One of my favorite assignments in my
25 years of teaching various corporations was being involved in not
one, but two programs while with Xerox. It taught me a great deal about many things,
but perhaps the greatest lesson it taught me was the answer to the question, "Can
ethics be taught?"
The first Xerox program taught a valuable lesson, but hid it in a program that
taught quality improvement. I used to teach the program so I knew it well. The problem
was, we wanted to teach our participants about ethics - specifically how easy it is
to knowingly ignore doing the right thing, but it went in one ear, and out the other.
We spent four days teaching participants how to solve problems, improve quality, and
work cohesively in groups, all designed to improve quality within Xerox. After all, who
would knowingly produce something that was not up to the quality of the organization
they represent? The answer is just about everyone.
We didn't help matters much by placing the participants in a
manufacturing simulation that was timed, and had an
air of competition to it. By the end of the simulation, in just about every
case, participants were so driven to produce at a profitable level; they knowingly
would sacrifice quality to achieve it. They were almost stunned when they were
reminded about their own vulnerability to
breaching ethics to achieve personal or corporate goals. |
