and of course unless we have a common
understanding around what ethical
conduct looks like then things can be
pretty challenging and in relation to
that institutions need to develop much
greater alignment in terms of the level
and nature of ethical thinking within
the organization individuals at all
levels from leadership to frontline need
to build a shared and clearly defined
sense of what ethical and desirable
behavior is in any function of the
business and also what it is not this
has to be taken seriously if
organizations are really wanting to
achieve behavior change and activities
in this area need to go well beyond the
drawing up of a simple code of conduct
I talked about the importance of alignment
because of course each individual within
the organization comes with what we call
a unique ethical reference system which
simply means that they have their own
set of ideas and perceptions around what
ethical behavior actually looks like
based upon their own life experiences
and the ethical conditioning they've
developed overtime and so an easy way to
maybe think about this is to consider
different countries around the world
each has a unique culture which promotes
different behaviors beliefs and
practices which are by and large
completely accepted as being ethical by
the country's population yet people from
other countries may view those same
practices beliefs and behaviors as
completely unethical because they view
them in the context of their own ethical
reference system and who's right
well of course everybody thinks that they're
right because they judge their own
actions against their own reference
system which they believe is morally
justified
and so to automatically expect all
individuals to operate to the same
ethical standards whilst operating from
different reference systems and
understandings around what ethical
conduct looks like is wishful thinking
and so to create cultures of high
ethical behavior and conduct the first
thing organizations need to do
is establish clear definitions and a common
alignment and understanding around what
ethical standards look like
