Compliance Culture

Practical insights for compliance and ethics professionals and commentary on the intersection of compliance and culture.

Starbucks and cultural respect in design as business strategy

Starbucks is one of the most recognizable global retail brands today. Its branding is universally known, with its ubiquitous green and white mermaid logo reliably present worldwide and its slate of coffee and tea products also dependably the same. While many consumers may find consistent branding and the resulting quality standards to be expected along with it comforting, one of the undeniable criticisms of globalization has been that localization – native customs and characteristics that often have deep historic and cultural significance – can end up subverted in favor of international sameness.

Indeed, companies such as Starbucks have struggled in some markets to import their menus and store designs to communities which may be resistant to connecting with what can be seen as a generic, foreign experience. Apart from just lacking appeal or seeming strange, sometimes these companies can offend local norms or fail to fit into the communities which they wish to court for business. While sometimes novelty of a brand can create allure or even cult status for the company’s products with curious consumers, more often, Imposing a company and its products on a community in a non-assimilative way does not likely make for a successful competitive strategy.

Starbucks has faced its challenges importing its distinctive coffee shop brand and products to new communities over the years. Even within the United States, local coffee houses with loyal customer bases have put up resistance to a major corporate brand setting up shop in communities such as Venice Beach, California which have preferred small, local businesses to fit with an indie, alternative vibe. Outside of the United States, the powerful social value of “coffee culture,” representing a social and community activity rather than just a caffeine and snack break, has sometimes not jived well with perceptions of the Starbucks brand. Criticisms of the products themselves come from people who have high expectations for bespoke coffee that they don’t feel Starbucks satisfies or, on the other end, a standard idea that coffee is quick, cheap, and on-the-go only, in light of which Starbucks seems expensive and inconvenient.

One striking way that Starbucks can address these objections is to seek to fit within and contribute to the community authentically and meaningfully. In Kyoto, Japan, the Starbucks Coffee Kyoto Ninenzaka Yasaka Tea Parlor is an amazing example of how a company can demonstrate respect towards a community and its traditions in the design of its public spaces. This Starbucks is located in a traditional wooden house, with subdued colors and branding on its exterior, which fits aesthetically and culturally in the historic neighborhood where it is located. On the inside, the authenticity of the retail experience to its cultural environment continues, with tatami (straw) matting on the floors and traditional Japanese garden in the back courtyard by the coffee bar. Rather than appearing in contrast to the other businesses in its area, this Starbucks blends powerfully into its distinctive surroundings. Starbucks does not seem here like it is trying to impose its brand or style, but rather to show respect for the traditions of the very historic Gion district of Kyoto.

Joining the community in which the store is located, rather than setting itself apart from it, is a powerful expression of social responsibility and engagement for a brand to make as it seeks to attract and appeal to customers. Matching with the experience and aesthetic of such a distinctive area as Gion, which was originally developed as a district in the Middle Ages and is one of the most well-known geisha districts in Japan with the Yakasha Shrine at its center, is a challenging but inspiring business strategy. This values-based approach to growth and design leads to sustainable expansion and competition for a brand such as Starbucks, which can benefit tremendously from positioning itself as sensitive and loyal to local communities and their characters.

For more on this interesting Starbucks outlet as well as Starbucks locations in other countries that aim to honor their communities with their design aesthetic, check out this CNN feature article.

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Profiles of ethical leadership in sports coaching: Johan Cruyff

This is the second in a month-long series of five posts that discuss successful sports coaches in terms of their ethical leadership qualities. Last Wednesday’s post was about John Wooden, the visionary UCLA basketball coach. Today’s post will focus on Johan Cruyff, the acclaimed Dutch footballer and manager of Ajax, Barcelona, and Catalonia football clubs. Next week, the profile will be about Jim Valvano’s leadership ethic as expressed in the famous speech he gave at the ESPY Awards in 1993, two mere months before he died of cancer. On November 22, the post will be about Vince Lombardi, the NFL Hall of Fame coach, and clues about how he saw ethical leadership based on some of his most famous public statements. The fifth post in this series, on November 29, will study Gregg Popovich, a current NBA coach with a progressive view toward developing his team as both players and people.

Johan Cruyff is widely thought of as one of the greatest football players of all time, having won the Ballon d’Or three times and playing many extremely successful seasons for Ajax (1964-1973) and Barcelona (1973-1978) in club play and the Netherlands (1966-1977) in international play. Cruyff is equally regarded for his impressive achievements as a club manager. His innovations while at the helm of Ajax and Barcelona football clubs laid the generational foundations of coaching philosophy that continue to shape the directions of those teams and their youth academies, as well as those of many others.

To learn more about Cruyff’s life and accomplishments as a player, read this profile from The Guardian published after his death in March 2016.

Cruyff, regarded by many as a technically perfect football player, was able to devote his energy to creative organizational strategies to make the game more cooperative and dynamic. From his perspective, technique went far beyond fundamentals of football that could be learned from rote practice of drills. Rather, real playing ability came from having a fluency and versatility with the game that allowed players to connect to one another and work in an instinctive and flexible system together on the pitch.

Cruyff also receives special mention for his approach to the game that emphasized morality via simplicity of play. While regarding football as a beautiful game, this was not merely based on entertainment value or competitive stakes that might be exciting, but also on efficiency and mental strategy, where the mind’s plan facilitates the body’s actions. This is a powerful consciousness that elevates a deeper existential, internal success over the fleeting external recognition of a win-lose result that was not achieved by a personal commitment to greatness via integrity and discipline.

Cruyff’s strong values toward the game and life are most poignantly embodied in his “14 rules,” which are displayed in each of 200 Cruyff Courts set up in countries all over the world for children to use freely to play football together.   These 14 basic rules are fundamental for all players in football match to follow, but they also provide a guiding philosophy for a values-based approach to life. Applying these as both personal and business management principles allows an individual to seek inner satisfaction and success via connections to and cooperation with others, personal accountability, authenticity, and informed ambition.

Cruyff’s 14 rules, annotated with suggestions for their application to corporate cultural principles in interests of promoting organizational and employee integrity, are as follows:

  1. Team player – To accomplish things, you have to do them together. – True success is achieved by focusing on collaboration and cooperation, not making isolated decisions in disconnected processes.
  2. Responsibility – Take care of things as if they were your own. – Individual ownership of risks and recognition of each person’s role in their management is fundamental to any defense strategy as well as necessary for a genuine culture of compliance at all organizational levels.
  3. Respect – Respect one another. – Businesses must have zero tolerance for non-inclusive or abusive behavior; incidences of it must be addressed seriously and mitigated or prevented from reoccurring when possible.
  4. Integration – Involve others when possible. – Work together to share responsibility – invoking praise when duly earned, and liability when risks are not managed.
  5. Initiative – Dare to try something new. – Foster and contribute to a culture of speaking up and out. Challenge heuristics and routines which can drive unethical decision making and narrow cognitive frameworks.
  6. Coaching – Always help each other within a team. – Regard the organization as an interdependent unit to support an integrated style of decision-making and working.
  7. Personality – Be yourself. – People should maintain their personal code of ethics and sense of right and wrong that they have in life, at work. Good people should not be afraid or unable to do good things.
  8. Social involvement – Interaction is crucial, both in sport and in life. – Be active champions for ethical processes and work together to promote them. Isolation is toxic to collective integrity.
  9. Technique – Know the basics. – Have or get the information needed to remain in constructive compliance with rules, regulations, and laws. Stay up to date or in front of them.
  10. Tactics – Know what to do. – Have a strategy that is flexible but driven by defined values and a thoughtful understanding of risks. Prepare work based on a plan and in agreed terms.
  11. Development – Sport strengthens body and soul. – Stay up to date or in front of the guidelines that form the controls framework. Feed-forward ideas, letting future productivity benefit from past performance.
  12. Learning – Try to learn something new every day. – Be open to and informed about different perspectives and opportunities. Seek knowledge and evaluate strategy based on it, not based on what is easy or fast.
  13. Play together – An essential part of any game. – Share values and manage risks by working together. Don’t be solicited for advice or seek an opinion; have an evolving and ongoing relationship.
  14. Creativity – Bring beauty to the sport. – Be passionate and on the lookout for novel approaches that will provide elegant solutions to dilemmas.

Cruyff’s 14 rules are about so much more than football or sport. These rules are succinct, relatable suggestions for how to live a moral life in harmony with others and in pursuit of self-sustaining accomplishments. This emphasis on values drives intellectual curiosity, physical effort, mental development, and individual accountability. These powerful principles promote integrity in all areas of life and work.

To learn more about Johan Cruyff and his undeniable legacy in football and leadership, check out this Football’s Greatest feature on him:

Also, make sure to read next Wednesday’s post, when this series continues on to look at Jim Valvano, a famed NCAA basketball coach and, later, broadcaster and motivational speaker, and his legendary speech at the first ESPY Awards in 1993 which makes a powerful, simple statement on integrity and internal success.

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Profiles of ethical leadership in sports coaching: John Wooden

This is the first in a month-long series of five posts about historically significant sports coaches as exemplary models for ethical leadership values. Today’s post will focus on John Wooden, the legendary UCLA basketball coach. November 8th’s post will analyze the famous “14 rules” of Johan Cruyff as business values to promote organizational and employee integrity. On November 15, the profile will be about Jim Valvano and the inspiring speech he gave at the ESPY Awards only two months before his untimely death in 1993. Vince Lombardi, the NFL Hall of Fame coach, and his insights on the ethics of leadership and performance will be the focus on November 22. Finally, on November 29, a contemporary coach will be the final profile along with the previous leaders from sports history, with the focus on NBA coach Gregg Popovich.

These coaches are all beloved, legendary figures whose importance in society extends far beyond their teams, and for good reason.   Beyond inspiring players and other coaches who develop with them or work alongside them, the ideas coaches share about motivation, personal growth, attitude, and performance can easily translate from the court, pitch, or field to all areas of life.

No discussion of legendary coaches in sports history is complete without mentioning John Wooden, so it is logical to start this inquiry with him. John Wooden was the head basketball coach at the University of California Los Angeles from 1948 until 1975. During that time, he coached the team to ten NCAA national championships in 12 years, seven of those in a row. For his many storied accomplishments at UCLA, Wooden was named coach of the year six times.

Apart from his winning record, Wooden is renowned for his popularity among his former players, many of whom recognized him as having shaped their lives positively. He is well-known for his organizational leadership and insights which have been translated as tips for success in life in general, often relying on simple and straightforward inspirations for positive behavior and attitude. Wooden defined many leadership and performance principles to inspire his players to achieve their best in basketball and life. These were embodied by, for example, his Seven Point Creed, which included being true to yourself, helping others, building relationships, seeking advice, and being thankful, and the Pyramid of Success.

The Pyramid of Success describes 15 blocks which, when considered in performance and strategy, support competitive achievements which can be reached through a values-based approach. These 15 qualities are: (1) industriousness, friendship, loyalty, cooperation, and enthusiasm; (2) self-control, alertness, intitiative, and intentness; (3) condition, skill, and team spirit; (4) poise and confidence; and, culminating in, (5) competitive greatness. These are supported by, on one hand, from bottom to top: ambition, adaptability, resourcefulness, fight, and faith; and on the other hand also from bottom to top: by sincerity, honesty, reliability, integrity, and patience.

This balanced approach demands that any individual hoping to reach competitive greatness must take into consideration the personal qualities and resilience that are required to get there. In this model, quick wins or external satisfaction are not emphasized; instead, building character ethic and cultivating a measured path to the desired achievement.   These values are not special to basketball or sport. They are also not mere business principles. They are a life philosophy and paradigm which an individual can consistently carry though all of his or hers endeavors. The hard work a person devotes to the dual goals of sustaining faith and patience provide the momentum for the culmination in success.

For an interactive look at this, check out the website memoralizing him, which has a section devoted to the Pyramid of Success.

The key takeaway from the Pyramid of Success, and many of Wooden’s finer management and development insights, is that success and winning are not synonyms. A person can reach competitive greatness, the ultimate stage of the Pyramid of Success, but that does not mean the result will be winning every time thereafter. By the same token, an individual game or effort can result in a win, but that does not mean intrinsic success has been achieved in a sustainable, credible way.

In Wooden’s words in his 2001 TED talk (linked below), success is defined as “peace of mind attained only through self-satisfaction in knowing you made the effort to do the best of which you’re capable.” This is not something others can judge or define and does not come from an external performance or perception. This sense of self-accomplishment, win or lose, prevail or fail, can only be reached through hard work, the commitment to which is supported by equal doses of patience and faith.

Watch and read Wooden’s TED talk, “The difference between winning and succeeding,” here.

Having a commitment to this internally-motivated model of success is powerful for determining that the results of one’s effort will be about the integrity with which it was made. Individuals and organizations can inspire a values-based approach to work from this management mechanism. Getting there is the most important part of the process of “being” there. If the emphasis is on winning, competition, profit, attention, and external accolades, then the internal values will be missing to sustain the accomplishment. But, if the emphasis is on growth, hard work, relationships, learning, preparing, and internal satisfaction, then the greatness achieved will last long enough to get the win and keep much more after that.

For a great study of the enduring legacy of John Wooden, check out this Sports Illustrated article by Seth Davis from March 2017.

Also, don’t forget to check back next Wednesday when this series continues on to look at Johan Cruyff, legendary Dutch footballer and manager whose coaching philosophy is credited with revolutionizing the game of football.

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The five branches of ethics as applied to compliance principles

Compliance and ethics are related but separate disciplines. In a professional setting each one relies heavily upon the principles and practices of the other, while still maintaining its own distinct character.

Compliance concerns not necessarily the intuitive or collective ideas about right and wrong, nor the legal bright lines about what is permissible or prohibited, but rather the decision points between all of these. The function of compliance in a practical sense is to adjust or create conditions to choices in order to analyze or bridge the gap between good and bad, yes and no. In compliance, ethics provides the values-based approach, while the legal and regulatory guidance provides the rules-based approach. The work of the compliance professional is to attempt to reconcile the two and in that work create a second set of connections, this time between that which is legally acceptable or not, and that which is deemed ethically appropriate or not.

Very simply put, ethics, on the other hand, refers to the standards of behavior by individuals or organizations and the moral principles governing the conducting of an activity by the same. This is a values-based approach to “right” and “wrong,” or what is good for people and the society in which they live and work. The concept of right and wrong behavior is fundamental to ethics and acts as a systematic discipline in order to guide decisions on how to act.

Ethics draws its foundations from five branches, each one of which is useful to inform a practical and discipline perspective for a corporate compliance program.

  • Normative ethics contemplates the questions which arise in consider how one should act morally, in line with the norms and expectations of society or a community/organization in which the actions are taken. What are the different interests at stake and what are the potential consequences and outcomes of the possible actions to be taken? This view is very helpful in ethical decision-making and designing defense strategies to encourage identifying and choosing good decisions while discouraging and removing incentives or rationales for bad decisions.
  • Meta ethics focuses on what morality actually is and means – in general as well as in context. This involves the careful analysis of the level of understanding about moral considerations as well as an analysis of the situational status and scope of it. This approach is imperative for defining a values-based culture and corresponding corporate identity and business strategy. These values must be organic and intrinsic from the beginning in order for them to truly imbed as genuine. If they are imposed upon the business culture with no respect for what original standards were set for the organization at its inception, then a values-based approach to a culture of compliance will not permeate the company’s actions- customer service, product design, hiring and retaining employees – and a strong tone at the top cannot succeed.
  • Applied ethics goes in-depth into the practicality of really using ethical theory in order to analyze actual moral issues in both private and public life. The practical skills inherent for this discipline are incredibly useful for creating the dialogs that support compliance awareness. Taking a critical look at real-life moral issues that would be encountered in one’s personal time or on an everyday basis at work is a very useful way to get comfortable with approaching ethical dilemmas. Dilemma analysis and discussion is key for encouraging a robust culture of compliance at all organizational levels.
  • Moral ethics is the philosophical area of ethics that centers on defining, choosing, and suggesting behavior with classifications of “right” and “wrong” in mind. This practice is the most directly influential in determining standards and expectations for conduct. Elevating moral conduct by clearly defining it as a corporate cultural norm is imperative for encouraging employees to value it as such as well. Senior leadership should genuinely demonstrate this as well, acting as good conduct role models to embody the cultural values and categorizations for understanding the difference between right and wrong and making good choices within that dichotomy.
  • Finally, descriptive ethics is the study of attitudes of individuals or groups of people aimed at characterizing and understanding their beliefs. The objectives of this branch of ethics are very important for compliance risk management because they help to expose heuristics and routines in play that may encourage or hinder ethical decision-making and the cultivation of strong compliance themes within the corporate values. This is crucial for providing positive support for organizational and employee integrity.

Given the above, there are great affinities between the principles of ethics and those of compliance. The two disciplines share prolifically in their application in life in general and specifically in the workplace. It is very useful for compliance professionals to have some foundation in the discipline of ethics and an understanding of the practical application of its system of principles.

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Selected TED & TEDx talks on ethical dilemmas

An ethical dilemma is a problem in decision-making between two or more possible choices which involve conflicting interests and challenging possible consequences. Often this can be understood as a scenario in which making one decision has an impact on the interests involved in the other decision(s) not made. Choosing to not make a decision is also, in its own right, a choice which implies these consequential dynamics. The below TED/TEDx talks are a sampling of some different dilemmas encountered and the ways that the speakers have thought about and attempted to resolve them.

  • The ethical dilemma of designer babies (Paul Knoepfler) – Biotechnology which was once the stuff of science fiction is now becoming an everyday reality, or at least a possibility that is easy to imagine for the not-so-distant future. For many years now there have been ethical questions about the use of gene editing technology in human embryos. This could allow scientists to mitigate the risk of certain auto-immune or congenital diseases, which would be a marvel of modern medicine. However, it could also make the way for individuals to use the technology to also alter physical appearance and pre-determine many of a person’s traits, perhaps also eventually personality characteristics. What answers does bioethics have for this dilemma? Is it worth the risks, too dangerous to justify the benefits, or somewhere in between – a technology that should be progressively and thoughtfully developed with both those risks and those benefits in careful balance?

 

  • Can we engineer the end of ageing? (Daisy Robinton) – While the prior talk considers the beginning of life, there are also bioethical considerations to scientific advancements made concerning the end of life also. Just as there can be cellular interventions on the biological makeup of embryos, therapeutic mechanisms of stem cell identity may already be useful in increasing longevity and health, such as by reversing the growth of cancerous cells or addressing other developmental diseases. However, what about the possibly to “edit” one’s DNA not for survival or to cure a sickness, but to improve capabilities or change aesthetic qualities? If some physiological differences are editable at the cellular then is it ethical to do so?

 

  • The Social Dilemma of Driverless Cars (Iyad Rahwan) – Self-driving cars have been in the news a lot recently as leading organizations such as Ford, General Motors, Tesla, and even Samsung are making major investments in developing field. In the US, the federal government has indicated that it prefers to let technological innovation take precedence over anticipatory regulation, perhaps taking lessons learned from the initial failure of the electric car industry in the 1990s and early 2000s. The artificial intelligence of self-driving cars is ethically challenging, in consideration that these driverless vehicles will share the road with pedestrians and conventional vehicles. Will they be safer than cars with human drivers, or do they bring up all kinds of new safety and privacy concerns?

 

  • Machiavelli’s Dilemma (Matt Kohut) – More to the point of typical everyday interactions than the abstractions of the limits of medicine and technology, what about character judgments? The classic question remains – do we want to be loved or feared? Liked or respected? Most people of course would say some combination of both, but in first impressions or in difficult leadership situations, sometimes the choice to be one at the expense of the other is unavoidable.

 

  • The paradox of choice (Barry Schwartz) – The thing of all these different dilemmas have in common is, of course, choices that individuals, organizations, and sometimes society as a whole must make. Facing the responsibility of making a choice indicates that there is freedom of choice in the first place. The privilege of decision-making can also be a burden. One must be able to decide in the beginning in order to feel some sense of personal dissatisfaction or insufficiency provoked by the idea that other choices, and other outcomes could have been possible.

 

As the above demonstrates, there are many diverse examples of ethical dilemmas which come from all areas of business and life. This effectively points out how ubiquitous these challenging situations are. From simple, everyday interactions to matters of life and death, ethical dilemmas present challenging, compelling moral questions.

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Using ethical dilemmas for creating a compliance training dialog

For effective compliance training, learners must be prepared to discuss and challenge dilemmas independently and with others. The details of specific policies, directives, and regulations can quickly become very dry and irrelevant, whether the audience is made up of compliance officers, senior managers, or new starters. To prevent topic fatigue and keep important compliance training vivid and engaging for those attending awareness sessions, it is important to encourage discussion. An active participant will think, care, and learn more than one who is just watching the clock for the end of the program.

One way to spark discussion that can be employed at all levels is using ethical dilemmas. This is effective either as a stand-alone program, where attendees are introduced to ethical dilemmas and spend time in groups discussing their ideas and views, or as an icebreaker to a content session, to grab the audience’s attention and test their knowledge from the beginning. This can provide an approach to then thinking about the practical handling of compliance subject which is both easy and enjoyable.

Considering and responding to ethical dilemmas helps learners to build fluency with ethical decision-making and evaluating potential conflicts of interest, especially in balance with their own possible interests. Giving meaning to the impact of behavior and choice is significant for establishing cultural values that emphasize individual responsibility and integrity. Dilemma analysis involves several simple but thought-provoking steps following the prompt:

  • What is the ethical question?
  • What personal values are relevant in considering this ethical question?
  • Who are the parties with interests in this dilemma?
  • What are their interests and how do they conflict?
  • How can the ethical question be answered and what are the potential consequences?
  • What is the decision in response to the ethical question?
  • Is the choice that came from the decision-making process of the dilemma possible/practical to do in light of all considerations and consequences?

Ethical dilemmas used as such for prompts in compliance training should be universal and straightforward. In general, dilemmas used to teach this style of thinking to beginners or to instigate audience participation in at the start of a session should not focus on specific employee responsibilities or business functions. For very advanced and targeted audiences it may be acceptable to give a anonymized example of a dilemma they may come across in their work, but for the most part, daily life dilemmas are more relatable and more fun to discuss, regardless of the experience level of the participants.

Some examples of simple dilemmas that can be analyzed as described are:

  • You are meeting some friends at a standing room-only concert and arrive late. As you approach the venue you walk past your friends, who are got there early and are waiting near the front of the line. They tell you they have been there for almost two hours and invite you to join them where they are in the line, even though the end of the line is very far behind them.
  • Your company has been considering some wellness initiatives to offer to employees as benefits but hasn’t contacted any providers yet. Your roommate just finished yoga teacher training and wants to get experience as a corporate instructor.
  • You are taking an exam after studying hard for days to prepare and attending every class the entire term. However, you woke up this morning with a terrible cold and can’t focus. You know the professor will not allow a rescheduled or make-up test. There is no proctor in the room and you have all of your course material with you.
  • You and your partner have a joint bank account where you are both named. Your partner is one week into a two week trip abroad when a letter comes from the bank. You have to fill out and return a form with both your and your partner’s signatures. If you don’t return the form within two business days you will not be able to use your credit card.
  • You are taking your relative to an urgent doctor’s appointment. The parking lot is quite busy but all three of the parking spots designated for disabled drivers are empty. Your relative has no problem walking, but you are already five minutes late for the appointment.

Choosing simple prompts like the ones suggested above will allow the learners to be more creative and perhaps to even engage in discussion with themselves. The facts may be straightforward, but the huge array of perspectives and outcomes that people can suggest is always impressive. By keeping the dilemma prompt at a level everyone can understand regardless of his or her own background and initial interest, the dialog can be truly inclusive. This allows the person who is running the training session to fall into the role of a true facilitator, which offers the enriching experience of watching individuals converse organically on these provocative questions.

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Corporate compliance and “the arc of the moral universe”

It is one of the most frequently-used and beloved quotes for champions of progressive values: “The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice.” This famous line from Dr. Martin Luther King espouses a certain determinism, from nature or faith, that morality favors fairness and the truth in the end, even if it takes a long time and a lot of effort to get there.

Perhaps further motivation behind these words can be sussed out by understanding the original lines by which Dr. King’s statement was inspired. The older quote comes from Theodore Parker, a 19th century minister and abolitionist. He stated, in full: “I do not pretend to understand the moral universe; the arc is a long one, my eye reaches but little ways; I cannot calculate the curve and complete the figure by the experience of sight; I can divine it by conscience. And from what I see I am sure it bends toward justice.”

Parker was also a Transcendentalist scholar who wrote prolifically on the subject of justice and the conscience, and the sanctity of the rights of all people in the service of those virtues. In Parker’s view, then, justice can be elusive or disappointing, but it is unequivocally a moral force, and progress toward it, however slow and halting, is a high state of being for people and governments. In light of Parker’s remark, Dr. King’s words indicate that individuals alone cannot be definitively satisfied that society will become universally just, but this should not dissuade them from their commitments to their ideals or their personal responsibilities to uphold them, in both private and public.

However reachable this sentiment may seem to be (or not be) over history and in practice, this idea can still provide inspiration to those wishing to positively impact the journey toward a just society. Individuals, for example, may take this concept as a reinforcement of personal conviction, the kind which is passed down over generations in pursuit of an ideal. Organizations such as political action committees, community groups, or charitable organizations may see as a direct call to diligent and persistent public activism with the goal of societal change, often enforced by legal action.

But what about corporations? The concept of the corporation as a legal “person” is always controversial in contemporary society because it conveys rights and protections on companies that many feel should be limited to natural persons only. However, with this designation comes responsibilities and obligations also, and not just ones that may be important in a courtroom. Corporations can do their own part to positively impact progressive toward justice by adopting business values that elevate morality and encourage organizational and employee commitments to integrity and fairness.

  • Social responsibility sells: As companies compete in the ever-crowded global marketplace, price and product are far from the only deciding factors between success and failure with consumers. Companies are now putting their social responsibility interests at the forefront. This shows up in their business values that they communicate to their employees as well as their advertising, corporate branding, and strategy that they bring to the market and identify themselves with to their customers. Consumers want strong personal associations with companies when they have many choices for retailers or service providers. Embracing social responsibility and commitment to progress, inside and outside of organizations, gives corporations a competitive edge and a striking identity that helps them to stand out and be remembered.
  • Representation is key: It is well known that the workplace has much improvement to do before it starts to even appear as diverse as society is outside of the office. Representation at all employee levels, from starters to executive boards, is important in the efforts toward inclusion. In order to aspire for equality and diversity, people of all backgrounds need to first be present and practically included. Then the real effort for change can happen, where this truly representative group can start to work together toward the integrated, equitable type of collaboration and open access that is still lacking from many broader communities and discussions in the world in general.
  • …but tokenism is toxic: In order to support this ambition, however, obstacles must truly be removed, and merit and performance have to be the standards by which people are promoted and co-working is established. Representation in name only, or to fulfil an appearance, is empty and non-progressive. Companies must commit against token inclusion and truly seek to integrate and cooperate authentically. Only then can responsible corporate citizens inspire in the world the changes they see in themselves.
  • Transparency fosters a more equitable working environment: As the saying goes, sunlight is the best disinfectant. Open processes at a corporation will lean more easily toward equitable outcomes for employees and consumers. Unethical management decisions are easier to take and justify if they are concealed and never need to be explained. Having to reconcile the interests and feedback of others, however, helps toward mitigating unfairness. There will always be some amount of bold intolerance or exclusion, just as there will always be a few bad apples. However, it’s much more productive to focus on the decision-making that can be nudged toward a positive viewpoint and those people who will do good things when they are appropriately informed and supported to do so.
  • Integrity promotes sustainability: Sustainability – not the type that encourages re-using recycled coffee cups or only printing documents if it’s really necessary, but the type that focuses on longevity and sensibility of business practices and relationships – is, like social responsibility, a key competitive advantage. Integrity as a main business strategy shows that organizations value their relationships and want to make the right decisions not just for their profit, but for their partners and the future. In this sense, a strong moral code for business values represents both an investment in the aims of justice as well as a preparation for success.

For further contemplation on the concept of the moral universe and its predisposition to justice, and the nature of humans within this, amidst the challenges of the secular world and the frustrations of the individual, Theodore Parker’s “Of Justice and The Conscience” from his Ten Sermons of Religion is a powerful and interesting text.

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Round-up on higher education compliance

Many of the challenges of modern society in general are writ large in the world of higher education. The obstacles to ethical decision-making that are prevalent for individuals and organizations in business are also present in the educational environment. Campus culture often represents a microcosm of culture at large, with many complex social dynamics playing out in close quarters. Students as well as educators and administrators are confronted by complicated moral dilemmas as generational divides and differing expectations for justice, integrity, and duty of care coexist.

  • In taking the administrative decision to close a popular but controversial student dormitory, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology stepped into the thorny issue of informed consent. In order to support their choice to deaccession “Senior House” as a student housing, MIT used data from student surveys that were supposed to be anonymous (but were actually tagged with geolocation information) to collect evidence that the dormitory was the source of high drug usage, low graduation rates, and other behavior deemed unsafe or unacceptable by the Chancellor’s Office. This methodology of gathering data from students and their organizations without explicit expression of the purpose and its intended usage, and the questionable decision-making that stems from it, bring into question the ethics of universities’ relations with the students for whom they are supposedly providing a supportive and inclusive community. The closure of Senior House by MIT is seen as part of a trend of university administrations to exact more control over students’ lives, including conduct they may expect to be unrelated to their educational relationship with their school, such as things that happen off-campus, when school is out of session, or even online:  A Weird MIT Dorm Dies, and a Crisis Blooms at Colleges
  • Given the insular culture that many university academic departments are known for cultivating – focused on competition and comparison and often resulting in isolation and highly politicized decision-making – hostile working environments can quickly emerge on interpersonal levels. Unlike most at-will employees in the job market at large, however, many experienced professors have security of tenure and therefore their interactions with colleagues are not always checked by their fear of reprisal that could lead to losing their jobs. In some situations this can create workplaces that value and promote individuals for their academic prowess but turn a blind eye to claims of troubling personal behavior with colleagues or even students. Universities are often accused of failing to adequately investigate these allegations or not even providing a sufficient framework for safe and effective reporting. Hierarchical departments allow powerful, tenured professors to exploit their positions, with addressing toxic behavior taking a backseat to protecting those reporting harassment:  She Was a Rising Star at a Major University. Then a Lecherous Professor Made Her Life Hell.
  • “Call-out culture” – in which people, often in groups, point out statements or actions of others that they see as problematic or abusive and take down the person in question – has been fed by the public’s appetite for controversy and the prevalence of the internet and social media, where otherwise innocuous events between friends can be broadcast all over the world for commentary, criticism, and ridicule. While understandably some of the intent of call-out culture is to suggest and reinforce more positive, informed standards for interactions in a more inclusive society, this often goes too far. Far from just being restricted to taking down those who act with the intent to cause offense, or educating those who are unaware of the real implications of things they do and say involuntarily or too casually, this culture has fostered an environment where innocent behavior is subject to ridicule and derision. In the university setting, this fear of group criticism is very destructive to creation of community. Being unable to have dialog in the classrooms and student centers of universities has a major chilling effect on sharing of views and open learning:  The Destructiveness of Call-Out Culture on Campus
  • The call-out culture trend described above between students also exists on campuses between professors and other academics. Instead of playing out on social media, this dynamic takes place from editorial boards and academics who read papers in journals, or even just commentaries on papers in journals, and then pile on to criticize the author’s intent. Leaving aside the merit of any arguments made among these groups, the dynamic is the same, of stifling dialog and using groupthink to determine which expression is acceptable or even legitimate. Often this criticism is not very informed and even extends to having the outright intent of policing which and whose ideas are considered worthy of engaging with and debating about:  Academe’s Poisonous Call-Out Culture 
  • Another impact of social media and the internet on the classroom has been the rise of the “teacher influencer” – educators who are given free educational software or equipment, and even sometimes paid in addition, to use for their students in exchange for making posts online or giving talks about the products. These teachers can argue convincingly that their students benefit from access to these products, and that their business arrangements are taken on with the sole objective of benefiting their students in a time when school supplies and improvements are vastly underprovided and underfunded.   However, the standards for disclosure of these arrangements and the handling of the potential conflicts of interest that can arise even from the most innocent, helpful intentions are uncharted ethical territory:  Silicon Valley Courts Brand-Name Teachers, Raising Ethics Issues

In many ways the academic setting, for secondary education as well as at the university level, can be seen as an incubator for these social disruptions that occur in every area of contemporary life. Educational institutions are struggling with cultural changes that redefine the responsibilities in and limits of authority. Issues of consent, safety, cultural values, and conflicts of interest all prompt compelling compliance dilemmas in the higher education domain.

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Round-up on ethics of design in technology

One of the most interesting and challenging inquiries in the evolving ethical code of technology has to do with design choices. Ethical decision-making and process design has direct impact on the fluid, complex process of creating the devices, interfaces, and systems that are brought to market and used by consumers on a constant basis. In such a disruptive and innovative industry, there are moral costs for every design decision: every new creation replaces or changes an existing one, and for everyone who has new access or benefits, others experience the costs of these decisions. Therefore the ethics of design as applied to technology and, of particular interest, social media, have concrete importance for everyone living in a world increasingly dominated by user experiences, communities’ terms of service, and smart devices.

  • Former Google product manager Tristan Harris has gone viral with his commentary on the ethics of design in smart phones and platforms creating apps for them. There is a balance in online design where the internet platforms go from being useful or intuitive to encouraging interruption and even obsession. Many people worry about the effect “screen time” may have on their attention span, quality of sleep, and offline interactions with people. Design techniques may actually keep people attached to their devices in a constant loop of advertisements, notifications, and links, as content providers and platforms compete to grab viewers’ attention. Alerting people to the control their devices have over their attention and time is one step, but urging more ethical choices in the design process is the next frontier for innovation reform:  Our Minds Have Been Hijacked By Our Phones.  Tristan Harris Wants To Rescue Them. 
  • The above phenomenon of addictive design has become so imbedded in the creation of app features that even the most subtle changes can have a huge impact on the consumption practices of users. But when do features go from entertaining and user-friendly to compulsive, even addictive? Refreshing an app can be like pulling the lever on a slot machine, giving the brain rewards in the form of new content to keep the loop going at the expense of other activities and priorities. These design improvements, then, may actually affect users more as manipulations:  Designers are using “dark UX” to turn you into a sleep-deprived internet addict
  • These small, ongoing redesigns are intended to make apps more readable and consumable. These periodic improvements are intended to make content more captivating and enable longer browsing – again prompting the question, what is the ethical code for the control designers wield over users with these choices? From a design ethics perspective, these small changes can be viewed as more alarming than major ones, as they are so incremental that many users do not consciously notice them and therefore “optimization” tips into “over-optimization,” meaningful interaction becoming possibly destructive:  Facebook and Instagram get redesigns for readability
  • Artificial intelligence always captures the public’s imagination – thrills and fears about the possible developing capabilities of robots and predictive algorithms that could direct and define – and perhaps threaten – human existence in the future. AI has been developing in recent years at a breakneck pace, and all indications are that this innovation will continue or multiply in the coming period. The science fiction-esque impact of AI on society will grow and bring with it all kinds of ethical concerns about the abilities of humans to define and control it in a timely and effective way:  Ethics — the next frontier for artificial intelligence
  • Social media platforms have developed into social systems, with all the dilemmas and dynamics that come along with that. These networks may face the choice between engagement and all of the thorny dialogs that come with it, and a simpler, more remote model that can be enjoyable but is less interactive and therefore, perhaps, less provocative:  ‘Link in Bio’ Keeps Instagram Nice

Queries into design ethics and choice theory in technology, especially social media, ask the questions of what human experience will evolve into in a world which is increasingly digitized and networked. The design decisions made in the creation of these devices and systems require an ethical code and a sense of social responsibility in order to define the boundaries of what are the best collective choices.

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Key compliance culture values for promoting employee integrity

Employee integrity is the cornerstone value for establishing organizational integrity, and therefore for the success of any compliance program. As fundamental as employee integrity is, it is also complex, elusive, and affected by a huge array of factors and influences. Perceptions and biases can defeat individual intentions for ethical behavior. External forces on the decision-making process and the impact of management in a complicated organizational structure and business world can defeat incentives for integrity and honesty.

What can a compliance program do to address the need for employee integrity in a world which presents so many obstacles and hindrances to developing and maintaining this trait? Compliance professionals should be the organizational standard bearers for encouraging good people to do good things and limiting access of the occasional bad people to do bad things. This message can be very simple and should focus on reinforcing positive perceptions of corporate values and leadership expectations so that employees aspire to model their own character within this.

  • Openness: Transparency and honest, active communication are crucial to the success of a compliance program. Employees must see that openness of communication and transparent reporting and sharing are highly valued. Open communication is directly linked to reduction of reputational risk and perceptions of greater honesty. Establishing a culture where employees feel it is encouraged or expected to speak up and speak out requires management to be meaningfully open, accessible, and relatable. In an environment where employees feel that all behavior and performance can be discussed openly, they will also be aware that it will all be noticed, and therefore will feel positive pressure to meet best expectations for integrity.
  • Clarity: Clarity of expectations and perceptions is essential for a culture of integrity. As with all objectives for compliance culture at an organization, norms and values must be clear and consistent across all employee populations. Communicating different or confusing messages, or giving information that impacts everyone to only some and leaving others out to hear it indirectly, is disastrous for imbedding ethical traits in an organization. Clarity promotes understanding and discussion, both of which are necessary for employees to take up the cultural objectives of the organization as their own.
  • Leadership: Tone at the top is just the first step. Leadership should be encouraged as a professional competency at all levels in the organizations, so that advocacy for the compliance culture can take root everywhere. Employees need to see leaders speaking up about the importance of integrity, but they individually also need to feel they are in the position to speak up themselves, and will be looked upon as vested with responsibility for their own integrity and choices in everyday ethical dilemmas.
  • Trust: Trust is the most simple factor for encouraging integrity in organizations, and indeed in all interactions and relationships, and it is also one of the most difficult and fraught qualities to meaningfully establish and maintain. Trust is constantly threatened and questioned. It cannot be given automatically and still have meaning, but it must be given confidently and with expectation that it will be received in return. Investments in mutual trust cannot be forced or demanded. The pain of having colleagues or managers who are not trustworthy can cause deep damage in teams and organizations and impede individual development. The only solution to this is to see trust as a reward and an ongoing evaluation, and to embrace frank and open dialogs which can help to resolve prior mistrust and discourage future violations.
  • Engagement: Engagement discussions usually focus on employees, but the quest for achieving it starts with management. Employees should see that management follows up, takes integrity seriously by individually espousing all the values, responds visibly to problems and complaints, and confronts issues boldly and confidently. Management engagement in the compliance culture should embrace professional skepticism and pursue public accountability. When employees see this, then they are empowered in turn to engage with their direct managers, peers, and direct reports to have discussions about integrity matters and to demonstrate all the traits that support ethical decision-making.

Modelling the key values of a compliance culture to create strong organizational drivers for integrity should be the focus of the conduct objectives of every compliance program. The fundamental message should be that performance and behavior linked to demonstrating integrity will be encouraged and appreciated.

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