Business Ethics to Create a Responsible Workplace

How to tackle everyday business decisions to protect your organization’s reputation

Continuing Education Credits: CEU: 0.6 CPE: 6 

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Overview

In one information-packed day, you’ll learn how to:

  • Encourage open and honest workplace discussions about ethics
  • Set an example with follow-the-leader behaviors that all managers and supervisors should be following
  • Include ethics as part of your company’s performance appraisal system
  • Develop, implement and enforce a written ethics policy
  • Understand how ethics should impact your organization’s customer service - both internally and externally
  • Recognize that ethics go far beyond what’s legally required
  • Ensure your mission statement includes references to your organization’s commitment to better business ethics
  • Structure interview questions to uncover unethical tendencies in applicants
  • React rationally to a person whose personal beliefs conflict with your organization’s ethics policies
  • And much, much more!

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Solid Business Ethics Equals a Spotless Reputation

Your organization’s reputation is based on the work you produce and the public face you present, in other words — your credibility. Don’t damage your company’s image by practicing poor ethics! If you establish an ethical foundation for your business, you’ll reap the rewards of improved teamwork, positive employee morale, lower levels of stress and a stronger public image.

Not exactly sure where to start when it comes to business ethics? It’s defined as the branch of ethics that examines rules and principles within a commercial context. In short, there are many moral problems that can come up in a business setting, and you need to ensure your employees are DOING THE RIGHT THING.

14 Issues of Business Ethics

  1. Accounting and financial standards (a.k.a. creative accounting)
  2. Advertising deception
  3. Black market sales
  4. Bribery and kickbacks
  5. Business intelligence and industrial espionage
  6. Political contributions
  7. Competition vs. cooperation
  8. Corporate governance
  9. Corporate crime
  10. Discrimination
  11. Employee rights
  12. Environmental issues
  13. Marketing, sales, and negotiation techniques
  14. Product issues

Agenda

History

  • Ethics vs. legal - which principles have been translated into law and which ones haven’t but should still be recognized
  • Corporate governance
  • Examples of ethical breakdowns - how they’ve caused the creation of regulations

Overview

  • Practical guidelines for ethical conduct in the workplace and how to ensure they’re being followed
  • A responsible business checklist that your entire organization should be utilizing

Corporate Ethics Areas

  • Finance
  • Human resources
  • Sales and marketing
  • Property
  • Intellectual property

Ethics in Practice

  • The importance of alignment
  • How to put the right people in the right places - some employees make better role models for your organization than others
  • Ways to encourage employees to follow standards, such as incentives during performance reviews
  • How to deal with mistakes and ensure they don’t happen again
  • Effective policies and procedures that will boost productivity and give you peace of mind

International Issues

  • A comparison of business traditions in other countries, and how their ethics might differ from yours
  • Varying global standards - and which ones you need to make sure your organization adheres to
  • The FCPA (Foreign Corrupt Practices Act)

Responsible Business Conduct Through Ethical Relationships

  • Shareholders and owners
  • Government officials
  • Private sector
  • Voluntary action

Code of Ethics Implementation

  • The decision-making model
  • How to build a business ethics infrastructure
  • An outline of a code of conduct, and how you should adapt it to your organization
  • Code of ethics development — from brainstorming and writing to implementation and maintenance, we’ll walk you through the entire creation process!