ETHICAL WORKPLACE CONDUCTEverybody Does ItLloyd A. Conway Approximately 20 minutes |
15 |
Overview
This exercise presents five all-too-familiar workplace scenarios and challenges participants to explore the ramifications of all-too-familiar reactions to those scenarios.
Purpose
To encourage more ethical behavior with regard to little things, which, when considered as a totality, are immensely costly for the organization.
Group Size
Any number of participants can work on this exercise, which initially involves individual work and then small group discussions.
Room Arrangement
No special arrangements are required other than seating that permits seats to be rearranged to form small groups.
Materials
Handout 15.1, “Everybody Does It”
Procedure
1.Lead a discussion of “cognitive dissonance,” a psychological term that refers to ways we justify information that runs contrary to our values. For example, we all know it’s wrong to steal, but many of us would be willing to take company tape or clips or paper for our own use. To resolve the dissonance that results from doing something we know is wrong, we might say to ourselves, “It only costs a penny,” or “They’ll never miss it,” or “This is a small compensation for the pay raise I didn’t get.” (Worse yet, some would not even feel the dissonance: they simply take the item without even thinking about it.)
2.Ask for other examples from the national scene: How do Democrats, for example, resolve the dissonance caused by having the President involved in a scandal? How do anti-war Republicans support a pro-war President?
3.Explain that you’d like to explore the issue further via workplace examples.
4.Distribute Handout 15.1, “Everybody Does It,” and allow about 15 minutes for completion.
5.Form small groups and have participants share their responses.
6.Bring closure to the exercise by asking for a spokesperson from each group to present a synopsis of the discussion.
Variation
Ask for a volunteer to calculate the potential cost of each scenario by:
1.Passing out small sheets of paper after the first scenario and asking each participant to indicate anonymously whether or not he or she has used the company’s fax machine or copy machine for his or her own purposes.
2.Calculating the percentage of people, compared to the class total, who do employ company property for their own use. On the same sheet, ask each person to indicate the number of times in a given year that he or she uses the company fax machine or copy machine for personal use.
3.Calculating the cost of such action in terms of lost productivity.
4.Multiplying that cost times the number of times it is likely to happen in a given year for a single employee.
5.Multiplying that cost times the number of employees in the organization.
6.Multiplying that cost by the percentage of employees who are likely to engage in such conduct based on the percentage you came up with from step 2.
Discussion
What characteristics will business leaders need for success a decade from now?
What are some of the reasons people give for small violations of ethics?
Is it worth a manager’s time to attempt to put an end to such violations?
Assume you are the head of the department or head of the company. What would you say to end such “conversion thefts”?
Quotation
“Anything you do is everything you do.”
—Buddhist saying
Points of Interest
“Profitability and the Common Good,” an article by Pam Mayer, reports an interesting study from the Johnson School of Management at Cornell University. The School surveyed executives from several Fortune 1000 companies and asked, “What characteristics will business leaders need for success a decade from now?” The top two answers from these executives were team-building and compassion. These two elements would easily appear on a list of traits possessed by ethical leaders. It’s reassuring to find, at least in this study, that today’s executives are concerned with the common good.
By comparison, the same question was asked of MBA students from the top 20 business schools. Their responses related to profitability: the trait they selected was an orientation toward results. (Only 28 percent of the students strongly agreed that corporations have a responsibility to the environment. Half the executives were in strong agreement with the statement.)
HANDOUT 15.1
“Everybody Does It”
DIRECTIONS
We all realize that a clerk taking money from the cash register is stealing; that the Enron and Global Crossing scandals, in which insider information was used for personal profit and to mislead the public, are morally wrong. But in the commonplace occurrences of our everyday lives, do we stop to think about the small ways in which our integrity is put to the test? Read each of these scenarios and answer the questions related to them as honestly as possible.
1.Your child’s school calls you at work, because you forgot to turn in a signed permission slip for today’s field trip. The school secretary offers to fax you one to sign; your return of the signed paper will permit your child to join his classmates. If not, a sad face will greet you after a day of being left behind at school, while everyone else had a great time.
What do you do?
What is your employer’s policy on personal fax use?
Would it be different if the fax involved a long-distance call? Why or why not?
Would the situation be different if the fax were for a car loan application, student loan paperwork, or an RSVP to a retirement dinner? If so, tell how, in reference to each of these three situations.
2.You’re responsible for making flyers for the PTA bake sale. Would you copy them on the company copier? If so, what would your rationale be?
What is your employer’s policy on personal use of the copier?
Would it matter if you brought your own paper?
Would it matter if it were for a charity, as opposed to something for private gain, such as “For Sale” flyers for your used computer?
3.Most employers have policies covering local phone calls. If yours does, do they limit the times when calls can be made or accepted? If local calls are acceptable, is there an issue with the amount of time spent on the phone, as opposed to phone charges? Share your views here of what is or, perhaps, what should be allowed.
4.Think of a scenario involving actions that might be described as being in a “gray zone.” The scenario could be related to checking personal e-mail while at work, using the Internet to shop or bank online, favoring a friend in a hiring or promotion situation, or something similar. Tell the consequences of these actions, specifying, if you can, how “innocent” things can lead to trouble (gossip, damaged reputations, reprimands, etc.).
5.What overall conclusions can be drawn about habits and the “everybody does it” syndrome at work?
The fancy legal term for much of the preceding is “theft by conversion,” or using someone else’s property without asking for permission in order to meet your own needs. Even if you don’t agree that all of the examples given in the preceding are wrong, ask yourself how you would react if you read in the newspaper that employees of your children’s school or the City Hall were engaged in such actions and getting paid with your tax dollars. Remember, it’s what we do when no one is looking that truly shows our character (and in the digital age, somebody is probably looking).