organization was indicted for channel stuffing. Too many leaders assume that talking about ethics is something you do when there’s been a scandal, or as part of an organization’s compliance program. Everyone gets their annual “ethics flu shot” in the mandatory review of the compliance policy, and all is well for another year. Nick Eply, professor at the University of Chicago, in Four Myths about Morality and Business, says, “It’s a myth to think ‘Everyone is different and everything is relative.’ You actually have to teach people the relative value of principles relative to choices.” Leaders have to infuse everyday activities with ethical considerations and design policies and norms that keep ethics top of mind. Jonathan Haidt, Professor of Business Ethics at NYU and founder of says, “It’s important to talk about the positive examples of ethical behavior, not just the bad ones. Focusing on the positive reasons you are in business, and reinforcing the good things people do strengthens ethical choices as ‘the norm’ of the organization.” A positive example isn’t being set. Leaders must accept they are held to higher standards than others. They must be extra vigilant about not just their intentions, but how it is others might interpret their behavior. While they can’t control every possible misinterpretation, leaders who know their people well make careful choices in how they react to stressful situations, confront poor performance, how politic they are in the face of controversy, and how receptive they are to bad news. Above all, even in what might be considered the smallest “white lie,” ethical leaders are careful not to signal that hypocrisy is ok. As an example, a leader may casually review an employee’s presentation and provide feedback like, “I think we need to take these two slides out — that data is inflammatory and we don’t want to derail the ultimate outcome which is to convince the budget committee to give us the resources we want.” While the leader might presume he has acted in the best interest of the group — going to bat for resources they need- the person building the presentation has just been told, “We can’t tell the entire truth because it could prevent us from getting what we want.” Leaders must put themselves in the shoes of those they lead to see what unintended messages they may be sending. Organizations who don’t want to find themselves on a front-page scandal must scrutinize their actions to far greater degrees than they may have realized. In an age of corporate mistrust, creating ethical workplaces takes more than compliance programs. It requires ongoing intensified effort to make the highest ethical standards the norm, and ruthless intolerance of anything less.
You run a community violence prevention program, working with kids who are gang members or gang hangers-on. The kids trust you, and sometimes tell you about some of their less-than-savory activities. The police also know you work with gang members, and often ask you for information about particular kids. What are you obligated to tell them, or to keep from them? The right of a person to know what happens to information he reveals in the course of a community intervention falls under the heading of ethics. A participant in a community program -- a health clinic, an adult literacy class, a youth leadership initiative -- has a right to certain expectations relating to how she and the information she passes on are treated. The community has expectations as well about the reliability, competence, and honesty of a program that benefits its citizens. In this section, we'll discuss what some of those expectations are, and your and your organization's or initiative's moral and legal obligations to those you serve. What do we mean by ethics?Ethics is a code of thinking and behavior governed by a combination of personal, moral, legal, and social standards of what is right. Although the definition of "right" varies with situations and cultures, its meaning in the context of a community intervention involves a number of guiding principles with which most community activists and service providers would probably agree: Do no harm. Hippocrates put this in words over 2,000 years ago, and it's still Rule Number One.
Why is ethical behavior important in community interventions?In addition to its simply being the right thing to do, always acting ethically brings some particular advantages with it. It makes your program more effective; it cements your standing in the community; it allows you to occupy the moral high ground when arguing the merits of your program, and to exercise moral leadership in the community; and it assures that you remain in good standing legally and professionally.
Who is subject to a code of ethics in community interventions?The short answer is that everyone -- who works in a community program of any kind, or who deals with other people in a professional or paraprofessional capacity -- is subject to a code of ethics in community interventions. There are, however, a number of formal ethical codes -- usually set down by professional organizations, but sometimes by law -- that apply to people in particular professional or other positions. Here are some examples of people expected to adhere to a formal code of ethics:
What are the ethical issues that need to be considered, and how do they play out in community interventions?Ethical behavior in community interventions relates to the treatment of people, information, and money, and to the general actions of the workers and the organization or initiative, even when they're not dealing directly with the community. Not all of the areas discussed below are covered by a specific legal or ethical code for every profession or community service, but are nonetheless related to ethical behavior for just about any program or organization. All should at least be considered as you define ethics for yourself and your program. ConfidentialityProbably the most familiar of ethical issues -- perhaps because it's the one most often violated -- is the expectation that communications and information from participants in the course of a community intervention or program (including conversations, written or taped records, notes, test results, etc.) will be kept confidential. Programs' legal responsibilities in this area may vary, but as a general rule, confidentiality is the best policy. It protects both participants and the organization from invasion of privacy, and establishes a bond of trust between the participant and the program. Depending upon the program, the staff member's position, and the participant's needs, confidentiality may encompass a range of possibilities:
This type of sharing is consistent with the rules of the Family Educational Right to Privacy Act, popularly known as the Buckley Amendment, which protects academic records. This act was meant to assure both that student records were not distributed to non-school recipients without the permission of the student or her family, and that students and their families would have free access to copies of their records. It also gives those students and their families the right to question any elements of those records, and to negotiate corrections where necessary.
In all circumstances, ethical treatment of participants demands that they be informed about the program's confidentiality policies. In most cases, they then have the choice of not participating if they are unhappy with those policies; in the case of court-mandated participation, at least they'll know what to expect. All of which brings us to the next two issues, which may intertwine with confidentiality and each other: consent and disclosure. ConsentThere are really three faces of consent: program participants giving program staff consent to share their records or information with others for purposes of service provision; participants giving informed consent to submit to particular medical or other services, treatment, research, or program conditions; and community members consenting to the location or operation of an intervention in their neighborhood.
Handling these issues in a community is seldom easy or clear-cut. In general, the best course is to be honest about your intentions and to try to attend to people's objections or concerns. There's usually a way to find a solution that both sides can live with if you keep communication channels open. Both confidentiality and consent bring up the issue of privacy, one that has been much discussed in the past 20 years or so. Technology has made information far more accessible to far more people, and individual privacy has consequently become far more threatened. Much of what is discussed above and below has been the subject of legal wrangling or legislation (as in the case of the Buckley Amendment). While the question of the right to privacy, constitutional or otherwise, is much too broad to go into here in any detail, it is always lurking behind any decision about releasing information. DisclosureLike consent, disclosure in this context has more than one meaning.
CompetenceBy offering services of any kind, an organization is essentially making a contract with participants to do the job it says it will do. Implied in that contract is that those actually doing the work, and the organization as a whole, are competent to accomplish their goals under reasonable circumstances. It is obvious that no program or individual will succeed 100% of the time. Participants may be unready -- think about the long-term failure rates of many substance abuse treatment programs -- or resistant. Some community interventions may succeed less than half the time, and that may be the best anyone can do. But whatever the success rate, participants and the community have a right to expect that the program knows what it's doing and will make its best faith effort to provide effective services. That means that community services need to be offered by folks who are competent at what they do. Competence means more than simply having the appropriate training and experience. A competent organization hires competent staff members, provides supervision and staff development, and does everything it can to assure that the services it offers are the best available. If service appears to be ineffective or harmful, it is the ethical responsibility of the program to seek out or develop and try more effective methods. If a staff member, even with help from supervisors and others, isn't able to do the job, that should be documented and she should be dismissed. There are legal implications here as well. As explained earlier in this section, in some cases, service providers can lose their licenses or be sued for malpractice if they are found to be incompetent. It is up to a program to make sure that no one on its staff places himself in that position. Conflict of interest.A conflict of interest is a situation in which someone's personal (financial, political, professional, social, sexual, family, etc.) interests could influence his judgment or actions in a financial or other decision, in carrying out his job, or in his relationships with participants. In community interventions, conflicts of interest may change -- to the community's disadvantage -- how a program is run or how its money is spent.
Conflicts of interest are virtually always unethical, to the point where the mere appearance of a conflict needs to be avoided. Even if decisions or actions are not actually influenced by personal interest, people in conflict of interest situations in their public or professional lives should do everything possible to resolve them. If you find yourself in such a situation, the ethical remedy is two-pronged:
Some examples of conflict of interest (with possible solutions in parentheses):
Grossly unethical behavior.This is behavior far beyond the bounds of the normally accepted ethical standards of society. In some cases, grossly unethical behavior may stem from taking advantage of a conflict of interest situation. In others, it may be a simple case of dishonesty or lack of moral scruples. Both individuals and organizations can be guilty of some instances of it, and in both cases it is often a result of someone managing to justify the unjustifiable. Community programs need to be clear about their own ethical standards, and to hold individuals to them and to any other standards their professions demand. In most cases, staff members guilty of grossly unethical behavior should be dismissed as quickly as possible, and prosecuted where that is appropriate. Some of the more familiar types of grossly unethical behavior include:
General ethical responsibilities.Ethical behavior for a community intervention is more than simply following particular professional codes and keeping your nose clean. It means actively striving to do what is right for participants and for the community, and treating everyone -- participants, staff members, funders, the community at large -- in an ethical way. By doing what you do in the community, you take on a number of responsibilities: Responsibility to funders. You are responsible for being fiscally accountable, for using funds properly, and for trying to do what you promised to do when you took the money.
Responsibility to staff members. You are responsible for making sure everyone is treated fairly in all dealings with the program; that everyone is paid for the work she does; that everyone has a reasonable amount of control over her job; and that everyone has the opportunity to continue to develop her skills and effectiveness through staff development and/or supervision. You are also responsible for protecting staff from harm to the extent possible, and for warning and training them if some physical or other danger is part of their jobs.
Responsibility to participants. You are responsible for trying, throughout the life of the program, to provide the best and most effective services possible. This means constantly searching for better methods and ideas; paying attention to participant feedback; building on program successes; and acknowledging, learning from, and correcting program weaknesses. You are also responsible for respecting participants' rights, and for treating all with the respect due them, not only as program participants, but also as human beings.
Responsibility to the community. You are responsible for trying to understand and meet the needs of the community; for being responsive to community attitudes and opinions (without compromising your own mission or philosophy); and for trying, through your intervention, to improve the quality of life in some way for both program participants and the community as a whole. The participatory nature of community interventions that these obligations imply can also raise ethical questions. It usually makes both ethical and practical sense to involve the target population and/or the community at large in planning a community program. There are many good reasons for this involvement -- fostering community ownership of the program, having the input of people with a sense of community history, respecting people enough to pay attention to what they say they need, etc. -- but there can be drawbacks as well. What if you think the community's ideas are completely wrongheaded, or they want more control over the program than you'd feel comfortable with? What are the ethical solutions to these situations? The reality is that there aren't specific answers to most ethical questions. It's important to consider the questions, but to understand that taking what you see as the ethical path can sometimes land you in a briar patch. It helps to have clear sense of what you believe is right, and to also consider carefully what will actually benefit the situation and the people involved. In the case of community participants giving wrongheaded advice, for instance, is the principle of respecting the community's wishes more or less important than that of creating the most effective way to meet community needs? And which will be more likely to actually get the job done in the community? The answers will probably vary in different places and times. In SummaryEthical considerations are extremely important in community interventions. A program that itself behaves unethically or allows its staff to do so is both ignoring its mission and risking its credibility and effectiveness in the community. Because ethical issues are not always cut and dried, community programs should work out their own ethical guidelines and policies before questions actually arise. If you can agree on standards for primary ethical issues -- confidentiality, consent, disclosure, competence, conflict of interest, grossly unethical behavior, and the overall ethical stance and actions of the program -- and create policies which will help you uphold those standards, you're on your way to community respect and outstanding service delivery. |