Category: Uncategorized

Real emergencies are rare

“I was under time pressure to make this (bad) decision.”

We often hear this reason from employees during an investigation. They say they had no time to think things through, and they made a mistake.

However, in almost every case, an immediate decision was not necessary. They had an hour, or a day – sometimes several days, during which they could have made a quick call to the ethics office.

Remind your employees that the ethics office is a safe harbor. If we can’t give them the advice they need before their deadline, that missed opportunity will be on us, not on them. And if they follow our advice and it turns out to be wrong, they won’t be punished.

There’s (almost) always time to call the ethics office.

Entourage

Once again, the Olympic world is in a tizzy over the doping of an athlete. This time, we are talking about a 15-year-old girl.

Many people wonder why the IOC wasn’t informed of the positive drug test. Others worry about the “credibility” of the Olympic Movement. All I can think of is: “We are talking about a 15 year-old girl here!”

Think for a minute about all the adults who might have conspired to drug this child: her parents, her coaches, her doctors, officials of the ROC. Unlike her, they are not making the front page. By the time the investigation is completed, the Olympics will be over. The culpable adults won’t be dragged in front of the press. All the world will remember is that a young athlete won (and probably lost) her gold medal by cheating.

Yes, she cheated.

But she was cheated too. By those who should have protected her.

Actus reus

If you disagree with a rational person on any given topic, the answer to the following question will usually lead you to an agreement: “What would you need to see to change your mind?”

An irrational person will not be able to answer that question. A disingenuous one will refuse to answer it. Alternatively, they will take a position that is impossible to refute. For example, they will contend that the COVID vaccines contain undetectable microchips that allow the government to track their activities. Or that massive fraud during the 2020 elections will be proven in an upcoming report. Or that the 1969 moon landing was filmed on Earth at a secret location.

Secret. Undetectable. Just wait (and wait, and wait).

Some of our employees are making similar contentions in the workplace right now. The ones who don’t believe in the moon landing are probably not disruptive. Those who believe in election fraud may have caused some friction in the office. And the ones who believe in undetectable microchips have probably accused your company of unethical behavior when you decided to make vaccination a condition of employment.

What to do with such employees? My criminal law teacher, when explaining mens rea and actus reus, liked to remind the class that “you cannot convict a man on his thoughts alone.” In the E&C world, we need to learn to live with disagreeable people. How we treat them must be based on their behavior, not simply their beliefs.

On opinions

We have the power to hold no opinion about a thing and to not let it upset our state of mind – for things have no natural power to shape our judgments.

Marcus Aurelius, Meditations, 6.52

Have a look at the troubles people experience at work and at home.

How many would remain if they chose to let go of their expectations and opinions?

The magic question

Jacqueline Novogratz, the founder of Acumen, teaches us that if we truly want to make the world a better place, we have to listen to the unheard voices. If you haven’t read her Manifesto for a Moral Revolution, I highly recommend it.

Often, those who have remained unheard for a long time have learned to remain silent. To get them to speak up, you have to ask the right questions.

Zoe Chance, a Yale professor, offers such a good question – which she calls “the magic question”:

“What would it take to [fill in the blank]?”

If you have 7 minutes, listen to her recent interview on NPR, and pay attention to how this magic question revealed a simple solution to child trafficking in a small Zambian village (start listening at 4:15 if you are short on time).

This magic question conveys humility, respect, and vulnerability. It takes privilege and saviorism off the table.

Are you trying to help another person, or an entire group, either at work or at home? Do they feel heard?

Have you asked them what it might take?

Just because we can

In his blog post today, Seth Godin reminds use that some industries get away with ignoring customer satisfaction because their customers will use them only once and only for a short period of time.

Maybe the same forces are at play with employers who ignore employee satisfaction (and ethical business practices) because their employees are seasonal or temporary, and won’t be back next year.

Just because we can get away with it doesn’t mean we should do it. And if we decide to do it, we must remember that, in this new interconnected world, we are much more vulnerable to a disruption. Why not simply do the right thing and treat our employees and customers the way we’d want to be treated?

Almanacs

I have recently been involved in a project to create an almanac.

I can’t share the topic of the almanac until closer to publication. But it’s not one that contains astronomical and meteorological data. Not one that will be revised yearly.

Simply one that contains facts as we know them today. No opinions. No projections. Just facts. Things we know for sure. Data that cannot be challenged by reasonable people.

In these times of political turmoil, of social injustice, of health concerns, I think we need more almanacs. Places we can go to get the facts on a specific topic.

Almanacs are like a vaccines against conspiracy theories.

Reading list

I get a lot of my business ethics insights from books that have nothing to do with business ethics.

In fact, I suspect that people who write business ethics books derived many of their insights from other areas – like culture, politics, religion, and sports.

What was your favorite book of 2021? Did it contain, by any chance, a business ethics lesson?

Let’s build a small reading list! Share your favorite book and its lesson in the comment section below.

Cooperstown, performance, and trust

The big story in baseball this week is the induction of David “Big Papi” Ortiz in the Baseball Hall of Fame.

But for me, the bigger story is how Barry Bonds and Roger Clemens did not make the cut. Bonds hit 221 more home runs than Ortiz. Clemens won a record seven Cy Young awards. But their accomplishments were tarnished by the performance enhancing drugs scandals of the early 2000s*.

This is a good reminder of the important difference between a breach of performance and a breach of trust at work. An employee with performance problem will often get a second chance. An employee who breaks your trust will be fired on the spot.

* It is not clear why rumors of Ortiz testing positive for PE drugs in 2003 did not tarnish his record to the same extent.