Business Ethics Training is common for larger organizations. It instills a sense of corporate responsibility and unifies the operating ethos that drives the company towards its goals. However, more often than not it fails to achieve the desired results as is evidence from Enron and WoldCom, Tyco and Madoff and what have you.
To really develop an ethical workforce – one needs to begin at the top where the scandals and the scams often start out and let that trickle down. CEO’s and CFO’s, VP’s and Department Heads – all need to hold themselves to a higher example in order to show their determination to implement ethical practices within their respective departments and overall.
A second change is required at a much different end – primary school. A wide-ranging, nationwide ethics studies that would instill core values from the beginning of a child’s education is necessary. It would be a natural result of cooperation between the parents and the school (private or public) to develop honesty and integrity from the start. This change would pave the way for a future workforce that has been reared from the beginning on playing by the rules.
A third change and that at the middle should require those that would most commonly face ethical issues such as lawyers and accountants, to spend as part of their university curriculum a few hours in the field talking with victims of scams and scandals whose lives have been ruined. That kind of human interaction is vital – because textbook ethics is prevalent in our universities and colleges – but we need a human touch so that memory serves as a moral compass of a future workforce.
All these three changes are necessary and all the more important in the hard times that the 1st World faces today. The corruption that is prevalent in the 3rd World is in part a result of the poverty and hard times that force people to steal and cheat without remorse. In such recessionary times – we need to understand the value of business ethics training at all levels of education – and at home.
