Question

As business leaders get promoted, evidence suggests that there are more opportunities for ethical transgressions. Companies can do several things to help prevent ethical lapses. (1) Promote an ethical culture. (2) Use 360-degre e evaluations. (3) Apply coaching. (4) Discuss the importance of ethical leadership. 1. What kinds of approaches might you use to help leaders be more ethical? How could performance management processes be used to facilitate this aim? 2. Besides some of the ideas already discussed, what do you think companies can do to reduce the likelihood of leaders acting unethically?

Answer 1

1. In order to help the leaders become more ethical, I would firstly ensure that the consequences of being unethical in the organization are understood and accepted by all employees. There should be a whistleblower policy so that any unethical behavior can be brought to the immediate notice of the higher authority.

Performance management processes can be used to facilitate this aim through performance appraisal. The performance appraisal process should have a criteria i.e. ethical behavior. It would be an essential component of the appraisal process and any unethical behavior would have serious consequences. This will force the employees to be ethical at their work.

2. To reduce the likelihood of leaders acting unethically, it is important that they understand the fact that the unethical behavior would be profitable for a short time period only. In the long run, the leader would not be able to escape or protect himself/herself from the consequences of the action. The long term impact would be more powerful and devastating than the sjort term gain. Thus, the likelihood of leaders acting unethically may reduce to a large extent.