Ethical Behavior: No one is truly listening to you

When leaders in other organizations ask me how they should go about launching an ethics program, they are often enthusiastic. Whether because of an article recently read or a director’s conference recently attended, these men and women have “gotten religion” and cannot wait to go forth and conquer. For those of you who heard me recently recount my discussion with Pam (here), you know that it takes a certain kind of mindset to lead the ethics program. But leaders launching an ethics program within an existing organization are also often convinced that its success will be measurable in a manner akin to counting widgets produced per hour, or similar.

The common refrain I hear is, “We’ve got to get this [ethics] program up and running fast! We’ve already drafted communications, planned all-staff meetings at each facility. We’re going to tell people all about it, so they’ll get on board right away!”

Now I don’t know about you, but when people I don’t really know are rushing toward me smiling, frantically waving their arms, and telling me in crazed fashion that “they’re here to help”, I run the other way. And so will employees when confronted with top-down headquarters-scripted communications and town hall meetings. Many of your employees have been at their facility longer than you’ve been out of college. They’ve seen the “program of the quarter” launch, fizzle and fade more than once. Don’t let your well-intentioned (and necessary) ethics program join the fizzle-and-fade folly.

Here’s the rub…your employees aren’t really listening to you most of the time. Unless you directly impact a man or woman’s paycheck, schedule, assignments, or working conditions, you are likely immaterial to their day-to-day professional landscape. An employee can only speculate what a remote company executive does each day, but he/she can surely tell you what his/her boss is doing, not doing, saying, not saying, etc.

If your line supervisor breaks promises, falsifies expense reports, or takes office supplies home for personal use, his/her employees not only know about, but they resent the supervisor for it. That very same supervisor could talk about ethics all day long, handing out buttons and pens galore, and the employees will smirk and roll their eyes.

Bottom line is that it’s not what you say about ethics that will strengthen ethical behavior in an organization, but what you and your fellow leaders model. The measure of success for a newly-launched ethics program will be that future moment where ethical behavior has been modeled so consistently from the CEO through the ranks to the shop floor, that when one employee sees another employee about acting unethically, the first employee holds the second employee accountable.

No words or fancy slogans will be necessary from that moment on…