Topic 4 Code of Ethics – Step by Step Implementation
Source: Compliance and ethics
Ensure that you have gathered the required preconditions to successfully elaborate a Code of Ethics.
Conception of the human being’s dignity. Managers and shareholders in order to construct this code should be aware of this conception, more or less explicit, as well as how it fits in a company.
The example should be set at the top. It is essential for leaders to have or to aspire having a consistent performance according to the business principles that will be approved. The example set at the top, or lack of it, will be the confirmation subordinates need to understand if chosen principles are to be implemented and followed or not.
A small committee should be created to begin the first sketches, make sure to determine the appropriate mechanisms of participation and consultation to reach the aforementioned target, oversee its introduction in real life and in the future accompany it’s practical application and the definition of criteria.
Create an internal questionnaire submitted to all the company’s employees to find out which great principles they feel are in tune with what the company stands for and which ideas do they personally stand by.
Gather every result and aim to identify, in preliminary document, the principles and practices that match your code. Beware that the Ethics Code can’t be tangled or even brought down to the level of the current business culture (which can be unhealthy and unwise), it should consist instead of normative principles, that do not express how the majority acts, this is as you can imagine Sociology.
Provide this document to be analyzed by every one of your company’s official, so the final document can be produced.
When the final document is approved, arrange an internal meeting to present it and if possible deliver a copy to each employee after it being individually signed, in order to solidify your commitment.
Publish the code on the company’s website, make sure it is in a visible and accessible place so every person that visits it can access it, not just the employees but the multiple organizations that interact regularly with your company.
Schedule periodic meetings with the board of direction and/or the employees, in order to discuss the ethical issues and assist in raising awareness, commitment and criteria creation, you can whenever it is possible to use real and personal real life situations. Promote programs (internally or otherwise) that aim to educate about Ethics in general or Business Ethics.
Reward those that abide by the code, such reward should be handled publicly and fairly. Ethics is a practical science that, principles aside, demands its continuous application in order for it to ingrain itself and evolve: one does not study to know, one studies to act.