adminhowever, implement management practices which make life difficult for those who want to misuse company assets for their own gain.
Zimbabwe’s economy is awash with cases of high-profile corporate fraud and corruption, and endless violations of acceptable workplace behaviour by staff in different organisations.
The need for ethical leadership in the economy has never been as strong as it is today. There can be no doubt about the significance of ethical decision-making in the country today as we trudge through the transformational era of our battered economy.
Globally, the business sector has become increasingly more and more competitive, and ethical decision-making leveraged on deliberate corporate ethics programmes has become the newest and most inspiring cutting edge for competitive advantage.
The dictum “right tone at the top” places the responsibility of shaping ethical decision-making processes in organisations right at the doorstep of all leaders in different sectors of the economy.
This is because those at the top naturally consummate the critical decision-making processes that shape the destiny of their organisations, firms and the nation at large.
Unfortunately, leaders sometimes can be blinded by their own feelings of self-importance and more dangerously can believe that the leader’s job requires them to shoulder the burden of decisions which cause anguish and suffering, or worse, for their followers.
Believing that leadership carries some sort of right to take risks with other people’s well-being is nothing more than arrogant apparition.
A strong feature of good leadership is knowing and having the strength to be ethical.
Unethical leaders tend to share the delusion that no one can see what they are up to.
Years ago maybe they could hide, but now there is absolutely nowhere to hide, and like fish in a basin, they are prone to constant stakeholder scrutiny, which unmasks all their intents.
Surely, what is so great about building and leaving behind a huge empire if that is done at the cost of other people’s well-being?
Ethical decision-making in an organisation is about knowing what is right and wrong, good and bad, and choosing to do what is right and good in relation to products, services, clients, customers and all stakeholders.
Based on the levels of unethical conduct describing the moral standing of some of the leaders in the country today, one would suspect that these leaders in business, politics and civil society don’t have a firm grasp on the difference between right and wrong.
But the truth is that they know exactly how they should conduct themselves, and when they act unethically it is with deliberate intent.
The legal system believes sane people have an innate ability to determine right from wrong, and it includes the ability to tell right from wrong in its definition of sanity.
It therefore follows that legally when someone questions your ethics, he/she is literally questioning your sanity. Ethics places not only our actions and behaviour under the microscope, but it also scrutinises our integrity and worth as leaders.
Nothing can destroy a leader’s career faster than the exposure of unethical behaviour.
Leaders should always commit themselves to a 360-degree ethical mannerism.
They should eat, drink and sleep ethics.
A simple test for ethical decision-making follows the three basic factors below.
Transparency
Am I happy to have my decision published in the daily paper as a news headline? If your intents are unethical, the image of that glaring headline, and the obvious consequences of such visibility, should be enough to force you to reconsider your actions.
Effect
Have I fully considered the harmful effects of my decision to those who are affected by the decision and how to avoid them?
Fairness
Would everyone affected by the decision consider my decision as fair?
If you can honestly answer “yes” to each of these questions then you are making an ethical decision.
If you have any doubt about your answer to any of the questions think about things more carefully.
If you cannot decide how to answer these questions, seek input from someone who is of an impartial standing, and who owes you nothing.
Do not seek advice on difficult decisions from people who owe you some kind of allegiance.
This acid test speaks to the heart of the ethical behaviour, and it acknowledges that an action is deemed to be ethical or not according to public opinion.
Ethical decision-making ensures that you do not attract needless bickering and stakeholder cynicism around your decisions particularly if they concern issues of fundamental importance.
Surely, it is human nature to be good, and the human species would not have survived were this not the case.
The greedy and deluded among us have all along been able to persist with their unethical and irresponsible behaviour abusing the authority vested on them by their organisations.
This is because there has not been much to stop them from doing so. But not any longer; the globalised world economy is certainly changing all this.
The clearly unstoppable and fervent rate at which workplace ethics programmes are being taken up by corporations and organisations of all sizes globally, and the passionate approach with which governments are promulgating laws to manage ethics in their economies, illustrates that soon there will be no choice on whether to implement ethics programmes or not for all of us.
All organisations and firms wherever they are under the sun will have to comply with proper ethical and socially responsible standards which will have a global enforcement. This phenomenal change is surely going to catch up with even the most pessimistic in each organisation, small or large.
So be warned; it makes sense to change before you are forced to change.
Yes, it’s time unethical leaders in our midst should shape up or ship out. Welcome to the age of transparency and accountability.
- Bradwell Mhonderwa is the Managing Consultant of Business Ethics Centre, a corporate governance and business ethics management firm. Phone 04-293 2948, 0712 420 090, 0772 913 875, or email [email protected]
Online Reporter