You are the chief financial officer of a 25-year-old manufacturing company that employs 75 people. The company has been losing money for four years and its family owners have poured over $1 million dollars into it to save it. In addition, the company has a $750,000 line of credit. The bank has become increasingly nervous about the loan, especially since …
13 Truths for HR Professionals
Everyone rationalizes — including you. There are lots of things you don’t know and lots of people who hope you don’t find out. (The most dangerous problems are the ones you don’t know about). Complacency and overconfidence about ethics is a major vulnerability. (Everyone says it can’t happen here until it does). There’s never just one bad employee – there’s …
Honesty in Conduct
Honesty is the bedrock of trust and trustworthiness. The moral command to be honest requires us to speak and act only in ways that engender and justify trust. That seems simple enough. But honesty is a broader concept than some realize. An honest person tells the truth, is sincere, doesn’t deceive, mislead, act devious or tricky, doesn’t betray a trust, …
Leaders Create New Realities
If I had asked my customers what they wanted, they would have said a faster horse.” – Henry Ford Leaders need to listen to those they lead and those they want to influence, but as their greatest task is to take people beyond the reality and even the imagination of those they seek to lead, they often must choose another …
12 Ethical Principles for Business Executives
Ethical values, translated into active language establishing standards or rules describing the kind of behavior an ethical person should and should not engage in, are ethical principles. The following list
Accountability
Ambrose Pierce, a nineteenth-century humorist, defined responsibility, as “A detachable burden easily shifted to the shoulders of God, Fate, Fortune, Luck or one’s neighbor. In the days of astrology it was customary to unload it upon a star.” Being accountable means accepting responsibility for who we are, and for our character, personalities, attitudes, and weaknesses. Even for our happiness. The …
Citizenship
Orlando and his three friends went on a camping/fishing trip. When they reached the camp site they were unpleasantly surprised at how it had been left by the previous campers. Beer cans and other trash were all around. They spent almost three hours cleaning it up. The morning of their scheduled departure day another camper in the area told them …
Avoiding Unfair Conduct
One of the problems with interpreting the concepts of fairness and justice is that so many factors can go into the notion of a fair judgment. There is rarely one single result dictated by ethical analysis. Consequently, we often do not know what is truly fair. We do, however, often know what is unfair, and our first obligation is to …
Fairness
How old were you when you first experienced the sting of injustice? Perhaps you were blamed for something you didn’t do or excluded from a club or team because someone didn’t like you? Perhaps you were given a lower grade than you deserved because the teacher had it in for you. Or did you ever experience frustration and moral indignation …
Rationalizations – The Enemy of Integrity: Twelve Common Rationalizations and Excuses to Avoid
Everyone is ethical in their own eyes. Rationalizations are the most potent enemy to integrity. They work like an anesthetic to our consciences allowing us to avoid the pain of guilt when we don’t live up to our values. We want to think well of ourselves so much that we develop strategies to convince ourselves that we are better than …