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So, too, with our social constructs. In this series of articles on ethics, we have argued
that having an ethical organization is not just something that happens, but it is something that
the leadership of the organization must build. Also, the ethical culture that you have
constructed will, without a constant infusion of energy, decay over time; thus, entropy.
You will, therefore, have to be a constant source of new energy that is embedded into the
ethical culture so that it can continue to thrive. It will remain only as strong as your
leadership of it is. If your constancy or commitment were to waiver, probably because you get
distracted by all of the other pressing concerns of your business, the strength of the moral
culture will suffer.
Therefore, you will need to make a commitment to this process and its success, and it would be
wise to acknowledge the difficulty of that from the very beginning. The goal of your program
is to align your organization’s stated values with its actions. As you review your decisions,
and as you receive feedback from the “report cards” we talked about earlier, you will be able to
gauge how much energy to infuse into the system is “enough.” That isn’t easy. But, if
you are like the rest of us engaged in this struggle, you will find that it gets easier over
time.
In addition to making choices, leaders earn their following by assuring adequate
communications. And this is critically important in building and sustaining an ethical
organization. Look back at the idea of a Values Identification Audit, and you will see that
it is created out of communication among the leaders and the other stakeholders of the
organization. Fighting erosion and maintaining strength will be the result of an on-going
dialogue among the interested parties. And when the organization is not perfect, the leader
will need to admit these failings, just as he or she will need to reward the successes along the
way.
An ethical organization is maintained by integrity. Integrity comes from a Latin word
which means “wholeness.” An organization built on integrity is one that has all of its
pieces, that is not missing anything, that is morally complete. (You can see how this works
if you think about what “disintegrate” means - to break apart.) Part of the integrity of an
ethical organization arises from its culture, part from the history of its ethical decision-making,
and part from the commitment of its leadership.
As discussed in an earlier ethics article, a commitment to ethics will not be a great investment
strategy, but it will turn out to be the right thing to do. It is worth remembering that a
lack of a clear return will make the temptation towards serious compromise that much more
enticing. You need to remain focused. Your personal integrity will become bound up in what
you are trying to accomplish within your organization. If you succeed, not only will you reap
the benefits we have discussed, but you will be respected and maybe even admired. Not a bad
reward for doing the right thing!
In addition to a commitment to integrity, you will also have to commit to transparency. It
is important to note that public relations experts usually recommend that a leader caught up in a
potential scandal should get all of the information out at the beginning, and be as transparent as
possible. Time after time, the real problem arises less from the initial transgression and
more from the attempt to cover it up.
So, transparency is highly functional. But beyond that, ethical organizations will end up
demanding transparency of their leaders and members. It will become an operating
assumption. An early mentor of mine always said, “Make every decision as if it were going to
be covered on the front page of the morning newspaper.” If your organization professes to a
moral conscience, it will be next to impossible to not openly discuss the tough choices and their
ramifications when you make them. The good news is that that commitment to transparency will
serve to strengthen the culture that demands it. And there is quite a reward for exercising
your discretion as if you lived in a fish bowl - you get an extraordinary level of peace of mind,
knowing that all you have to do is tell the truth when asked.
Can every organization be ethical? Yes, but only to the extent that the leadership of that
organization is willing to make the moral choices that occur in the building and the maintaining of
an ethical culture. The tendency to avoid choices is quite widespread. Every day, we
see stories of people trying to avoid accountability. They send tough choices to a committee,
or endlessly study problems. They delay and delay difficult decisions, not because they are
thinking through their complexity, but because they simply don’t want to make the necessary
choice. But when choices are presented, only choices will suffice, and you will become the
leader of a successful and ethical organization to the extent that you accept that truism.
What are the next steps in creating an ethical organization? As mentioned previously, the
hardest choice is the choice to choose, so that is where this series of articles ends, but also
where your tasks begin. Will you commit to a Values Identification Audit? Will you
establish an organization that is committed to transparency and dialog? Will you ask for
evaluations of your organization’s progress from all of its stakeholders? And will you begin
the process of openly communicating your activities and the results that you see?
If yes, then you are probably already on your way.
© Daniel Swartzman
2010
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