How to Promote Ethical Behavior in the Workplace

Establishing Ethical Standards

Put your company’s standards of conduct in writing. Don’t assume that all employees have a universal sense of what’s right and wrong. Compile an exhaustive list of workplace standards, from acceptable language to ethical business practices. Post written standards in common areas and publish them in the employee handbook. Keep standards as specific as possible. Instead of “Be respectful,” specify that “Employees should not comment on physical appearance or make unwanted sexual advances of any kind.” Consider also hiring a team or department that manages the ethics of the entire workplace, like an HR department.

Include regulatory codes, but don’t let them define the company’s ethics. Legality is important, but it doesn’t define workplace ethics. Educate employees about industry-specific regulations, but don’t limit your ethical standards to legal codes. For example, ensure that all employees know the safety standards for the products you manufacture and repair. However, set your standards beyond safety codes. If a product needs to be repaired, terminate or discipline employees if they overcharge for services by repairing parts that weren’t broken.

Model ethical behavior from the top down. Written ethical standards are useless if the organization’s leadership doesn’t follow them. Executives, board members, and department heads must act as role models for the rest of the organization. Furthermore, standards must be enforced consistently; a senior manager should face the same consequences as a mailroom clerk. “Do as I say, not as I do,” and “They’re breaking the rules, so I can, too,” mentalities can lead to a toxic company culture. If the head of sales fudges numbers and misleads customers to exceed quotas, your entire sales team will follow their example. The resulting company-wide ethics breakdown is a lot more difficult to handle than individual cases of misconduct.

Hire applicants with values that reflect your company’s ethical standards. When you interview prospective employees, include specific questions that gauge their values. Hire a candidate who demonstrates strong ethical reasoning over one with dubious ethics, even if the latter has a strong professional record. For example, ask industry-specific interview questions such as, “Is it more important to meet a deadline or to ensure a product exceeds safety standards?” or “What would you do if you knew a coworker took bribes?”

Providing Ethics Training

Create company-specific training strategies. Like written ethical standards, training needs to provide concrete, relevant information instead of vague ideals. The company’s ethics officer or human resources department should come up with a list of specific scenarios that employees might face. These examples should then be presented to employees at new hire orientations and in annual ethics training sessions. For example, present specific examples of sexual harassment, hostile behavior, fraud, and other unethical conduct. Look online for newspaper articles or other accounts of actual misconduct. Analyze these case studies with employees during training. Ask them to identify why particular actions were unethical and how violators could have handled the scenario differently.

Build skills in addition to reinforcing ethical behavior. Focus on developing skills that empower employees to perform efficiently without cutting corners. For instance, teach employees how to manage their time, solve problems, and ask for help when necessary. Set reasonable productivity expectations to discourage them from making unethical decisions in order to meet deadlines.

Include ethics training in new hire orientations. Onboarding and orientation typically focus on filling out paperwork and teaching new hires about particular tasks. However, new hire procedures should include verbal instruction on the company’s ethical standards and prepare employees for ethical issues they might face. Additionally, you need to inform new hires about the process of filing a confidential complaint if they witness or are the victim of misconduct.

Schedule ongoing organization-wide ethics training days. Annual training days will help maintain your company’s ethical culture. Review workplace conduct standards and ethical business practices, and analyze industry-specific scenarios as a group. Hold training sessions in person instead of remotely in order to encourage dialogue, trust, and team problem solving.

Rewarding Ethical Behavior

Prioritize ethical decisions over sales or profits. Avoid setting performance goals that encourage employees to put profit over clients, coworkers, and safety standards. Sales quotas and other profit-centered benchmarks can incentivize unethical behavior. In addition to rewarding top sellers, offer monetary bonuses and other awards to employees with high customer satisfaction ratings or excellent safety records.

Reward employees who raise concerns about products or services. Suppose an employee identifies a specification mistake in a blueprint or raises concerns about a new product’s safety. Redesigning that product might cost money in the short-term and delay its release. However, that employee saved your company’s reputation and prevented potential injuries, recalls, lawsuits, and regulatory fines.

Promote employees based on ethical behavior. Factor ethical conduct into all decisions regarding promotions, raises, and bonuses. Failure to do so could result in a toxic company culture. If you reward unethical behavior with promotions and compensation, you’re telling employees throughout the organization that they need to violate codes of conduct in order to succeed.

Create a profit sharing system. Sharing company profits with workers discourages them from manipulating numbers for their own benefit. For instance, you could earmark 10 to 15 percent of pre-tax profits for distribution among employees. Distribute payments quarterly or annually, and base the amount an employee earns based on their overall performance. Don’t base performance evaluations on raw numbers. Factor in their contribution to morale, work ethic, client relations, and other less tangible criteria.

Dealing with Misconduct

Communicate disciplinary policies clearly. Ensure every employee knows the consequences of unethical behavior. Inform employees about specific disciplinary measures in the company’s written ethical standards, at new hire orientations, and at ongoing training sessions. For instance, make it clear that any employee caught stealing will be automatically terminated.

Ensure employees can report misconduct anonymously. A confidential complaint process is absolutely necessary. Ideally, employees should be able to file a complaint with your human resources department anonymously. If you don’t have an HR department, appoint an ethics officer or committee who can process complaints, investigate misconduct, and ensure confidentiality. Whether an employee is the victim of sexual assault or witnesses unethical business practices, they need to know that they can report misconduct without fear of retaliation. Make sure that all employees can comfortably voice their ethical concerns, regardless of their rank.

Discipline violators consistently and in a timely manner. Investigate misconduct allegations promptly, and don’t allow complaints to blow over or fall through the cracks. Furthermore, everyone in the organization must be held to the same standards, whether they’re a senior executive or intern. Consistent disciplinary measures go hand in hand with rewarding ethical behavior. Both are required in order to enforce the company's ethical standards.