The usual ethics & compliance program comprises a team of ethics officers and compliance counsels. The lucky one also have professional investigators. But the majority lack a critical team player.
A communication specialist.
This is the person who writes articles on the intranet to summarize recent cases, to feature a member of your team, to recognize an employee exemplifying good behavior. This specialist can create a blog, send Tweets with the right hashtags, edit videos of an event and upload them to your company’s YouTube channel. She can help you prepare slides for your next employee meeting, arrange for a photographer to document your next trip overseas, and create a communication plan for the launch of your new Code of Ethics.
This expert becomes a megaphone. Someone to showcase all the good work done by your team. Without him, only you know all the work deployed to make your organization a better place. With him, employees see the organization in a new light and can feel a responsibility to support your efforts (dare I say “feel inspired”?).
In 2016, we must all think of ourselves as media companies. Doing good work is essential but often insufficient. Our work must be visible and communicated in a captivating way. No offense, but compliance counsels are rarely good at that.
If you are lucky enough to have the budget to hire a new team member, consider a communications guru.
The Ethical Leader 