adminBradwell Mhonderwa Business Ethics
The beginning of the year is a period companies use to revisit their business strategies with a view to ensuring that they remain in line with set company goals and objectives.
While successful companies are traditionally identified by sound strategies, robust systems, technical competence and competent staff, trends in today’s highly competitive global marketplace show that ethical leadership has become one of the key business success factors.
Ethical leadership has grown to become a key item on the agenda of board meetings, and through the ethical leadership quotient (EQL), companies can now even measure the contribution of ethical leadership to business success.
Indeed business strategies of today must be juxtaposed with corporate ethics.
This means the company strategy and mission statement should not only discuss profit and growth, but should, with the same vigour, articulate ethical issues in the organisation.
With embedded ethics, the corporate strategy becomes a tool with which the entire organisation can be re-energised, including fostering a renewed employee loyalty and commitment towards company goals and objectives.
Ethical leadership is built on a number of attributes which include servant leadership, self-awareness, honesty, integrity, respect for employees and stakeholders, and taking care of the community and the natural environment.
These attributes are discussed below.
Servant leadership
Servant leadership entails company leaders being responsive, caring and humble, and putting the people first ahead of their personal interests.
It means being fair, showing compassion and being sensitive to stakeholder interests.
Servant leaders empower their subordinates and are facilitators.
They care about the workers and want them to be successful.
Servant leadership means listening intently and receptively to what employees say and acting upon it.
Self-awareness
A leader with self-awareness possesses the power of persuasion, influencing others by way of convincing them and not through coercion.
Leaders with self-awareness see themselves as stewards or as individuals whose main job is to serve others not personal interests.
Honesty and integrity
Honesty and integrity are key values that must inform the character of every leader.
Engaging in conflict of interest, insider trading and corruption destroys the integrity of the leader including becoming a person who cannot be trust.
Leaders mustn’t give themselves excessive compensation particularly in situations of constrained company productivity because such behaviour will only help to alienate the leader from staff resulting in a poor industrial relations climate and low productivity.
Respect for employees
Ethical leaders have respect for employees whom they view as partners.
Ethical leaders understand that workers want to be respected and that they want to experience real purpose and meaning in their workplace.
Ethical leaders are supportive and are aware of the fact that employees desire to grow and learn, to be connected to the purpose of the organisation, and to be a whole integrated unit that cannot simply be sacrificed for business expediency.
Empowered employees are motivated employees and leaders must understand this.
Respect for customers
Ethical leaders take care of customer needs.
Caring about customers includes listening to them and hearing what they have to say. Listening to customer complaints is a good way of coming up with ideas for improving product quality.
When a leader makes a mistake he/she should not be afraid to apologise and show remorse. Apparently the strength of an apology is in acknowledging the mistake, communicating in a humble and sincere manner and explaining why the mistake was committed.
Respect for community and natural environment
Ethical leadership entails establishing and maintaining strong ties with the local community in which you do business, and understanding the need to protect the natural environment.
Improving the health delivery system, building schools, roads and other community infrastructure is a practical way of ensuring you maintain a close-knit relationship with the community.
Industrial waste should not be allowed to damage the natural environment and leaders should assist communities to conserve the flora and fauna
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