This blog is about the relationship between organizations and the people who work for them. And, it’s dedicated to the millions of people around the world who go to work every day wanting to do a great job.
Ethics
Sucky values suck!
It was impossible to disagree with Robert Fritz when he said, at a training I participated in last week, that:
“Organizations are amoral in and of themselves.
It’s human beings in organizations that have values.
It’s leaders that must impose values.”
So, when I read the most recent Maritz poll results (2010, USA), I had to conclude that leaders may be imposing values, but they aren’t the ones that are being communicated by Corporate communications and HR professionals.
The survey found that “despite a slight improvement in business conditions, the American workforce remains less engaged with their employers than they did one year ago. Poor communications, lack of perceived caring, inconsistent behavior, and perceptions of favoritism were cited by respondents as the largest contributors to their lack of trust in senior leaders.” Specifically:
- Only 7% believe senior management’s actions are completely consistent with their words.
- 14 % of employees believe their company’s leaders are ethical and honest.
- Only 12 % believe their employer genuinely listens to and cares about employees.
- Only 10 % of employees trust management to make the right decision in times of uncertainty.
- About 25 % of employees distrust management more than they did the year before.
What is especially disheartening is that these same leaders are reading this report and year over year seeing the same results disappointing results. What are they making of it? Do they see employee involvement in their businesses as a must have or as a nice to have? What’s keeping them up at night if it’s not this?
Sucky values suck!
Thanks to Hacking Work and Communication at work for bringing this poll to my attention.
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After 168 years, what changed?
As anyone who is on the ‘grid’ knows by now, News of the World, once the most widely read newspaper in the world will be no more after Sunday’s last edition. Why? What changed after 168 years in business?
One reporter suggested: “In the ongoing battle to maintain circulation and stay relevant to readers in the electronic age, News of the World editors and reporters had conspired to adopt news-gathering practices that plainly violated ethical codes of conduct.” I think a little background reading and it’s pretty clear that they’ve been violating ethical codes of conduct for quite some time. Long before electronic age competition. Let’s face it, the combination “of grisly crime and adulterous sex” sold papers.
I think the seeds of today’s story were sown long ago. Back at the very beginning, in 1843, when News of the World’s first edition announced … ”Our practice is the fearless advocacy of truth. [We] will seek for the patronage of no party …will conceal neither the merits nor the faults of any party, but… will aim alone at doing good service to old England by maintaining her glory and security, the prosperity of all classes of the people.”
This is a strong and clear ‘mission statement’. In fact, after a quick read you might want to leap into action for “good ol’ England” [even if you are Canadian]. Too bad, because upon closer inspection, their founding motto left the door open to everything that has followed. Truth at all cost is the message. Over the century and a half they’ve been in business, employees were empowered by these words. A culture that “advocated for truth” was left to run rampant even if it meant breaking the law.
In 2006, one reporter was sent to prison for hacking the royal families phone lines. Nothing changed except that News of the World now began paying millions of dollars on a series of high profile libel settlements.
In January 2011, one former editor was forced to resign as the spokesperson for the British Prime Minister. And, since then, 3 other colleagues and another freelancer have been arrested and released on bail. Allegations of corruption and phone hacking continued to mount. Police investigations were ongoing. Still nothing changed at News of the World as far as we can tell.
But, on Monday of this week a “British freelance magazine editor began calling for advertisers to ‘reconsider’ their financial support of News of the World” on Twitter after the most recent and most appalling accusations relating to a kidnapping and death surfaced. And they did. That’s what changed.
And, today, just 5 days after his first tweet, 200 employees have been told they will lose their jobs as of Sunday. The former editor is being held for questioning. The Prime Minister promised public inquiries.
Twitter, that’s what changed!
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On being authentic
The first time I ever heard the term authentic used in an organizational setting was only a few years ago and it might have been the last time it made any sense.
I was doing a small project for Nike’s Marketing team at their head office in Portland, Oregon. They often referred to authentic Nike. At first I thought it was some meaningless corporate jargon [there’s generally a lot of that going around at HQs wherever they are]. It took me a while, but I finally realized that for them a product was authentic Nike only if it had been designed with a world class athlete to improve their personal performance. Now, that’s authentic.
Three years ago, The Authentic Enterprise concluded that “…authenticity will be the coin of the realm for successful corporations and for those who lead them.” And, that “Communicators are uniquely positioned to become experts on the new art and science of organizational trust.” Now, I need to say up front that I generally find this whitepaper interesting and compelling. And not surprisingly I’m pretty keen about their conclusions for communicators.
The problem I have is that this paper and the discussion that has followed is based on two flawed assumptions:
- Institutions can be other than authentic
- Being authentic is always going to be good.
I don’t believe either of these assumptions are true.
First, how could an institution be anything other than authentic. They are what they are. They do what they do. Their behaviours and actions, the decisions they take or don’t take reflect their underlying beliefs and values. And, whether you like them or not they are a totally authentic.
Second, authenticity has lost its meaning. For Nike it was real and good. The challenge for many institutions today is that what is authentic is not that good. What’s real is not good. Think of British Petroleum or the Vatican. Their behaviours and actions tells us much about their authentic institution and it’s not good.
Importantly, though authentic and transparent are often talked about in the same breath, you don’t have to be transparent for anyone to get who you really are and what you stand for. Here’s an example:
A young friend of mine, a recent MBA grad, got a job offer from a fortune 100 global high-tech company early this summer. He was told that his candidacy had to go through the CEO. He stopped his job search – he’d received and accepted a formal offer [reflects his values]. It’s been weeks and still no word. This one act tells us a lot about this organization. And, perhaps more than my young friend would like to know. First, even though one of their 5 values is respect they have put a young debt-ridden new grad in this position. Second I believe my friend can be confident that control will be one of the most important underlying values – not innovation or accountability. Two other values that are listed on their site.
On being authentic. That’s easy. Now how to make institutions authentic and forces for good?
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From the inside looking out
Earlier in my career I worked for one of the most admired brands in Canada. It’s the kind of thing that makes you proud. You walk into any situation and people are all over you about how great it must be. Except it wasn’t. The buzz and hype had created an external brand that didn’t match the internal reality.
What brings this to mind is that two more of the world’s most powerful and valued brands have taken big hits to their reputations in the past few weeks. And both of them for misleading customers.
DELL is accused of hiding significant and potentially dangerous technical issues from their business customers. Recently unsealed lawsuit documents reveal cover-up and purposeful deception that may have gone on for years.
Apple’s iphone customers have complained of dropped calls since the first iphone hit the market. They were told it was a network problem. A small problem of design which meant you just had to hold it a certain way. Then a software problem. Now, according to consumer reports the phone’s hardware is flawed. And it looks like Apple may have known about this problem for some time.
The thing is when we say DELL and Apple knew and have been misleading customers, we mean DELL and Apple employees knew and have been misleading customers. Certainly not all employees new. But, most certainly some of them did. And, no doubt many of them suspected the truth.
What’s it like to be on the inside of brands like these? To know that the customer’s brand experience is build in whole or in part on a myth. To know that if anyone really took a look behind the curtain they’d find behaviours that were questionable if not unethical or illegal. To know that your boss or your colleague is misleading you?
Rising employee cynicism and plummeting trust in leadership tell the tale. So the next time you’re asked how communications can help reverse these trends don’t start drafting new and better messages to push. Stop yourself from building a inspiring internal campaign or refreshing the intranet. Do start thinking about how you can help set the conditions for getting the right conversations going with the right people around where and how the employee experience is not aligned with the brand and discovering what needs to change.
Some additional reading
I went to see if I could find the values statements for DELL and Apple. Read in the context of what is in the news now, they are pretty interesting.
- Check out Dell’s official ‘Soul of Dell’
- Apples doesn’t publish its values statement on the web, but I did find a pdf post that looks pretty credible. If the actual values statement “customer empathy” is especially chilling.
And, I’ve been following the animated discussion on the smoke and mirrors of employer branding with Sean Trainor at CIPR Inside that adds another dimension to this post.
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What makes a good code of conduct?
Virtually every organization of any size has a written code of conduct. I’d really never thought about them much but, in the course of doing research for two posts for this blog I’ve ended up checking out Rio Tinto’s, British Petroleum’s and the Canadian Forces among others.
I was reminded that a good code of conduct is about more than the content of a written code. It’s about “the way we do things around here”. It’s about the behaviours employees see at work every day. It’s about the institutional stories that are told both formally and informally.
That said, all this often starts with a written code. So, here are some preliminary thoughts on what I think makes a good code of conduct:
- It’s written to help all employees behave in a way that is consistent with the authentic values of the organization and in line with national and international laws and regulations.
- It’s written from an employee’s point of view and not just the organization’s. The Code is about more than maintaining the organization’s reputation. It’s about employee pride in their organization, their team and their own work.
- It’s “virtually universal in … application”. There’s no guessing about who the code applies to [all executives, managers, non-managers, business partners]. No guessing about when the code applies or doesn’t. No gray zone. No exceptions.
- It clearly defines acceptable actionable behaviours and operating practices. It is written simply and is easy to understand. Plain English. No management speak or legalese.
- The number of behaviours are relatively few, easy to remember and act on. The consequences – both positive and negative – for the institution and the individual are clear.
- It includes relevant scenarios and mini-cases that bring the values and the behaviours to life for employees and can be used as the basis for discussion.
- It is supported by a process[earlier post]. that ensures employees are introduced to the code of conduct on day-one as part of their orientation to the organization and their work. There are regular opportunities to discuss the implications of the code in their day-to-day decisions and actions with their immediate supervisor and to ask questions, provide feedback. There are ways to report suspected violations without fear.
What do you think? Is this list complete?
Do you have any examples that you think are particularly good? Why are they good?
When was the last time your executive spent time thinking about the code of conduct and its implications in terms of their day-to-day work?
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Actions speak louder than words
This week, British Petroleum [BP], under Tony Hayward’s leadership, failed to make any progress in stopping or even slowing the flood of oil in the Gulf of Mexico. Five weeks after the explosion on the Deepwater Horizon oil platform the crisis is now described as perhaps the largest man-made disaster in history.
In the same week, the Canadian military leader of Canada’s mission in Afghanistan, Brigadier-General Daniel Ménard, was removed from his post after rumours of an affair with a soldier in his command.
The military responded quickly and unequivocally. Ménard is now back in Canada awaiting a hearing and potential court-martial. The allegations alone were serious enough to remove him from his post.
Back at BP, Tony Hayward, continues to run the company despite:
- The explosion of the Deepwater Horizon on April 20, 2010 that killed 11 people and began the uncontrolled oil spill in the Gulf
- Rumours that the explosion happened because the company had not invested in a relatively inexpensive remote control shut off device due to budget constraints
- The fact that the oil spill now threatens some of the most important and fragile ecosystems in North America along the coasts of Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, Texas, and Florida and the livelihood of millions of people. Today, on the first day of hurricane season, the potential threat to people and the environment has just increased. The current and potential costs are incalculable.
- The lack of an actionable crisis plan. Now over 5 weeks later it is very clear that the company did not anticipate an accident of this magnitude or have plans in place. Every attempt [and there have been many] to stop the flow of oil is a new and so far failed experiment.
- The fact that the direct costs to the company of responding to the spill is now reported to be at $1B
- Today’s news that BPs stock plunged 17% – Investors will pay – and that the company’s very survival is at stake. If this happens, over 80,000 employees and their families will be directly affected. The direct social and economic costs to the supply chain and everyone in and around the communities where BP operates will be huge.
In the case of the Canadian Military morale may be affected by this revelation about a man they respected and trusted to lead in a critical and dangerous theatre of operation, but they will have no doubt that the institution values the lives of the people on the mission and in the communities they are there to protect over the image of the institution or the reputation of the commander.
What about the 80,000 employees at BP?
These are extreme examples, but I’d love to hear from you. What actions are speaking louder than words in organizations you know? What impact does that have?
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“Open book policy can inspire staff”
This headline from the today’s newspaper caught my eye. The article describes the experience of two businesses that had successfully implemented an open book policy with employees.
Pretty courageous for privately held businesses I thought. And then I read this… “Although bullish on open-book financials, there is one line element you won’t see passed around among employees: salaries. “Revealing individuals’ salaries “would create too much drama,” Mr Sim. “Maybe one day we will figure out the salary thing, but our culture isn’t ready for that level of discourse.””
Is it the culture that’s not ready? I wonder.
Imagine if salary structures were as competitive, equitable and fair as we tell employees they are. Why couldn’t we? Why wouldn’t we share this information?
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Learning from the Vatican [part 3]
Today, few believe the Vatican was unaware of the ‘priestly sexual abuse’ that occurred over several decades in Ireland, the US and more recently reported in Germany. Instead, it is widely assumed that they knew and their response was ‘cover-up, evasion and criminal negligence’. It is “a time for contrition” it is also a time to reflect on the role of internal communications in this most terrible story.
In the Roman Catholic Church as an organization there are many features we would wish for as corporate communicators [part 2] including a clearly a structured disciplined communication system designed precisely to feed very “rich” information up and down the system [part 1].
It is impossible to believe that what was going on in individual parishes around the world wasn’t known within those communities. Institutionally, they either knew or they didn’t. If they didn’t then as communicators I think we need to ask ourselves why? And, if they did and didn’t act. Again why?
Collecting such vast amounts of rich information may have contributed to
- Seeing and not recognizing
- Listening and not hearing
- The long time delays
And may also underscore the importance of the art rather than the science of communication. What can we do to ensure institutionally we’re listening wisely?
Once the institution understood what was going on that same in depth knowledge may have actually served to enable the cover-up and manipulation rather than ensuring swift and appropriate action. Unfortunately and as we’ve seen during the global financial crisis and the aftermath this may not only be an isolated situation. We as corporate communicators have been fighting to get to the strategic table, so if you’d been in the room when these issues were discussed what would you have done?
And, finally, a lesson: If the leadership of any organization values the institution over the employees or its clients – where the means justify the ends – then all the great communications systems in the world aren’t enough. If that is so, what are the implications for us as corporate communicators?
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