the morally responsible college: practicing what we teach1 · but in addition to all the standard...

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The Morally Responsible College: Practicing What We Teach1

Ethics By Design

The Morally Responsible CollegePracticing What We Teach

by Michael Palmer, J.D., Ph.D.

Welcome to this presentation on The Morally Responsible College, which is based on the book by the same name.

About Mike Palmer

• Lawyer since 1980

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Mike has been a lawyer since 1980, first with Jenner & Block, a major law firm in Chicago, and then as head of his own firm in Middlebury Vermont.

1 © 2011 Michael Palmer, Ethics By Design.

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• Consultant to large and small companies and non-profits

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About Mike Palmer

He has extensive consulting, legal, and training experience with all levels of business and non-profit entities from Big 4 Accounting firms such as KPMG and multinationals such as Johnson & Johnson to governments of emerging market countries such as Jordan, Bosnia & Herzegovina, and Azerbaijan to micro businesses of 2-5 people in rural Vermont. Mike earned his doctorate magna cum laude from the Free University of Berlin and his law degree magna cum laude from Georgetown University. He teaches professional ethics, litigation risk management, negotiation, and business and professional judgment to college students and working professionals.



• Author

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About Mike Palmer

He is the author of numerous books and articles on business and professional ethics, including The Morally Responsible College (on Amazon Kindle), Ethics in a Professional Context, and, most recently, Complying with the Ethics Mandates of the Federal Acquisition Regulation.

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• Author

• Founder, Ethics By Design

© 2011

About Mike Palmer

Mike founded Ethics By Design to provide Ethics & Compliance services to small and mid-sized entities. He is a member of the Society of Corporate Compliance and Ethics, the American Bar Association, and the Association of Certified Fraud Examiners.

Overview of Program

• Cracks in the Ivory Tower

• The College as Moral Agent

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This presentation has four main parts: Cracks in the Ivory Tower summarizes some of the major ethical shortcomings that we have read or heard about in recent years in colleges and universities. Part two, the College as Moral Agent, addresses the need to think about the responsibilities of the college as an organization in addition to the ethical duties of individuals.

Overview of Program

• Developing Organizational Responsibility and Accountability

• The Benefits of an Effective Compliance & Ethics Program

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In Part Three, we will look at the policies, procedures, and structural changes colleges and universities can put in place to build trust, assure compliance, and prevent fraud and misconduct. Finally, we will briefly look at some of the benefits we can reasonably expect to flow to those colleges and universities that put an effective compliance and ethics program in place.

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Colleges Face Common Organizational

Ethics Challenges

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Harassment Fraud & TheftDiscrimination

Like other for-profit and nonprofit organizations, colleges and universities must deal with common human frailties in the workplace that involve sex, money, and power. We have laws and regulations and policies and procedures that address and attempt to minimize the harm that comes from human shortcomings in these areas.

Cracks in the Ivory Tower

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But in addition to all the standard ethical problems that plague small to large corporations, colleges and universities have types of problems that are unique to American academic institutions. The following list is not exhaustive. Rather, it provides an illustration of the kinds of challenges that face boards of directors and other college leaders seeking to achieve consistently high levels of integrity throughout the organization.


Athletic ProgramsThat Crowd Out Academic Interests

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Athletic programs that so thoroughly dominate college life that coaches are paid much more than college presidents whom they bully into submission to get what they want? See, e.g., Murray Sperber, Beer and Circus: How Big-Time College Sports is Crippling Undergraduate Education 23-24 (New York: Henry Holt, 2000).

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Academic Dishonesty

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An academic culture in which a majority of students, including those who have a high opinion of their own morality, admit to some level of cheating on tests and plagiarism on term papers? See, e.g., Bernard Whitley, Jr., and Patricia Keith-Spiegel, Academic Dishonesty: An Educator's Guide (Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, 2002); Gregory Cizek, Cheating on Tests: How to Do It, Detect It and Prevent It (Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, 1999); Donald L. McCabe, Linda Klebe Trevino, and Kenneth Butterfield, "Dishonesty in Academic Environments: The Influence of Peer Reporting," 72 The Journal of Higher Education 29-45 (2001); Donald L. McCabe and Linda Klebe Trevino, "What We Know About Cheating in College," 28 Change, 28 (1996); Richard A. Fass, "Cheating and Plagiarism," in William W. May (ed.), Ethics and Higher Education 170-184 (New York: Collier Macmillan Canada, 1989).


Research Fraud and Misconduct

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Research programs in which a prominent scientist can build a small empire by falsifying data for years and is detected only because one individual has enough courage to blow the whistle? See Jeneen Interlandi, ”An Unwelcome Discovery," NY Times (October 22, 2006)(on the Eric Poehlman case at the University of Vermont).

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Gigantic Lecture Halls

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Some educational programs treat large numbers of students as so much flotsam and jetsam by stuffing them into mass lecture halls presided over by inexperienced graduate fellows. See Murray Sperber, Beer and Circus, supra, 71-80.


Admission Preference to Star Athletes

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Small, liberal arts colleges that reserve approximately one-third of their seats for athletes because they are accomplished enough to compete in intercollegiate varsity sports? See William G. Bowen and Sarah A. Levin, Reclaiming the Game: College Sports and Educational Values 43-84 (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2003); John L. Shulman and William G. Bowen, The Game of Life: College Sports and Educational Values 258-261 (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2001).


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College presidents and coaches who are implicated in various violations of NCAA rules? See Douglas Lederman, "College Presidents Learn It's Hard To Keep Sports Pure," USA Today (January 14, 2004)( http://www.usatoday.com/sports/college/other/2004-01-14-ceos_x.htm). Joe Nocera, business columnist or the New York Times, wrote a column on how the NCAA winks at major infractions by big-time coaches such as Jim Calhoun of the University of Connecticut . . .

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. . . while coming down extra hard on student athletes such as Perry Jones who arguably had nothing to do with a violation of the rules.


Bacchanalian Social Life

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College residential life that has devolved from in loco parentis in the late 50's and early 60's to just plain loco? See, e.g., Michael Moffatt, Coming of Age in New Jersey: College and American Culture (New Brunswick: Rutgers University Press, 1989); Anne Matthews, Bright College Years: Inside the American Campus Today (New York: Simion & Schuster, 1997); Tom Wolfe, I am Charlotte Simmons New York : Farrar, Straus, Giroux, 2004).

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Abuse of Power by Presidents and Deans

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Periodic scandals involving gross abuse of position by presidents of prestigious universities such as that involving Benjamin Ladner of American University whose lavish spending of university money included a personal chef, vacations in Europe, an engagement party for his son, and other excesses reminiscent of Dennis Kozlowski's bacchanalian parties. See "An Order From Congress," Inside Higher Education (May 18, 2006) (http://insidehighered.com/news/2006/05/18/american).

• $43,892 for personal wine, liquor, and private parties (including 13-course meals)

• $80 bottles of wine served at personal events

• $22,345 for first-class plane ticket to Nigeria

• “Personal Development Trips” to Europe for Ladner’s Personal Chef

• More than $500,000 (total) in questionable presidential expenses over a three-year period Ben Ladner

American University

Source: Kim Turner & Robert Smith, Ethical Lessons Learned from American University.


In one famous case, the former president of American University, Ben Ladner, indulged in a lavish life style at the expense of the university’s coffers, buying expensive wine and spending exorbitant sums on trips and perks for his personal chef. A personal chef???

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Or consider the Dean at St. John’s University who embezzled over $1 million and also allegedly forced students to do her laundry, cook, clean her house, and drive her son around town.


Exploitation of athletes as semi-professionals

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Colleges that recruit young, mostly African-American, men who are ill-prepared for college study, require them to practice, train, prepare, and play ball for over 40 hours a week, keep them on scholarship only so long as they are healthy and perform as expected, and give them little time for academic work? See, e.g., Christopher W. Haden, "Foul! The Exploitation Of The Student-Athlete: Student-Athletes Deserve Compensation For Their Play In The College Athletic Arena," Journal of Law and Education (October 2001); Wilber Marcellus Leonard, II, "The Sports Experience of the Black College Athlete: Exploitation in the Academy," 21 International Review for the Sociology of Sport 35 (1986); William C. Rhoden, "At Conference Tournaments, The Colleges Major in Money," NY Times (March 15, 2003); Joshua P. Wimmer, "Student Athletes or University Slaves," (2001).

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Recently the PBS Frontline Program highlighted the fact that everyone connected with NCAA big-time basketball gets buckets of money—except the people who actually play the games.


Admission Preferences to the Rich and Well-Connected

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Highly selective colleges that hold themselves out as admitting students based on academic accomplishment and overall "well-roundedness" but routinely admit applicants who have little to recommend them other than famous or wealthy parents? See Daniel Golden, The Price of Admission: How America's Ruling Class Buys Its Way Into Elite Colleges—and Who Gets Left Outside the Gates 23-82 (New York: Crown Publishers, 2006).


Scholarly Opinions for Sale

Economist interviewed on Oscar-winning Inside Job

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Conflicts of interest arise when scholars and medical scientists take large sums of money to provide opinions in support of hedge funds, investment banks, pharmaceutical companies, and other institutions with financial agendas. I could go on, but I guess you get the idea.

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Declining Academic Quality

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A major problem has arisen in the last 10-15 years associated with the core mission of colleges and universities—the erosion of academic standards and the decline in quality. We are seeing colleges use the Internet to establish programs that do little more than churn tuition-payers through the system as part of a growing revenue stream. It is not just for-profit organizations that succumb to this temptation. Of course, leaders in higher education have voiced concern about the quality of the educational program in colleges since before Robert Maynard Hutchins launched the Great Books Program as President of the University of Chicago in 1929. But we may be seeing something new in the commoditization of credentials.


Environmental Impact

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Like all large institutions, colleges and universities use enormous amounts of energy and produce gigantic amounts of waste. Some have deliberately taken steps to reduce their CO2 footprint. Others need to pay more attention to the impact they have on the ecosystem as well as on the communities in which they operate.

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Possible Causes

Human Frailty

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What might be the causes of these cracks in the ivory tower? Why would these problems arise in institutions from which we would expect moral leadership, not moral problems. Human frailty is one obvious candidate. The seven deadly sins are alive and well today no less than in the past. We now enjoy wealth and prosperity that was unimaginable at the time when these seven expressions of the Fall were conceived in the Middle Ages. Yet we fall prey to them still. And access to the resources provided by modern organizations only seems to intensify their destructive power.

Possible Causes

Fraud Triangle

Opportunity

Motive/Pressure Rationalization

-$

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Donald Cressey’s fraud triangle possibly provides an explanation for some of the misconduct of individuals within colleges and universities. If you leave the cash box unguarded, financial pressures and greed will lead some people to help themselves as they tell themselves that it is not really stealing because they have been mistreated or they will pay it back or one of the hundreds of other rationalizations our fertile minds can readily invent.

Possible Causes

Perceived Injustice

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Numerous scientific studies have established a connection between the perception of being treated unjustly or disrespectfully and active sabotage, fraud, or theft within organizations regardless of type. Dale Miller published an excellent summary of the psychological research on the subject of “Disrespect and the Experience of Injustice” in 2001 (Annual Review of Psychology 52:527-53) that rewards careful study.

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Possible Causes

Diverse Ethical Backgrounds

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We are all different from each other. While most of us share many fundamental moral instincts regardless of what part of the world we come from or where and how we grew up (see Moral Foundations Theory http://faculty.virginia.edu/haidtlab/mft/index.php), our workplaces bring together people from widely diverse normative backgrounds. What is common practice in some places is a grave offense elsewhere. We might be surprised to find that not everyone has the same judgment about the rightness or wrongness of a particular decision or action.

Possible Causes

Poor Ethical Leadership

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In addition to problems arising out of individual behavior, however, we must also consider possible shortcomings in the organization itself. One of the most commonly cited sources of the ethical downfall of organizations is the absence of strong ethical leadership, the oft-mentioned “tone at the top.” In its 2009 National Business Ethics Survey, the Ethics Resource Center puts ethical leadership at the top of its four essential elements of an ethical culture. If a college or university is developing moral cracks, it makes sense to ask whether the board and top-level executives are providing the ethical leadership all organizations need.

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Possible Causes

Normalization of Deviance

In her landmark study of the fatal decision to launch the Challenger Space Shuttle in January 1986, Diane Vaughan identified and investigated what she called the normalization of deviance within the organization itself. The term signifies a set of attitudes, decision processes, and other practices that lead people within the organization to accept practices as normal or standard that those outside the organization readily see as unacceptable. Indeed, the pattern of behavior might be seen as deviating from the organization’s own standards—as was the case with practices in Morton Thiokol and NASA—but nevertheless become normal. This phenomenon could well be at work, for example, in the acceptance of practices in Big-Time College Sports that strike some outsiders as deviating from basic standards of morality.

Possible Causes

Lack of Ethical Organizing Principles

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It is hard for any organization—college, university, charity, or for-profit business—to stay on the straight and narrow path if it has not clearly articulated for itself where that path lies. A statement of moral values and norms of behavior—the ethical organizing principles—help align everyone in the college or university along a common understanding of the essentials. Too often we assume that everyone shares the same moral values or sees right and wrong the same way. We don’t. The failure to provide clear standards is likely a significant contributing factor to the moral problems some colleges and universities exhibit.

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Possible Causes

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Finally, we must consider the failure to establish compliance and ethics offices and other means of directing and implementing the moral responsibilities of colleges and universities as a major factor in the moral problems we are seeing. Like all large organizations, colleges and universities are mini-societies. The norms and laws of the larger societies in which they operate help them function as ethical institutions to an extent. But the failure to develop more refined and mission-specific forms of internal governance may, in part, explain the development of cracks in the ivory tower.

The College as Moral Agent

Lorenzetti: The Allegory of Good Governance© 2011

The tendency in our culture is to see these problems as personal failings only. Some are personal shortcomings, but most are not the result of personal breakdowns alone. Instead, they are systemic problems, expressions of the way the institution has developed, the choices that have been made over time, the cultural habits that have become entrenched. While personal disposition plays a role. Context can trump any single person. The cheating problem persists regardless of who the president is, and the personal qualities of the students and faculty have less to do with it than we might think. The college/university itself is a moral agent. That is the college bears responsibility for its own moral failings. That is true as a matter of law and as a matter of ethics. Good governance makes a difference. But so, of course, do bad policies and procedures. And the absence of policies leaves the door open for all manner of vile acts on behalf of the college. This is no new insight that emerged with Sarbanes Oxley and other federal ethics laws. Shown here is a section of a fresco in Siena,

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Italy by the 14th Century artist Ambrogio Lorenzetti, commonly referred to as the Allegory of Good Government. He also painted a companion fresco, which is called the Allegory of Bad Government. Viewed together, they tell the story that good things happen to all when the government is good, and bad things occur just as surely when governance is bad or missing.

Focus Attention on College,Not Just the People In It

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Some commentators treat entities like inanimate machines or tools. The moral responsibility lies with the user, not the tool (entity itself). But human entities (corporations, charities, colleges, etc.) are not inanimate tools. They are not natural beings either. They are something different. They are constructed and have collective decision-making capacity. They can receive the benefits of this organization (income, growth, recognition, etc.). As entities, they also have responsibilities and can be called to account. It is not just the occasional office holders who bear responsibility (although they do); it is also the entities themselves. We tend to think of ethics as concerned with interpersonal problems or the problems of personal behavior only. However, in an age of organizations, we have increasingly become aware that organizations have impacts as organizations on the interests of others and thus have responsibilities. Curiously, there is a long-standing view that because organizations are not natural, flesh and blood beings, they cannot have responsibilities. The law long ago dispensed with that misplaced metaphysics, establishing in both statutes and judicial rulings that corporations and other organizations can be held accountable as organizations without regard to how the actions of the agents on behalf of the organization came to be authorized or not.

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This view was basically developed on the law of agency and the responsibility of the master (principal) for the acts of the agent committed within the scope of the agent's authority. Thesis: College governance bodies and officers should take responsibility and be held accountable for the impact that the college as organization has upon the legitimate interests of others.

Integrate Ethics Into theStrategic Mission of the College

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We are experiencing a growing awareness of the need to integrate ethical awareness and commitment into the structure of organizations. All organizations need goals and plans for reaching them. Colleges and universities are traditionally suited to the job of inculcating moral character in students, of being the institutions of ethical leadership in our society. One of the goals of a college might well be to help young people develop a thorough understanding of right and wrong and a commitment to doing the right thing. By integrating ethical standards into the overall mission of the college, it will more likely set an example, literally practicing what it teaches.

How?

But we should take care not to buy into quick fixes, piecemeal policies, fragmented and uncoordinated training or check-the-box approaches to the moral challenges colleges face. The commitment must be fundamental and the effort must be to create system-wide moral thinking and resources.

This is analogous to developing a healthy lawn or garden. Suppose you want to get rid of the dandelions in your lawn.

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How?

Herbicides provide a quick way to deal with the problem.

How?

But you might get splotchy grass.

How?

And by using pesticides and herbicides, we expose dogs, cats, and small children to harmful chemicals.

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How?

Herbicides and artificial fertilizers kill soil.

When we rely on pesticides, herbicides, and artificial fertilizer, we kill the bacteria and micro-organisms that live in the soil and enable growth. It is dead, dead, dead. Green grass will grow only if we keep pumping in artificial fertilizers, herbicides, and pesticides.

How?

Similarly, we can get short-term results in an organization using command and control techniques in disregard of the well-being of the employees and others. But when a better offer comes along—when we can’t pay them an extraordinary salary—they will take the alternative.

The soil we develop through such artificial, disrespectful means will not sustain the organization.

A Better Way

But if we go about the task the right way. We can permanently remove the dandelions and prevent new seeds from germinating.

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A Better Way

Leaving us with a lush, safe lawn.

A Better Way

Organic Soil

With soil that is alive with nutrients, bacteria, and micro-organisms that enable plants and vegetation to grow.

If the soil is healthy, the growth will be too.

Moral:Think Systemically & Organically

If we nurture the best ethical instincts and put good policies and practices in place, we will likely see a strong ethical culture grow that endures through good and bad times, regardless of who happens to be occupying positions of leadership in the college at any given moment.

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Two Key Words

Purpose

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We turn now to a discussion of possible solutions to the problem. The types of causes I have identified in the diagnostic portion of the presentation carry within them suggestions for possible courses of action. But before we get into specific prescriptions, let’s think briefly about the fundamentals of any ethical society. To develop an organization with a strong ethical culture requires a clear sense of purpose shared by the vast majority of those working in the organization. As Richard Ellsworth put it in Leading With Purpose (25), “Purpose affects the soul of the corporation: its rationale for existing, its strategy, its goals, its way of managing, and the motivation and commitment of its people.” Purpose is our first key word.

Two Key Words

Respect

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The other key word in building an ethical college is “respect.” The great German sociologist and philosopher, Niklas Luhmann, wrote that respect is the foundational concept of all morality. Morality is about giving proper deference to the legitimate interests of others. “Respect” is built on a Latin root meaning “to see, to be aware of.” Respect is about seeing the other. To be moral, the college or university must see others in terms of the interests they have, taking care not to violate their rights but also accepting and valuing their needs to be accepted, to be acknowledged, and to be supported—in short, respecting them as fellow human beings.

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Purpose

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Arriving at the edge of a medieval city in the 12th century, a weary traveler asks a worker what he is doing. “I'm breaking up rocks, as you can plainly see” the worker replies, somewhat miffed at the question. The traveler moves on to a second laborer and asks the same question. “I'm earning a living for my family,“ he replies.

Living Purpose

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When asked the same question, a third worker, dripping with sweat and obviously fatigued, stands up straight and beams as he responds, “You see that cathedral off in the distance? I'm building that cathedral.“ In the best organizations, people know what they are about. They know they are building cathedrals, not just busting rocks. If asked, they would not need to go look up a written mission statement—important as these are—to answer a stranger’s question. This is because the purpose is expressed so many ways in the work of the organization. It becomes part of what the organization lives and breathes, what it embodies.

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Living Purpose

Inculcate Moral Character and Moral Competence

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A morally responsible college integrates efforts to develop moral character and moral competence into all aspects of fulfilling its educational mission. This is part of its core mission, or should be. If colleges and universities do not take on this responsibility, who will?

Make Respect OperationalWith an Effective Ethics Program

• Promote the 7 core business virtues.

• Build a Strategic Code of Conduct.

• Implement a sound training program.

• Put an Internal Control System in place.

• Establish an organizational Ombuds Office.

• Measure the Effectiveness of the Program.

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What does respect mean in the context of actual decisions and actions of individuals, committees, departments, and other parts of the organization? How do we translate the general into the specific? A list of things we can do to make respect operational includes: • Promoting the 7 core business virtues • Building a strategic code of conduct • Implementing a sound training program • Putting an internal control system in place • Establishing an organizational ombuds office • Measuring the effectiveness of the program

Make Respect OperationalWith the Seven Core Business Virtues

• Do our Best

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The seven core business virtues are a means of developing a respectful workplace. We use the training to underscore the importance of these seven virtues. Excellence leads the list of core virtues. Do our best in all that we do. Maintain this as a standard for ourselves and our colleagues.

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• Do our Best

• Tell the Truth

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Honesty in all that we do—both with ourselves and others—is a foundational virtue. Deception must be rare and justified in terms of responsibilities toward others, never in furtherance of self-interest.


• Do our Best

• Tell the Truth

• Play Fair

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Fairness is an essential component of an ethical culture. It is also a key ingredient of a productive work environment. All of us want to be treated fairly. It is incumbent on the organization to establish procedures that incorporate this virtue.


• Do our Best

• Tell the Truth

• Play Fair

• Mind Your Manners

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Good manners are the bedrock of all social interaction. They are the primary norms, what we learn at an early age, what makes it possible to get along with each other. The great 18th-Century statesman, Edmond Burke, put it this way, “Manners are of more importance than laws. . . . Manners are what vex or soothe, corrupt or purify, exalt or debase, barbarize or refine us, by a constant, steady, uniform, insensible operation, like that of the air we breathe in.” Letters on a Regicide Peace, letter 1 (1796)

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• Do our Best

• Tell the Truth

• Play Fair


• Keep your Word

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The courts will not enforce promises made without adequate consideration, i.e., contracts in which there is an exchange of value. And the cost of enforcing even such legally binding contracts through litigation often exceeds the value of the breach. As a result, some business people rather cavelierly break their word or, worse, the word of their company or college. This is a mistake. It destroys trust. The principle should be: Make commitments carefully, but if you make a promise, keep it.


• Do our Best

• Tell the Truth

• Play Fair


• Keep your Word

• Obey the Law

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Many codes of conduct lead with this virtue. The law is a common good. It protects me from you and you from me. It establishes the boundaries. It makes social capital—the trust that enables commerce—possible. And respect for and compliance with the law is a core virtue.


• Do our Best

• Tell the Truth

• Play Fair


• Keep your Word

• Obey the Law

• Do no Harm

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Famously, the Hippocratic Oath begins with the injunction primum non nocere—first do no harm. In the medical field (as in many other professions) the import is both don’t make matters worse and don’t use your position of power and authority in ways that cause harm. This core virtue reminds us that we have the power to hurt others. Within organizations, everyone with discretionary authority, which means the majority of employees, must take care to use it appropriately and not to impair the legitimate interests of others.

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The Corporate Integrity Checklist

1. Is it our best?

2. Is it the truth?

3. Is it fair?

4. Is it polite?

5. Is it what we promised?

6. Is it legal?

7. Will it cause any harm?

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I have created the corporate integrity checklist as a way of reminding us about the seven core virtues in daily life. Borrowing from Herbert Taylor, who developed the Four-Way Test in 1930, it lays out seven questions. The question form prompts the mind to think in ways that merely listing the virtues does not. I recommend that organizations adopt a policy: If we can’t say yes to the first six and no to the last, we don’t say, think, or do it. Organizations that truly live this policy will build trust and go a long way toward assuring compliance and preventing fraud and misconduct.

Make Respect OperationalWith a Strategic Code of Conduct

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A strategic code of conduct is more than a set of do’s and don’ts filed away in the organization’s policy binder or, perhaps, laid out in an employee handbook. It is a carefully thought out set of commitments that are aligned with and supportive of the overall mission—the purpose—of the organization. The U.S. Military’s Code of Conduct illustrates the strategic nature of such a set of policies:

Article I I am an American, fighting in the forces which guard my country and our way of life. I am prepared to give my life in their defense. Article II I will never surrender of my own free will. If in command, I will never surrender the members of my command while they still have the means to resist. Article III If I am captured I will continue to resist by all means available. I will make every effort to escape and to aid others to escape. I will accept neither parole nor special favors from the enemy. Article IV If I become a prisoner of war, I will keep

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faith with my fellow prisoners. I will give no information or take part in any action which might be harmful to my comrades. If I am senior, I will take command. If not, I will obey the lawful orders of those appointed over me and will back them up in every way. Article V When questioned, should I become a prisoner of war, I am required to give name, rank, service number, and date of birth. I will evade answering further questions to the utmost of my ability. I will make no oral or written statements disloyal to my country and its allies or harmful to their cause. Article VI I will never forget that I am an American, fighting for freedom, responsible for my actions, and dedicated to the principles which made my country free. I will trust in my God and in the United States of America.

There are many more rules governing the behavior of soldiers set forth in the Uniform of Military Justice, of course. But this short code of conduct was obviously written to align thinking and behavior of all military personnel with respect to becoming a prisoner of war. It is a strategic document. The codes of conduct of colleges and universities should be conceived with similar strategic purposes as well.

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Make Respect OperationalWith Effective Training

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It is a truism among compliance and ethics professionals that ethics policies must be communicated effectively, which means, among other things, that everyone must receive effective training. “Print, post, and pray” is not sufficient. And it is very expensive. The delivery method can be either in live workshops or online. But to be effective, training must be interactive (requiring participants to answer questions and giving them the opportunity to ask their own), must cover the subject matter thoroughly, and must include scenarios and other illustrations that make abstract concepts real.

Make Respect OperationalWith an Internal Control System

Assign ResponsibilityTo Chief Ethics & Compliance Officer

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Like all organizations, colleges and universities are social systems that include sub-systems and function within a larger social system themselves. To make respect operational in such a setting, means to work systemically. To do this, the Federal Acquisition Regulation mandates that covered federal contractors develop an Internal Ethics Control System. The first piece of such a system involves assigning responsibility to a person with sufficient seniority and resources to ensure effectiveness of the business ethics awareness and compliance program and internal control system. A Chief Compliance and Ethics Officer who reports to the Board or the CEO.

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Periodic Reviews

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Conduct Periodic reviews of college practices, procedures, policies, and internal controls for compliance with the college’s code of ethics and conduct and the parts of the compliance and ethics system, including—

Monitoring and auditing to detect criminal conduct; Periodic evaluation of the effectiveness of the ethics awareness and compliance program and internal control system, especially if criminal conduct has been detected; and Periodic assessment of the risk of improper conduct, with appropriate steps to design, implement, or modify the business ethics awareness and compliance program and the internal control system as necessary to reduce the risk of criminal conduct identified through this process.


Internal Reporting Mechanism

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Establish an internal reporting mechanism, such as a hotline, which allows for anonymity or confidentiality, by which employees may report suspected instances of improper conduct, and instructions that encourage employees to make such reports.

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Disciplinary Action

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Rules without enforcement are worse than no rules. Accordingly, there must be a set of disciplinary procedures to respond to improper conduct. These procedures should include ways to hold leaders accountable for failing to take reasonable steps to prevent or detect improper conduct.

Make Respect OperationalWith an Ombuds Office

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An organizational ombuds is an office to which anyone (executives, managers, and other employees) may bring any type of work-related problem, concern, or issue with assurance that the matter will be handled independently, impartially, and confidentially. The employees in an ombuds office have no managerial responsibilities and, when the office is properly structured, communications with ombuds employees do not constitute notice to the organization of the concerns raised. An ombuds program provides many benefits to an organization not otherwise available through the legal counsel’s office, the human resources department, or the ethics and compliance office. For example, using impartial facilitators, such programs help resolve squabbles and even more serious problems among employees confidentially. But they also provide a place to which employees can share a wide range of ethics problems from workplace harassment to awareness of fraud and other misconduct. This summary description is based on Charles L. Howard, The Organizational Ombudsman: Origins, Roles, and Operations. A Legal Guide (Chicago: American Bar Association, 2009).

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Make Respect OperationalBy Measuring Its Effectiveness

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It is oft remarked that you cannot manage what you do not measure. When we manage business processes, we endeavor to intervene in ways that affect outcomes. But if we cannot somehow assess differences in outcomes, how can we know whether our management efforts are effective? They could even be counterproductive. We don’t measure for the sake of measurement. We measure for the sake of improving management—and performance.

Measure Employee Engagement

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Employee Satisfaction

For my money, the most telling measurement of corporate ethical health is employee satisfaction. This single metric indicates whether employees feel acknowledged and respected for the contributions they make, whether they feel abused or exploited, whether they are engaged productively in their work, whether they feel a sense of purpose and alignment with the company mission, and whether they are comfortable working with suppliers and customers. All of these conditions are directly related to the degree to which the culture of the company places high value on doing the right thing and conducting business from an attitude of respect. Employee dissatisfaction is to corporate well being as silent inflammation or high blood pressure is to the human body. Unless we pay specific attention to it, its deleterious effects may not be apparent until they have caused significant damage.

How to measure the level of employee satisfaction is not as challenging as one might imagine because several good tools already

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exist for the purpose. A simple, inexpensive method that helps small organizations stay on top of this metric is to give each employee a red, green, and yellow marble, one of which they drop into a jar at the end of the day, indicating whether the day went well (green), poorly (red), or so-so (yellow). The supervisor of that group can get an instant read of how things are going, keep track over a week or so, and address the results in staff meetings to find out more about what is working well and where problems exist. Another method is to use the Gallup Q12 survey form.

Employee satisfaction should be measured frequently. Executives who manage by walking around may get a sense of the level of employee engagement; but they really need a more objective measure. Survey instruments such as the Gallup Q12 provide an annual snapshot. Using the three-marble method provides more up-to-date information.

Measure Employee Wellness

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Employee Health and Safety

Closely related to employee satisfaction, employee health and safety is another indicator of how well the corporation achieves the goal of universal respect. A morally responsible company will not expose its employees to avoidable health and safety risks. Of course, every company has a financial incentive to reduce such risks in order to keep insurance premiums low. But as history shows, where immediate financial impact is the only concern, some companies could conclude that the costs of reducing health and safety risks outweigh in the short term the costs of higher workers’ compensation premiums. Companies that act on such short-term cost-benefit analyses

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disrespect their employees—a disrespect that shows up in higher levels of injury and illness.

To measure employee health and safety, we can keep track of work days missed for illness, accidents on the job, and how well employees comply with safety procedures (wearing hard hats, etc.). If employees routinely have an annual physical check up, the results could be compiled anonymously. Other anonymously collected and stored data might include the percentage of employees who smoke cigarettes, the number who are overweight, and the number who have chronic conditions (asthma, allergies, high or low blood pressure, etc.). Mental health and drug and alcohol abuse levels can be monitored—again without identifying individuals—by keeping track of how many people make use of employee assistance programs.

Measure Diversity

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Diversity

A workforce consisting of a diverse mix of people with different personality styles, of both genders, of different ages, who come from different cultural and educational backgrounds enriches the corporation in ways too numerous to discuss here. Most of us tend to hire and promote people who are like us—particularly, people who mirror our cognitive styles. To counter such inbreeding, corporations must take proactive steps to promote diversity. The degree to which they succeed in integrating people of different personality types and from different backgrounds into the work and power structure of the corporation is another indicator of its ethical maturity.

Measuring diversity well requires more than simply counting up the number of people who can be assigned to different categories. It also

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involves assessing the operational and power make up of the firm. Thus, to measure integrated diversity we would want to look at diversity among new hires, among senior management, across departments, on committees, in our turnover statistics and reasons for leaving, length of employment, in promotions, and more. Assessing the cognitive styles of all employees at least once, using an instrument such as the Meyers-Briggs Type Indicator or the Jackson Personality Inventory, is another way to assure that not all the linear thinkers are huddled together on a project that needs some fuzzy creativity.

Measure Turnover

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We know and can keep track of how often people leave. If we put programs in place that improve employee engagement and reduce harassment by supervisors, turnover should fall. Let’s find out whether it does.

Measure Ethics Knowledge

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Many companies would be able to provide little more in the form of ethics measurements than the number of employees who had attended an ethics workshop or signed the company’s code of conduct. But such statistics tell us next to nothing about the actual level of ethics knowledge and practice in the corporation. As Mark Brown put it, “[H]ow does one construct an ethics analytic that detects minor problems so that they can be easily corrected before someone goes to jail, gets fired, or is up on the front page of a newspaper?”

Brown recommends collecting data in five categories:

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Employee Knowledge of Right and Wrong

Perceptions about what really goes on (the real values)

Ethics Policies and Procedures

Employee behavior

Outcomes

Mark Graham Brown, Beyond the Balanced Scorecard: Improving Business Intelligence with Analytics 114 (New York: Productivity Press, 2007).

Measure Perceptions

of Ethics at Work

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The Ethics Resource Council has developed a survey that measures perceptions of ethical behavior in the workplace, which could easily be adapted for use in each corporation. The ERC survey measures perceptions of

Misconduct at work Employee engagement Transparency and accountability Top management’s behaviors related to transparency Accountability at all levels of management Appropriateness of compensation levels The strength of ethical cultures Pressure to cut corners Whistleblowing Retaliation against those who report misconduct

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Measure the Organization’s Ethical Footprint

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Over the past 20 years, the Global Reporting Initiative, the B Corporation Certification Process, AccountAbility, Vermont Businesses for Social Responsibility’s SR Journey, and others have developed off-the-shelf systems for assessing the degree to which a corporation is living up to its responsibilities to outsiders. For example, the Global Reporting Initiative assessment tool is a detailed set of standards for use in creating an annual report for stakeholders on the company’s socially responsible activity, collecting as much information as an annual consolidated financial statement.

About Those Benefits

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Over the past 15 years, numerous books and articles have focused on the benefits to corporations of adopting effective ethics programs. The resounding consensus is no surprise: Ethics Pays.

Although we have a good collection of articles on the benefits of student honor codes (they reduce cheating), I am not aware of studies showing the benefits to colleges and universities of effective ethics programs. It stands to reason that they would reap the same benefits in the areas of employee engagement, lower turnover rates, higher productivity, greater trust, less workplace harassment, and reduced fraud and theft. But we do not yet know what benefits accrue in the areas of student life, student learning, professional development of faculty, greater loyalty among alumni/ae, donations to endowment fund, and the overall financial strength of the college. This is fertile ground waiting to be ploughed by doctoral candidates and tenure-track faculty.

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For More Information

Michael Palmer

Ethics By Design(802) 870 3450

[email protected]

www.ethicsbydesign.com

© 2011

The book on which this presentation is based is available in a Kindle edition on Amazon.

More information the Ethics By Design Assured Compliance Program is available through our website and by telephone or email.

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