The true heroes of an ethics & compliance program

Ethics & compliance professionals use a lot of neat phrases to inspire good behavior:

• Don’t cheat. Don’t lie. Don’t steal.
• Do the right thing, even when no one is watching.
• We’d rather lose business than compromise our standards.

These sentences sound amazing in corporate videos or printed on posters.

But once you release them into the wild, things get ugly. Employees wrestle with the business pressures as they seek to live by the corporate values. Many will fail and those who don’t often get hurt. We have to celebrate those who are willing to get hurt. They have forsaken short term gains to ensure the survival of the organization. They have gone into battle because they believe in doing the right thing. They got bruised and cut and beaten down and yet they got up every time. These are the true heroes of an ethics & compliance program.