July 29, 2010
Ethics in Action
Ethics With a Very Small “e”
Like most people who've worked in large corporations, I’ve undergone my share of ethics training. But before I took the Spitzer Center’s Journey to Excellence course, my definition of ethics was cramped at best.
To be blunt, I saw ethics training as a check-the-box activity, which companies required because their lawyers advised them to do so – with good reason. Employees needed to know which words and actions could get them in trouble; companies needed to lower the risk of lawsuits and regulatory infractions and fines.
Since I wasn’t inclined to bribe foreign officials, offer stock tips based on inside information, or use the company’s email system to issue threats or send harassing messages, I didn’t find the training all that relevant. But I dutifully watched the videos depicting staged examples of bad behavior, and I sat through HR workshops that covered the various Thou-Shalt-Nots of corporate life. As a manager, I understood the need for these activities, even if I found them a bit condescending at times.
In retrospect, though, the problem wasn’t what these programs said or how they said it. The problem was the implicit message that ethics was largely a matter of legal compliance. Writing in his book The Spirit of Leadership, Fr. Robert Spitzer lamented
… the bizarre phenomenon of lawyers acting as agents of ethics. Law was never intended to be the foundation of conscience. The law’s function is to protect the rights of citizens. It is minimalistic by nature. When we make this minimalistic agency the grounds of ethics and conscience, we make ethics equally minimalistic.
This minimalistic approach can create huge swings between ethical laxity and ferocity. I’ve seen cases where careers were destroyed for one slightly off-color remark, because someone complained and the lawyers wanted to demonstrate zero tolerance for harassment.
"Any stakeholder good that does not undermine the common good of the organization ought to be pursued, for it will not only optimize contributions to the stakeholder but also cultivate benevolence, trust, openness, common cause, and esprit de corps." |
Conversely, I saw another case where a manager misled a team of employees. He told them their input was vital to a restructuring plan he was leading, so the team spent weeks compiling detailed reports to assist his efforts. But before the reports were turned in, the final restructuring plan was found sitting in a photocopier. Nothing happened to the manager because he only lied to employees, not regulators. When “unethical” becomes a de facto synonym for illegal, then “legal” becomes a synonym for ethical. (To make matters worse, the manager in question had a background that included ethics training.)
A more appropriate minimal standard for ethics is the Silver Rule: Don’t do to others what you wouldn’t want them to do to you. Don’t jeopardize their lives or safety … don’t impinge on their freedom or liberty without ample justification … don’t steal from them or cheat them … don’t exploit them … don’t lie to them or break promises. In short, avoid harm to others, and if you can’t avoid it altogether, minimize it. There’s overlap between the Silver Rule and a legally driven approach to ethics, but the former is more expansive and protective.
The highest ethical standard, and one that presumes the Silver Rule, is the Golden Rule: “Do to others as you would have them do to you.” While the Silver Rule prompts the mind to ask, “Where’s the line I shouldn’t cross,” the Golden Rule prompts the heart to look for ways to benefit others.
I think it’s safe to assume that those who see ethics through a legal lens would conclude that the Golden Rule was written for people, not organizations. The Journey to Excellence offers a different perspective. As Fr. Spitzer writes
Though organizations have an ethical obligation to pursue the Silver Rule, they need not pursue the Golden Rule. Nevertheless … the Golden Rule is the stakeholder philosophy brought to full life. Any stakeholder good that does not undermine the common good of the organization ought to be pursued, for it will not only optimize contributions to the stakeholder but also cultivate benevolence, trust, openness, common cause, and esprit de corps.
Ethics training needn’t be limited to discouraging bad behavior (and risking employees’ resentment at the insinuation that management doesn’t trust them). Every organization is free to pursue a higher vision of ethics, where minimizing harm is just the foundation of striving to maximize the good.
– John Keenan, Editor
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Last changed: Jun 04 2009 at 7:33 AM