If you reduced one of your corporate policies to a one-pager, and then reduce it further to a single word, would that word match one of your corporate values?

We all tell ourselves stories.

Some stories serve us well, others don’t.

For example, the story for many people is that they must exercise daily for at least 30 minutes. For others (but sometimes for the same people), the story is that they must have 3 or 4 beers every night because they’ve worked so hard during the day.

Our employees come to work with stories too. Some believe in an honest day’s work. Others feel justified to steal office supplies because they consider themselves underpaid.

Even those of us who build E&C programs have stories. One story is that workplace regulations are complicated and our job is to help our employees stay compliant. Another is that preventing risk is more important than innovation. Not all stories enable the business.

What stories do you tell yourself?

With every new policy, training, or communication that we are ready to deploy, we need to ask ourselves: “Will our employees now be more likely to speak up if they see a problem?”

If the answer is not a clear yes, our work is not done.

I don’t care for basketball.

And I don’t think that college sports should drive up the cost of education in the U.S.

So you can understand why I roll my eyes when I see one coach hit another because of an inopportune timeout.

Really? Who cares?! It’s basketball! A game where you try to throw a ball in a hoop! How can you get upset at this when 2.5 million American children are homeless?!

I’m too harsh, of course. I, too, get upset at silly things that no one cares about (you should hear some of my thoughts at the poker table). We all lose our temper from time to time, and we most often regret it later.

Seeing this coach get upset and physical reminded me of disrespectful behaviors we all see in the workplace. Often times, we can link a specific work pressure to the outburst. The pressure was the trigger. And the trigger needs to be looked at and questioned. Too often, we discipline the employee and move on. The pressure remains, building up for the next outburst.

Many religions have a holy day every week. It’s a way to remind followers of what is truly important, without letting too much time pass since the last reminder.

Is ethics truly important at your company?

How frequent are the reminders?

“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.

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?