This is a new world. A world where the common man or woman on the street has words like “Enron” and “Arthur Andersen” and “Worldcom” on the tip of their tongues. Yet will major corporate scandals have shaken the bedrock of America’s trust in its companies and their executives, this world is new in another way as well. Global competition has never been sterner. U.S. companies are sending jobs overseas to centers of cheap outsourcing labor at a record pace to try to staunch the flow of red in their profits column. Companies are competing with rivals from all over the world – rivals that may not hold to the same ethical standards of conduct, using child labor for instance, or refusing to insure its workforce.

Can American organizations really afford to operate ethically? Will it improve their bottom line over time? The answer can be found in examining the five major benefits that corporate ethics training, and the presumed accompaniment of ethically-behaving employees, can have within an organization. Before listing these benefits, it must be first stated that the tendency for corporations that do train its staff concerning ethics is to have workshops or other one-time “events.” These are, for the most part, ineffective when compared to a consistent ethics program which seeks to incorporate ethics into every piece of training and management disseminated company-wide.

Therefore, in this article we will refer to “ethics programs” rather than ethics training.

Benefit One: Ethics programs chart a course in time of change. Times of upheaval is precisely what we are facing in today’s economy. In these seasons, the line between right and expedient can become blurred, but choosing to make the quick yet questionable buck can permanently harm your company’s future ability to function with moral integrity. If it becomes kosher to gain money from outside the unit through unscrupulous means, what’s to say that employees won’t begin to defraud their employer as well?

Benefit Two: Public image is key to survival. The vast majority of companies in the U.S. are publicly traded, publicly held, or at the very least dependent on the public as consumers of their product. A company which strives for ethical integrity and gains a reputation for doing so, as well as fending off corporate scandals, will win the public’s trust and therefore financial fidelity.

Benefit Three: Ethics are cheap. In the long run, ethics save you money. Period. Less policing internally must go on, saving you expense. But far more important, scandals, siphoning, and embezzlement can be caught before they reach a truly gigantic scale. As well, any government fines for wrongdoing are reduced by catching them in an earlier, smaller stage of criminality.

Benefit Four: Ethics promote teamwork and work ethic. Hard work is just that: an ethic. An ongoing open dialogue for ethical questions and issues, and stress by the management upon key company values, over time produce a culture that reinforce and reward teamwork and hard work.

Benefit Five: Peace of Mind It feels good to good is an old but true report. Owners, executives, managers, and employees can trust an ethical operation, and that makes for happier, more well-adjusted personnel that tend to have longer careers, higher production rates, and more enjoyment than companies less trustworthy. Do right and it will reward you in the long run every time.

Nathan Warren owns and operates Ethics Education

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Tags: corporate, ethics, standard, code, business

When anyone commits insurance fraud, be it a one-time padding of a personal insurance claim or a conspiracy to submit false or inflated invoices in an effort to boost profits, guess who pays the ultimate price? The consumer. Sure, the insurance company may pay the bills but no one is really “sticking it to the insurance company” – they are sticking it to the policyholders.

After all, as expenses rise, so too do premiums. The Insurance Information Institute estimates that insurance fraud adds up to $30 billion per year in bogus losses. Now, $30 billion is a big number. This is a number that isn’t necessarily absorbed as a cost of doing business. No, insurance companies are in business to make money and they pass their expenses on to their customers – even bogus expenses.

In addition to the high cost of fraudulent claims, insurance companies have an additional cost related to this issue – the cost of identifying, investigating, and fighting these claims. It’s not cheap to hire teams of investigators or pursue fraud. Not only does the consumer receive higher premiums based on increased losses, the consumer must also foot the bill for investigating and pursuing legal action against fraudsters.

Think about the various policies that you hold. You might have medical insurance, life insurance, auto insurance, homeowners insurance, and workers compensation insurance just to name a few. How much do the premiums of all of your policies add up to each year? Your annual insurance costs add up to a pretty hefty number as well. Considering that you are paying for insurance fraud through increased premiums, suddenly, this problem becomes more relevant.

Now, consider the temptation involved. You pay tens of thousands of dollars for insurance and hopefully will never need to collect. However, if you do, you may be tempted to “get your money’s worth” by exaggerating your losses. Others justify insurance fraud by blaming the insurance companies for their unfair practices or lowball settlement offers. The system is far from perfect but adding fraudulent claims to the mix is not the answer.

While many consumers have a lax attitude when they hear of others filing false claims or padding their losses, others are deeply concerned. Why should the rest of us pay for greed? Insurance fraud is a crime and it hurts every policyholder in the nation.

Another way that insurance fraud hurts is that it tarnishes complete industries. For example, the recent indictment of the owner and several employees of Disaster Restoration Inc. has hurt the disaster recovery industry. Consumers wonder if all disaster remediation companies are making their own rules or participating in unethical practices. Drill these perceptions down even further and you’ll have consumers wondering if a company that feels it is okay to rip off the insurance companies also feel that it is okay to perform shoddy work or overbill for sub-par products and services.

Whether you’re a consumer or a business owner, insurance represents a large part of your budget. How you feel about the cost of insurance may influence how you feel about the so-called “victimless crime” of insurance fraud. However, once you realize that victims do indeed exist and that you are the one who ultimately pays the bill, you may not be quite so willing to sit idly by as others bilk the system.

In short, insurance fraud is wrong. It is unethical. It hurts us all. If you want to see decreased insurance premiums, you must take a stand against insurance fraud. In addition, if you want to see increased profits of your own, taking the high, ethical road is the right choice.

By: Mr. Mark Decherd

Dryout Inc Emergency water damage restoration, drying, deodorization, decontamination, disinfection, mold removal, water damage repair, restoration and reconstruction of commercial and residential properties damaged by fire, water and other disasters by a network of trained specialists, technicians and restoration professionals across the USA and Canada.

Mr. Mark Decherd
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Tags: health, care, ethics, issues, code

Did you now you can beat your competition even when they cheat? In the company that started I have been beating the competition city after city even though my competition lacks integrity and I often catch them cheating.

In my industry we are in the business of cleaning fleet of vehicles and we often found companies breaking environmental laws and charging the companies they did business with extra for environmental compliance and then underbidding us in the process. At first we could not understand how they were charging such little amounts of money and still reclaiming the waste wash water.

So we kept redesigning our environmental control and reclamation systems to become more and more efficient until we could compete on price without cheating. Eventually we noticed that they were cheating and we simply advised the industry that, that was unacceptable and we helped advise committees that set up standards in the industry to see that the industry could police itself and do business without environmentally negatively impacting the ecosystems.

Of course this is only one example of how we have beat the competition even when they have been cheating. We often in business find cheaters who cannot pull their own weight in nearly every industry. This is because they have grown old in stodgy and weak and they cannot compete in the real world so they make rules for a created reality.

Unfortunately, they can only do this so long until the customer tells them where to go and when they do; all you have to do is be in the way of the money and have with that customer wants and they will give you unit of trade called a dollar.

It is easy to beat the competition even when they cheat and you should know that anyone who cheats is inferior, weak and therefore you have the moral high ground and they should boost your strength of character and confidence in your ability to cream them.

Indeed, I love winning and I love beating the cheaters without cheating. It must be so demoralizing for them when they lack the integrity, the perseverance and the dedication to it even stand on the same field with us and cannot make single play without cheating. They must be so envious and jealous; maybe that’s what causes them to cheat so much?

Are you a small business owner, sales professional, C-Level executive or front line worker? What are your top major complaints as you travel the roads to greater business be it locally or globally?

Given how in touch we are between emails, voice mails and wireless connectivity, the most frequent and most frustrating complaint that I hear from business coaching or sales coaching clients, prospects and colleagues is the growing lack of professional courtesy. This complaint extends from business networking events to answering emails to actually returning phone calls. And even within my own business coaching training and consulting practice, I must agree that this is Complaint Number One.

Of course, most individuals engaged in business receive a lot of unsolicited contacts. However, the continued lack of professional courtesy is specifically directed to:

* Individuals who ask to be called back and then do not return phone calls
* Individuals who request information and then do not respond when contacted
* Individuals who make appointments and then do not show

Let’s accept the fact that everyone is busy. So being busy is not a justifiable excuse to be, simply speaking, rude!

Possibly, this lack of professional courtesy is because of the ongoing issue of wishy washy values or ethics. The Do as I say and not Say as I do belief stills appears to be very much alive. For example, small business owners to senior level executives demand that their sales to customer service people follow-up, yet they fail to model that same behavior.

Business building and sales research suggests that today’s uniqueness in the marketplace has much more to do with being reliable, doing what you promised in the time frame that you promised, than truly being different be it product, service or price. Reliability is a value, an ethic, a truly non-negotiable behavior that separates your business from everyone else.

Small Business Coaching Training Tip: To truly be that Red Jacket in the Sea of Gray suits, revisit your strategic business action plan and reread your ethics or values statements. Commit yourself to returning all phone calls, answering all emails and honoring all appointments. Who knows you may even realize increase sales in the process?

Chicago Sales Coach Leanne Hoagland-Smith helps to quickly increase profits & increase productivity for individuals & organizations involved in service industries of health care, real estate and regional railroads; distribution industry of new car sales and manufacturing. Process coaching and development works because my clients quickly double their results.

Sign up to read Leanne’s weekly business coaching training column. Visit Here to discover the value added articles, e-books and other tools.

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Tags: professional, ethics, code, conduct, work

Ethics, by its very nature, implies that the representation is both honest in promotion and has the integrity of faithful practice by its advocates. It is a kind of “walk the walk and talk the talk” integration through the actions and decisions of those who lay claim to the cause. Yet, the environmental movement has those who see Going Green merely as a public relations or marketing issue. Knowing that the federal, state, and municipal lawmakers are pressing hard to encourage Green transition in the business community; many businesses sense the wave of interest in environmental issues as something to exploit. In response, there is hardly a business that isn’t trying to sidle up to some Green ideas whether they are valid or mere tokenism.

Environmentalism is ill served by token efforts of installing CFL bulbs, donating money to an environmental charity, or buying carbon credits. Regardless of of your attitude toward these highly-touted ideas, the fact is that it is the operational processes of your business or company that show that Green is part of your agenda. Right now, there are any number of companies writing checks to save the polar bears or attending a Green seminar that have anything but a Green operation in place. There is certainly a need for a Green Business certification like the one offered by the Green Business League that focuses predominantly on changing the way the people in the each business operate in our society.

Let’s get right at the obvious issues of a functional Green business that spends its financial resources governed by the lowest price or a favored relationship. This is true for the hiring of the janitorial service that hauls in dangerous cleaning chemicals using a uncertified staff to clean the building, or asking your various vendor if they are also Green business certified. The hypocrisy of promoting your business as a Green business is revealed when the questions are asked whether your business is installing Green practices and using Green vendors. Ethically, the need for practices that match the boast and the integrity that expects the same of those you purchase from is obvious though rarely applied.

The new discussions of Green Supply Chain, carries the message already promoted by the Green Business League which is “Buy Green, Hire Green.” We are hearing about concerns for Greenwashing where the Green hype is pure marketing regardless of evidences of misrepresentation and poor business integrity. To be a Green business, there are hundreds of simple and inexpensive ideas that should be gradually introduced into each and every business wishing to be an environmentally-committed business. Don’t make the mistake of thinking that you must Go Green in one massive effort. Smart businesses hire a Green Consultant or follow a Green Management program to bring their business in the Green era with the credential that has the evidences to support the claims made by the marketing department. Go Green, but don’t Play at Green.

Green Business League invites businesses wishing to earn their Green Business Certification. If you need a Green Consultant, find one at the Green Consultant Directory.

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Tags: green, ethics, business, code, corporate

All businesses are grey. A loaded statement but one which befits today’s business milieu. The debate is on the shades of the color and not the color itself. Wealth creation precedes wealth distribution, an unalterable sequence. There is a growing realization that former belongs to the exclusive domain of business and the latter to a shared domain. Businesses demand autonomy from others to create wealth and others demand accountability from businesses for the wealth created. Both, autonomy and accountability are worthless in isolation. Accountable autonomy is the panacea. Current business landscape is unprecedented. It is a world where the ends and not the means are brought in to question leading to business ethics boiling down to a personal and not an organizational call, taken everyday by millions, closer to the ground to succeed and more importantly survive.

All the stakeholders-management, employees, board, investors and society are asserting their influence simultaneously. A historical perspective on corporate governance suggests different approaches- (organization+stakeholder)-control approach and capital-market control approach dominating at different times and in different geographies. Both approaches have come alive globally and are trying to pip each other.

India Inc. has moved away from regulation toward latitude since early 1990′s and with the markets coming into their own, the governance style seems to be headed the capital-market control way.

Board of Directors, the venerable interface has to ensure accountable autonomy by fostering its own culture which includes promoting constructive dissatisfaction, actively monitoring the firm’s risk policies and practices, not contingent on having considerable expertise in the areas concerned and avoiding soft conflicts.

Enron and other scandals happened at the best of times and at the worst of times. The aftermath ensured till then increasingly becoming adventurous management’s retreat, activism in boards, dispelled smugness of investors and an acknowledgment of fast becoming oblivious society’s rights and responsibilities. Business initiatives with social spin-offs and not the other way around initiatives are welcome as the need is of responsible corporates and not of over-hyped corporate social responsibility.

A culture, undoubtedly percolating from the top echelons fostering openness and adherence to laws is required.

It has to be appreciated by everyone involved but its adoption has to be voluntary and customizable. The organizations should disseminate the information like practices, policies and risk appetite needed to take a fair call and not accord the right to itself of other stakeholders primarily markets to judge the firm. A culture of transparency starts where regulation ends in achieving accountable autonomy. Every stakeholder must understand that she has a role to play and has certain rights and responsibilities. Separations of powers are difficult to achieve but are crucial for the organization to do the right business and for others to ensure that the former does it the right way as the eternal bottom-line is- the business has and will always be managed by executives, investors have and will always be the ultimate decision making authority on investing and society has and will always be affected by the businesses.

Introduction

The world operates like a simple pendulum. Its microcosm, the business world is no exception. One extreme is autonomy and the other is accountability. It is hard to strike a balance between the two. Both are benign in their own space but too much of a good thing is also detrimental. Business environment has and will keep on testing both extremes. When one extreme is about to be reached, then its dire consequences are realized and businesses move back from the brink. The force which pulls them back from the disaster is so potent that it adds tremendous momentum till the other extreme is tested. This process is eternal and gives businesses a grey shade, blurring the line between right and wrong. After the corporate scandals that rocked the world in 2001-02, the pendulum has swung in the favor of accountability. This shift has happened at a time when the businesses around the world are about to peak. Hitherto unexplored markets are being forayed by organizations worldwide. Issues of business ethics, right and wrong, and corporate governance are hot debating points across the business landscape. All parties- management, board, employees, shareholders, regulators and community are asserting their presence. All of them have to collectively make a decisive move as both regulation and latitude are looking equally enticing and as doing the right things is mulling on the imperative of doing things the right way. The world is waiting!

Business Ethics- Individual’s or Organization’s

Dis-connect between an employee and the ground realities widen as she moves up the ladder. Today, businesses are very target driven. At each level, targets are set and are interlinked. The performance of one’s superior is determined by one’s own performance and this process goes on till the very top echelons. Till such time one meets or surpasses the targets no questions are asked on the way of achieving those and disconnect mentioned earlier plays a huge role. It is only when the shortfall occurs, explanations are demanded and then also words like ethics are given a short shrift. In nutshell, only the end and not the means is what matters. In such an environment, where targets are means to not only success but more importantly survival, ethics boil down to a personal call. These calls have to be taken everyday by millions of people in real time with targets and survival at top of the mind.

The line between right and wrong gets blurred. Can one put a number on the price, less than which a gift is considered a culture token and above which it is considered a bribe? Doubt whether any corporate dossier conceptualized at the very top on ethics can address this issue on the ground.

Approaches to Corporate Governance

Over the years, two very distinct approaches to corporate governance have emerged. One is the mix of organization-control perspective and stakeholder-control perspective and other is based on capital market control.

The former approach sacrifices short-term focus at the altar of long-term sustainability. It is based on 1 person 1 vote dictum. The agreed upon goal for the management is to achieve stability and perpetuity of business. Board has representation of employees and society. Major chunk of equity comes from financial and non financial companies, which are ready to wait for longer periods for their investments to fructify. Firms are not too keen on going public thereby not lending themselves to the whims and fancies of markets. Employee welfare, obligation to local community, size and market share make up the essence of this approach. Myopic Market model by Marris is the fundamental pillar of this approach. According to this model, heeding the markets too much has a detrimental effect on the organization.

Excesses in this approach are created by managerial capitalism as executives are given a free hand in managing the show. At times, a host of objectives other than wealth creation are followed.

As the firm expands, it requires additional capital. If this capital is not forthcoming from stable sources like banks then the company has no other choice but to go public. This gives rise to capital market-control system. It is based on 1 share 1 vote dictum. The more the equity held by an investor, the more the firm is at her mercy. Investors are interested in the ends- dividends and capital gains. Hence, companies have to jostle for the mind space of these players. This brings in the short-termism of this approach. This perspective is based on Principal Agent model. Line is crossed in this approach when investor capitalism sets in. All other obligations of the firm are relegated to keeping the share price up and there is intense pressure on executives to perform consistently in the short-run leading at times to violation of norms.

Both the approaches are similar to the extent that they both give minority shareholders a short shrift. They have been taken for granted and most of their rights have remained on paper.

Lost Ground

Recently the stakeholder inclusive approach has lost considerable ground to shareholder savvy approach. The reason is capital becoming mobile. The global investors like private equity funds and pension funds are deluged with choices. But they lack one crucial element which the local investors have which is the closeness to the business which in turn lends stability to the equity provided. This means the firms have to attract these global investors by way of the globally acceptable parameters, toplines and bottomlines or their manifestation- the share price.

Catching up in the offing

What goes round comes back. Human capital is already the most valuable resource of organizations especially the ones operating in the technology sectors. With the focus shifting from attracting capital to retaining talent, the stakeholder inclusive approach with a sharp focus on employees might make up the ground lost in the last two decades or so to the capital-market control approach.

India Inc.’s Governance Evolution

Corporate entities in India stand out in terms of complexities in the ownership structure. The direct ownership of promoters is quite substantial and if that is not enough, the promoters indirectly have tremendous equity in and control of the firm through the rogue holding companies. It was believed that with the capital market reforms initiated in 1991, the dominance of promoters in the firms will pare. But unfortunately the last decade of the 20th century was marred by scams. The corporate entities went in for private placements making use of the relaxed regulations. These developments made the public spooky. In the last few years SEBI has put its foot down to crack down on the perpetrators and raised the disclosure standards leading to a renewed interest in the markets. The corporates are going global, a sign of their enhanced credibility.

Giants like TCS and Infosys have set global benchmarks in reporting standards and have implemented CSR in the fabric of their organizations.

With capital markets becoming dominant as the time passes and as organizations increasingly care to heed the market and keep the investors happy, it is safe to assume that the Indian corporate entities are veering away from organization-control to market-control approach toward corporate governance.

Right Directors mean Right Business

Board of directors is the highest internal governance mechanism in the organization. The board is the interface between external environment and management. The composition of the board reflects this. It has to straddle between providing necessary freedom to the management for wealth creation and protecting the interests of those who help create and of those who share this wealth. Just like an organization has a culture, it is critical for the board given the role it plays to have its own way of getting a handle on issues. No regulation can substitute for this. The non-executive members should meet separately to thrash out issues among themselves to promote ‘constructive dissatisfaction’. As far as the skills of the board members are concerned, they do not need to have finance or risk expertise to play an effective governance role. The task for the board is rather to understand and approve both the risk appetite of the company at any particular stage in its evolution and the processes for monitoring risk.

If the management proposes changing these radically-for example, by switching the portfolio of assets from low to high risk, or by engaging in off-balance-sheet financial transactions that inherently alter the volatility of the business and its exposure to uncertainties-the board should be quite willing to exercise a veto. Also, the management should be sensitive to the tricky context the board operates in and must grasp that directors’ independence can be compromised by ‘soft conflicts’ such as significant charitable contributions to a favorite institution or the employment of board members’ children.

Enron coterie Debacle – The positive fallout

There is a silver lining even in the darkest cloud that burst over the corporate world post-millennium. In the run up to the uncovering of some of the biggest frauds almost all in America, ironically a country which has always consecrated regulations, the markets were increasingly being viewed as infallible. Whatever information emanated from the organizations to the markets was taken as the last word. There was a reason behind this. The rules were set by the market and organizations were just playing by them leading to smugness all around. The disasters were eye openers for the gullible investors. Markets were vulnerable after all. Stricter rules followed. The corporate boards world over became more agile. The managements retreated. To a certain extent a long-term inclusive focus was restored in the firms having benign effects for every stakeholder.

The Undesirable side effect

Innovation is the mantra for success. But for corporates it has become a survival factor. The frauds have happened at the worst time. The organizations need to be more creative. Risk appetite should be high to capture the unexplored high potential markets. This calls for ingenuity on the executives’ part. But the atmosphere has become very restrictive. Regulations like SOX go overboard.

Boards would much rather have a conservative rather than an adventurous management. This does not bode well for the society as a whole as cagey entrepreneurs will not be able to fulfill their outstanding objective-wealth creation.

Business Initiatives with social spin-offs and not vice versa

Prima facie, ITC’s e-choupal venture seems an effort in the direction of social responsibility. But intrinsically the effort makes eminent economic sense.

It is not a subsidy but an effort which is mutually beneficial. Corporate social responsibility enthusiasts might label such efforts as social initiatives. But the bottom-line is that such efforts generate returns, which guarantees shareholder support. Till such time the business gains precede societal benefits and the society appreciates this reality, the long-run sustenance of these initiatives is guaranteed. Responsible corporates and not corporate social responsibility is the order of the day.

Crucial Culture

Culture is the way people behave when they are not being watched. It is very organization specific and very unlike regulation which is procrustean. The magnitude of damage that can be caused by an individual to the stakeholders of the firm increases as he/she moves up the corporate ladder. The power to influence attitudes also increases on the way up. Hence self evidently the top brass of the firm has a big hand in shaping the culture of the firm. If the honcho crosses the line, it sends out an implicit signal to the people lower down to knowingly or unknowingly to act in a similar manner as the stakes are not that high as they are for the men at the top. The trickling down of an open culture might take time but one can be rest assured that the only way in which it is going to impact the firm is positively. But where organizations go wrong is where they expect the same things from culture as the regulators do from regulation. It is never going to be a one size fits all story. This is where the earlier talked about concept of ethics being very individual specific and not organization one comes into picture. Do not impose culture. Let people understand and appreciate it and find their own way of incorporating it into their work life.

The information imperative

A fair judgment is based on fair information. Often, the best appraisal is done by those who are at a certain distance from the subject matter and at the same time affected by it. Organizations err when they try to preemptively guess others’ reactions. This leads to distortion of information. Doing business is the primary task of business; it is not in the best position to evaluate it from different angles. Hence, organizations should pass on information about its policies, practices and risk appetite. Let the other stakeholders primarily the markets assign an appropriate risk premium and cost of capital. Part of this information dissemination has been achieved by regulation manifested in balance sheet et al. The other part has become more crucial as the businesses have grown complex and can only be achieved with the will of the management and the board. A culture of transparency goes a long way in achieving the latter. Of course transparency has its limits.

But voluntary initiatives like Triple Bottom Line reporting which not only cover the financial but also the social and environmental impacts of the company signal a start. All kinds of companies from the ones with most to hide like chemical to the fairly innocuous ones with the least to hide have adopted this practice. Why? It does make social and environmental sense, but more importantly, thanks to competition in and integration of the world economy, it makes eminent business sense.

Conclusion

Wealth has to be created before it can be distributed. The responsibility to create wealth is of business. And responsibilities and rights must go together. Hence, the society cannot disarm business of its rights which are essential for creating value. The spookiness comes in when business accords certain rights to itself by itself. The importance of wealth creation and difficulty in achieving it blurs the fine line.

As we have seen there is no silver bullet for settling issues like business ethics and corporate governance. Separations of powers just like between executive, judiciary and legislature is imperative. No one stakeholder is an apex authority. Everyone has a role to play.

Regulation defines these roles to a certain extent. But it can only do so much. A culture epitomized by the top management and communication of the right information do much more than regulation. At the end of the day we are all human. We think differently and have different takes on different issues. Till such time this fact is appreciated and co-opted by every stakeholder and a healthy debate continues on the rightness of business, we are certain that businesses will keep on doing what they are good at and others will keep making sure that businesses do it the good way.

Sudeep Sanwal

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Tags: business, ethic, code, articles, policy

According to Michael Josephson, an ethics expert, there are four tenets that comprise ethical behavior: honesty, integrity, fairness, and concern for others. These four tenets are similar to the four legs of a chair. Even if only one leg is missing, the chair wobbles, and if two are missing, the chair collapses.

Priding oneself on your honesty and integrity isn’t anything if you’re also not fair or caring.

Ethical Behavior in Business – Today, one area of discussion that has been a hot topic is ethical behavior in business. The events of the past year make it appear that “business and ethics” are mutually exclusive. It is so downheartening to see that so many major businesses are being investigated for unsavory business practices. Mortgage companies, Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, AIG, Wall Street, you name it. The institutions we once thought we could trust are no more. Have we never left the 1980s with its “greed is good” code of ethics?

The fact that today’s business leaders are unethical should cause us to want to do just the opposite by being even more ethical in our daily affairs. But, it can also be deemed the reason that they continue with their bad behavior. If your boss can make personal calls on the company phone, why shouldn’t you conduct your personal business on the company computer? When the leaders in the company set a poor example, it is only natural that the employees will follow it without a qualm.

Additionally, a downsized staff that is expected to produce an upscaled workload may feel that how they do their job doesn’t matter, as long as it gets done. When employees are under pressure from management to achieve company goals, they will do everything they can think of to increase productivity, whether or not it is ethical.

This pressure makes it seem that management is telling employees that it is alright to do whatever they need to in order to meet their goals, even if this includes lying, cheating, stealing, and so forth. The economy is unpredictable. In these uncertain times, it is that much more important that we monitor ourselves and do everything we can to keep our actions open and above-board. Unethical behavior is not okay, even when it goes unchecked. Business communication is one area that is likely to be ripe for improvement.

From the excellent book, Business Communication, Process & Product, by Mary Ellen Guffey, 2000, I would like to share five suggestions that will enable you to maintain yourself as an ethical business communicator.

1) Tell the truth. Statements that are misleading or untrue should not be made. It is not ethical to use partial truths or to exaggerate.

2) Label the opinions. Opinions are not the same as facts. Do not just repeat what someone else has already done; do your own independent research.

3) Try to be factual. Be aware that your own personal biases may be shown through your writing. Even if it is a topic that you feel strongly about, you are ethically responsible for objectively presenting the information.

4) Communication should be clear. The message should be written in such a way that it should be easily and quickly understood. Words that can be easily understood by the reader should be used. Avoid intentionally overwhelming the reader with lengthy, complicated sentences or words that the reader is unlikely to know.

5) Credit should be given. You should avoid plagiarism. Most folks know that you are supposed to use quotation marks when you use the actual words of the author. But I have seen many instances where writers don’t understand they also have to give credit for borrowed ideas. It’s still plagiarism if you have done nothing more than reorder the words in a sentence and maybe added a few words of your own, but haven’t attributed the idea to the author.

In conclusion, not only is being an ethical communicator the right thing to do but it is also required. Take the lead by being a good example. Running a successful business by ethical standards will encourage others to follow your lead.

Michelle Howe, MBA, president of Internet Word Magic, specializes in writing irresistible copy for websites. Transform the way you do business. Visit her website at http://www.InternetWordMagic.com for a FR^EE chapter download of her new book “Turn Browsers into Buyers” and FR^EE report, “The Five-Step Plan to Article Success.”

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Tags: ethical, business, communication, issues, code

It’s gotten mighty hard to nail down just exactly what people mean these days when they speak of corporate social responsibility.

Does it mean extracting sea turtles out of fishing nets or not eating monoculture salmon? Does it mean not out-sourcing jobs to cheaper foreign lands even if it raises the standard of living in those places? What if the outsourced jobs go to foreign union members? Is it better to build a new LEED certified building or to make due with the old building that’s sturdy if not entirely energy efficient? Is it more socially responsible for a company to donate to an AIDS orphan cause in Africa than to a ballet company in Africa? What if the ballet company employs AIDS victims?

I’m not an ethicist and some of these questions are ethical questions. But for the rest of us how are we supposed to navigate the thicket of sometimes competing and oftentimes perplexing conundrums framed as issues of corporate social responsibility?

This was all so much easier when “the business of America [was still] business,” to paraphrase the famously-taciturn former U.S. President Calvin Coolidge.

I am, however, a marketer. And in marketing one way to know where you stand with stakeholders who are important to you is to ask them. It won’t necessarily yield perfect moral clarity, but it can suggest pathways.

Fleishman-Hillard, a public relations firm and division of Omnicom, in conjunction with the National Consumers League has now conducted three studies on the subject of corporate social responsibility; in 2005, 2006 and 2007.

I read the executive summary for the 2007 study and if you can get past the laughably inaccurate renderings of the bar charts and the occasional editorializing in the summary… which has been no small hurdle for me… there may be something here for cause marketers.

What does “corporate social responsibility” mean? Fleishman-Hillard asked consumers just that as an open-ended, unprompted question. A truncated list of responses from the 2007 survey released in May included the following:

Commitment to communities—23 percent
Commitment to employees—17 percent
Responsibility to the environment—11 percent
Provide quality products—10 percent
More charitable donations—1 percent
Don’t know—9 percent

What contributions do consumers expect from companies? Again, the truncated list included:

Non-financial contributions—29 percent
No expectations—13 percent
Treating employees well—11 percent
Fixing problems created by company—11 percent
Doing a good job—11 percent
Environmentally-friendly practices—10 percent
Financial contributions—10 percent

What to make of these low numbers when it comes to corporate charitable donations? The authors of the study’s executive summary surmise that:

“…the consistent findings across both the 2006 and 2007 CSR surveys, when it comes to defining the meaning and expectations surrounding CSR, suggest that companies’ charitable and philanthropic giving is no longer enough to impress consumers. Perhaps it is now viewed as a standard expectation that consumers have — a bare minimum requirement — to even be considered as a socially responsible company.”

They’re suggesting that there’s a kind of market price for corporate social responsibility and that consumers have already factored into that price corporate generosity to charity.

According to the Fleishman-Hillard study, what is likely to move the needle for consumers when it comes to corporate social responsibility? As it turns out, it’s self interest.

When asked what is most important to consumers with regard to corporate social responsibility the top vote getter with 29 percent was ‘treats/pays employee well.’ If England is a nation of shopkeepers then the U.S. is a nation of employees. And the survey’s respondees are internalizing the question and answering it as employees.

And yet, unemployment is 4.5 percent right now in the United States… quite low… which has driven real wages up. So while the newspaper headlines here are filled with stories of jobs being exported to India and China, the fact is that the American worker is in pretty good shape overall; the glass is half-full. But the perception is that the American worker is endangered… that the glass is half-empty. The Fleishman-Hillard study bears that out.

Changing that perception is in no small way a public relations challenge.

Call Fleishman-Hillard. I’m sure they’d be glad to help

Paul Jones is the principal of Alden Keene & Associates, a consultancy specializing in integrating marketing and communications, market research, and internal and external communications. One of Alden Keene’s especialidads de la casa is cause-related marketing. That is, helping businesses and nonprofits come together in ways that profit both. Check his blog at http://causerelatedmarketing.blogspot.com . Copyright 2007 Alden Keene & Associates.

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Tags: individual, ethics, code, issues, business

The basic idea of Fair Trade is one of connecting producers (rural workers and craftsman) with viable markets (you and me). The goal is to achieve this in the most efficient and transparent way possible to ensure that those producers:

* Receive a fair wage for the work they produce
* Work in conditions that are safe and hazard free
* Learn the business skills necessary to compete in the global economy
* Produce goods sustainably to ensure the resources they utilize will survive for generations to come.

According to Wikipedia, Fair Trade can be defined as: “an organized social movement and market-based approach to empowering developing country producers and promoting sustainability. The movement advocates the payment of a fair price as well as social and environmental standards in areas related to the production of a wide variety of goods.”

History: The current fair trade movement seems to have found its footing in and around Europe in the 1960′s as a grass roots way of attempting to help third world nations by empowering the working class with capital. Initial Fair Trade efforts focused on seeking specialized channels of distribution for Fair Trade goods. As a result of this effort, so called “Worldshops” opened and became the destination for those seeking Fair Trade goods and wishing to support the movement. While this method of distribution brought attention to the cause, theses specialized outlets lacked the broad appeal of mass distribution. Enter the certification label. In the late 1980′s in response to a sharp decline in coffee prices the first certification label was created (so called Max Havelaar label after a fictional Dutch character who opposed the exploitation of coffee pickers in Dutch colonies ). By creating a certification process and label that branded a product as “fair trade”, the movement was able to move out of small specialty shops and into the mainstream. The success of this first Fair Trade label brought about the creation of many more, which naturally led to confusion in the marketplace. In 1997 FLO (Fairtrade Labeling Organizations International) was established as a governing body to set forth standards for the varying labels (referred to as Labeling Initiatives). In 2002 FLO created its own label, the International Fairtrade Certification Mark in an attempt to consolidate all marks into single recognizable symbol. However many individual Labeling Initiatives (such as TransFairUSA and TransFairCanada) still maintain a separate logo and work alongside FLO to ensure guideline compliance
.
How it works: Fair Trade products are general brought to market in one of two ways. The first is the “supply chain” method whereby goods are produced, distributed, and sold through a common organization whose goal is to enhance the living standards of the worker and promote fair trade. The second and more common today is the “certification” method whereby goods are certified by one of many third party independent sources as complying with a set of underlying goals. These goods are then allowed to use the certification mark which in theory will garner a premium over non certified products.

Fair Trade Today: The idea of Fair Trade has grown substantially in the years that have followed its inception. In order to learn a bit more about the challenges facing Fair Trade today we spoke with Barkha Malik of Barkhas Custom Sourcing LLC. Barkha has been working directly with rural crafts people (primarily in India) for over 15 years. She specializes in facilitating the creation of unique textiles for use in both residential and commercial settings. We asked Barkha about the obstacles confronting rural crafts people and the role she plays in bringing the goods to market. According to Barkha, “the greatest hurdle for the rural crafts people is probably the lack of education. This leads to exploitation of their talent by their employers. They often do not earn enough to make anything close to a decent living for their families. Lack of education also leads to ignorance about all the options that might be available to them through government funding programs or other avenues which can get them out of the ill-paid jobs they are trapped in”.

According to Barkha, markets exist in which many of the goods produced can be very valuable,it is the logistics of getting their goods out to those markets that is daunting for these native artisans. Barkha sees her role as one who helps facilitate this. In order to do so she says that communication is the key. “Advances in technology have definitely made this work a lot easier than it was when I did my first custom project almost 15 years ago. Email and cell phones have made for much faster communication as compared to black/white faxes and waiting days for courier packages to arrive before approving textile patterns etc. Skype is another great way of international communication which is very economical and very popular even with small artisan groups in remote corners of the Himalayas who can log on from internet enabled computers in their local village marketplaces.”

Future of Fair Trade: With the increasing awareness among consumers about sustainability and environmental issues it stands to reason that products produced under Fair Trade conditions may continue to enjoy acceptance and growth in the marketplace. According to FLO, 2007 saw a 47% increase in the sale of Fairly Traded goods to about $3.6 billion worldwide. If this growth is sustained Fair Trade items may someday become the standard rather than a niche brand.

Verde Home – A boutique home furnishings and floor coverings store specializing in sustainable style.

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Tags: ethics, fairness, business, corporate, code

A person who informs on someone engaged in an illicit activity is considered as a whistle blower. The concept of whistle blowing can be found in visible situations as well as unnoticed ones. Their job is to report a violation of law, rule, regulation and/or a direct threat to public interest, such as fraud, health/safety violations, corruption, and plenty of others. These whistle blowers are not always in favorable situations, and things could be worst if they are not supported by the managers. People are criticized and disliked for it, which makes it a tough job.

Whistle blowing is present in positive as well as in discouraging situations. In an organization when an employee seeks to claim, revealing of inappropriate act and bringing it in front of their managers, could be taken as whistle blowing in positive conditions. But in a situation where an employee leek out information to the general public or to the competitors, this act can be taken as negative whistle blowing in terms of the company.

When a person usually blows the whistle, it’s normally not a direct attack towards a person, rather it is simply that the illegal or unethical actions of that person to be stopped. All the employees are suppose to work as a team and no body would like to be seen as the person who turns their back on them. The person has to make a very strict and uncompromising choice to make, keeping in consideration that the loyalty to their fellow colleagues as well as towards the company.
I personally favor the whistle blowers as it is one act which could help save a thousand.

People usually consider it as “back biting” or “tattle-tale-ing”, however that is how plenty of jobs, our environment, the reputation of the company, or in some cases even lives. They don’t realize that it is ethically and morally, actually their job towards the company, people and money. For example if someone is stealing from the company and the action not accounted could result in a loss of money to the company, and further proceeding could even result in removal of jobs. Whistle blowing has many positive effects, and if carefully considered it can lead to the end of unethical practices in business. It is a method of informing the concerned authorities before it’s too late and lead to a disaster. Whistle blowing can be negative to some, but it is a needed action for today. A controversial factor could be that it makes people decide between right and wrong. And the easy way would be to stay out of it and let someone else take notice, but the right way would be to go forward and stop it.

Faraz Ali

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Faraz Ali – EzineArticles Expert Author

Tags: guidelines, ethics, code, work, conduct

Hiring sons, daughters and wife is always a prerogative of the business owner, in this case, you. That is if you want to keep the money in the family or keep the teens out of trouble and wife busy with administrative support rather than washing dishes at home and nagging about your late hours at work.

Frankly, a small business will do well to involve “kith and kin” but if your business runs on a complicated system requiring qualified people to do the job, the family has to take a backseat, unless of course they have the expertise the business needs.

Hiring unqualified members of the family, including your favorite cousin, can be risky. Ask any hard core businessperson and heed the warning to keep family and relatives away. Business is business and family is family and never the twain shall meet if the relationships within the family are strained.

Good relations in the family can see the business through climactic events, competition, and changes in business trends and technology; so whatever dire predictions there are, a family in the business setup can contribute to better customer services because the sense of proprietorship is strong.

Dos and Don’ts

Research into family in the business yielded surprising results but more exploration is needed to pigeon hole specific issues. However, these common sense dos and don’ts can send you in the right direction when hiring immediate family members and relatives.

The Dos:

– Do follow the hiring process. This will help you evaluate their potential and the gray areas where company intervention is needed.
– Do tell them what you expect from their performances.
– Do remind them that you are the boss and there are boundaries where business is concerned.
– Give them the training they need.
– Do be fair.

The Don’ts:
– Don’t bring family issues to the workplace
– Don’t show any favoritism if you don’t want a mutiny in the company
– Don’t expect them to slave over their jobs because you are the boss.
– Don’t give unsuitable tasks and expect them to give an outstanding performance.
– Don’t excuse lousy performance

It is always tempting to put family members in the higher echelon of the business organization but if you want your children or your cousin to learn every aspect of the business, they should start at the bottom of the ladder. Exposing them to the different business facets will develop and hone their management skills for future positions.

It’s a pain hiring family and relatives WHEN they do not have the skills for the job; hiring them for the sake of family ties will only risk your business and not hiring them will put you in a jam. But if you have no choice, be firm. Start them on something they can handle and always be the boss — not Dad, hubby, or cousin.

Carol Araos comes from the eastern islands of the Philippines where life has its own pace and idiosyncrasies. When she is not busy as a full-time mom and granny or writing, she is out there exploring life and enjoying every minute of it.

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Tags: ethical, family, business, code, behaviour

“Because it certainly does not include honesty. It can be said with certainty that the current global financial crisis was created by the utter dishonesty of the banks.

The reputations of the largest corporations in the world are being questioned more and more as a tsunami of evidence emerges as to the utter indifference of Top-down-Management to their customers needs and expectations.

And the weasel words used by Marketing and Advertising agencies to justify spending (and thus wasting) more and more ineffectual advertising on new and old media are examples of creatively brilliant lying!

Traditional TV advertising is under further threat as the take-up of personal video recorders (PVRS) soars, and still they recommend advertising on TV, where no research evidence has ever emerged as to its efficiency and accountability.

Just how dishonest is the Advertising Industry?

For thirty years at least there has been a well researched, well documented communications technique that proves, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that interactive communication, properly executed, is far more cost effective than traditional advertising. However given the method of remuneration enjoyed by the Advertising Agencies/Media Agencies they have chosen to ignore this far superior method of communication.

Here in England, the Home Office has admitted spending tens of millions of pounds on TV advertising. £20 million was spent on TV adverts rather than the hiring of more police! A spokesperson said “”People will be appalled that so many millions are being wasted on spin at a time of economic hardship. People want more police on the streets, not more PR on the TV. It is, to say the least disgraceful , that at a time of economic hardship, the Home Office chooses to spend millions of pounds of taxpayers money on propaganda.

Good Lord how the mighty Marketing and Advertising experts have failed. For instance, let us start with high finance, the Marketing experts failed spectacularly to predict what in retrospect looks like a catastrophe waiting to happen. And a catastrophe, moreover, that owed nothing to bad luck or “”an act of God”", but was wrought by Marketeers themselves. In the world of Advertising it is the first era to value mass mediocrity above individual genius. That is evidenced by the decline and fall of the Marketing and Advertising expert in public esteem, no longer do the public pay attention to, nor believe in, the utter honesty of the marketing messages pouring out in an ever increasing number – they treat ALL advertising as a pack of lies (which is not too far from the truth).

It would be true to say that the crisis affecting advertising/marketing is a reflection of the crisis affecting civilization. Perhaps it is now necessary to look at this crisis as a symptom of things gone wrong in the business world.

It is time for Marketing/Advertising to wake up to the fact that they have dehumanized and depersonalized our relationship with the media, thinking that their actions only affected only their own sphere of interest, however the appalling decisions made in America have set off a domino effect making it necessary to bring new ideas to the forefront of Marketing and Advertising.

The only hope of saving advertising and marketing lies in a fundamental re-examination of the values that we have lived by in the past 30 years

After discussions with the publisher, my book “”Television killed advertising”" is now being issued early in the New Year, the Publisher wants “”Television killed advertising”" to miss the Christmas rush and sales. In the book I detail just how much more effective interactive communication is when compared to conventional advertising and details the results of a research investment in excess of £5 m.

Having invested over $10 million in independent research, Paul Ashby is ideally suited to present the case for the widespread use of interactive marketing communication. The research investment has proved conclusively that one exposure to an interactive “”event”" is far more effective in all key measurements, than traditional advertising. Paul made this investment because has established that Interactive Communication, properly executed, can be totally accountable, unlike all forms of advertising!

Discover more on this site

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Tags: ethics, code, conduct, business, behaviour

“It seems that Ethics is a growth industry. There are even advertisements in the newspapers for “”professional ethicists”".

Does this mean that we are getting more ethical? Are we at the place of which Plato dreamed, where “”kings are philosophers and philosophers are kings”".

Alas, the opposite seems to be true. The fact that so-called “”experts”" have to be employed to say what is ethical is just one sign that many people are increasingly incapable of telling right from wrong for themselves.

Indeed, the “”professional ethicists”" are not really concerned with moral right and wrong. Rather they are a junior branch of the legal profession. Many sectors, especially those related to medicine and human services, now have “”codes of ethics”" or “”codes of conduct”". A breach of these codes may have legal consequences. The purpose of the “”professional ethicist”" is to give a degree of protection from those legal consequences. Surely this is the very opposite of ethics.

The last century has seen an enormous expansion in the scope of the law in most jurisdictions. Activities which were previously left up to individual conscience are now regulated by the state.
This is particularly true of business.

Yet it has not made business more honest. To rely on force rather than conscience to get people to do what is right is to undermine conscience. When people are forced, rather than persuaded, they will do what they are forced to do and no more. They will feel no sense of obligation.

More and more, the business world is filled with people who are governed by the principle of “”what can we get away with”", rather than by what is right.

It was not always so. We must not be so naive as to imagine that there was ever a Golden Age when everyone was always honest – but things certainly used to be better than they are today.
Previous generations were less likely to see a conflict between doing what was morally right and doing what was in their own best interests.

Partly this was due to the greater emphasis that was placed on Reputation in those days. Business communities tended to be smaller, either because they were geographically isolated or because there might be a small number of specialists in very close correspondence. If a man did anything dishonest, it would soon be known by everyone and his chances of remaining in business would be negligible. Today, the global market is so big that it is unlikely that everyone will hear if someone has a bad reputation.
Mainly, however, it was because business communities usually had shared religious values.

Max Weber described the “”Protestant Work Ethic”". The same principle which encouraged people to work hard to succeed in business – a desire to please God – also imposed strict honesty on those business dealings. Protestant devotional works sometimes recommend standards that seem laughable today – like not taking advantage of information that was unknown to the other party in a deal and not charging market price where the profit is excessive. Yet the people who read those works often became very wealthy, not least because they had a reputation for fair dealing.

In the same way, Jewish bankers were able to do business, even if the face of virulent Anti-Semitism, because they built a reputation for scrupulous honesty. This only irritated the Anti-Semites even more.

Even today, an entrepreneur is better off if he deals with someone who is concerned about his reputation for honesty – and who possibly believes that there is an Accounting beyond the balance sheets of this life – than relying on any number of laws and regulations and artificial codes for protection.

Guy Kingston produces and presents the Mind Your Own Business podcast, offering free business advice to entrepreneurs and business owners. As well as audio podcasts there are more articles like this, compelling videos and a must-read blog. All at http://www.myobpod.com or you can network and join in discussions on the MYOB Facebook group (http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=12117784275).

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Tags: professional, ethics, code, conduct, work

Many street sweeping companies, which have big large contracts with retail outlets and shopping malls often cheat the company on their services. In fact, as I travel around the country I am appalled at this particular industry. It seems that so many of the contractors who have street sweeping businesses cheat the customer. I asked myself why this is? It appears to me that the lowest bid will get the contract and many of the companies bids are so low that they cannot afford to do the work or by adequate equipment to do the job right.

I have watched Street sweeping folks come into a parking lot and drive around a few times put a little bit of dirt in the air kind of like when you take your home vacuum cleaner and forget to clean out the bag and the vacuum blows all the dust all over the place while you are vacuuming. Then the street sweeper leaves without cleaning anything, as there is still debris in the parking lot and trash. This seems rather dishonest and I guess no one notices that they did not do their job.

Who is to say how clean a parking lot is supposed to be? As long as they showed up and drove around who is to say they didn’t do what they said they were going to do? My question is why show up at all if you’re not going to do the job? It seems there is a lack of integrity in many street sweeping companies. A very smart national firm, which operated professionally and responsibly could probably through economies of scale do the work for the same price and actually do what they say they’re going to do. Please consider this in 2006.

“Lance Winslow” – Online Think Tank forum board. If you have innovative thoughts and unique perspectives, come think with Lance; WorldThinkTank. Lance is an online writer in retirement.

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Tags:ethics, news, business, training, code

Do you understand what behaving ethically entails? According to Michael Josephson, there are four principles of ethical behavior: honesty, integrity, fairness, and concern for others. You can think of these four basic principles as the legs of an imaginary stool. One missing leg will create a wobbly stool, but two missing legs makes the stool collapse. If you aren’t fair or caring, your pride in being honest and having integrity means nothing.

Ethical Behavior in Business

As of late, ethical business behavior has been a number one topic of concern. Reviewing the events of the last year, it would appear that the words “business” and “ethics” are conflicting terms. Whether you look to Wall Street, mortgage companies like Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, or private companies like AIG, never mind all of the mortgage companies being investigated for questionable business practices, the news is depressing. It appears that the 1980′s mantra “greed is good” never truly went away.

The criminal dealings of top entrepreneurs have been uncovered, which should motivate other individuals to behave more ethically. In truth, however, it commonly acts as an excuse for not changing poor behavior. What harm can there be in using your company’s PC computer for personal business when your manager uses the company’s telephone for personal long distance calls? When employees see how company management conducts itself, they begin to feel no shame for whatever little indiscretions they may have committed themselves.

Managers can unintentionally be signaling that unethical behavior will be tolerated when they put pressure on a smaller, downsized staff to produce more. When employees feel forced to meet company goals by whatever means possible, ethical behavior may go by the wayside.

They get the message, “It’s OK to be dishonest, as long as you meet your objectives.” As the economy takes us on a roller coaster ride, we need to evaluate our own thought patterns to ensure that we don’t allow ourselves to fall into unethical behavior just because it looks like we can easily get away with it. There is always room for improvement in your business communications.

These are five guidelines to assist you in communicating ethically (source: “Business Communication, Process & Product,” Mary Ellen Guffy, 2000):

(1) Be truthful. Statements that are misleading or untrue should never be made. It is also not ethical to tell partial truths or to exaggerate.

(2) Be sure to label opinions as opinions. Do not attempt to convince anyone that something you merely believe to be true is already a proven fact. Do the work; research thoroughly and assure yourself that you aren’t just representing another person’s opinion as your own.

(3) Do not show bias. Understand that your own subjective beliefs may come through in your writing. Even if you are passionate in your opinions, ethics call for you to be dispassionate in your presentation.

(4) Your communications should be easy to understand. You should put down your thoughts clearly, so they are simple to comprehend. Make sure that what you write can be easily understood by the reader. Don’t muddy the waters by using convoluted sentences and all sorts of hard-to-comprehend industry jargon.

(5) Credit your sources. Do not copy anyone’s work. Most people have the basic knowledge that they must use quotation marks if they are using a direct quote from another writer. Yet there are a number of people who do not understand that they need to properly credit other people’s ideas as well. You are still cheating if you paraphrase sentences and throw in a handful of new words without crediting the author.

Summation

Not only must you communicate ethically to be successful in the long run, but it is also morally correct. Be sure you conduct yourself in the way that you would want others to emulate. If you conduct your affairs ethically and are successful, other individuals will follow your lead.

Michelle Howe, MBA, president of Internet Word Magic, specializes in writing irresistible copy for websites. Transform the way you do business. Visit her website at http://www.InternetWordMagic.com for a FR^EE chapter download of her new book “Turn Browsers into Buyers”.

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Tags: business, code, ethics, behaviour, communication, considerations

Does dishonesty in business pay? The answer to this question is: Yes, No, Maybe, and Sometimes. Dishonesty may pay, but usually only over the short run, and the consequences may be severe. Honesty may not always pay, although it’s still the “best policy.”

Examples

Bernie Madoff, the famous Wall Street Investment Advisor is a prime, and recent (December, 2008) example of business dishonesty on a large scale, and for a long period of time. While, at this writing, details of his scheme are still emerging, it appears as though an elaborate Ponzi scheme was perpetrated over at least a twenty year period. The total amount involved could be as much as $50 billion, as the $17 million that Mr. Madoff had under management was highly leveraged. In the meantime, Mr. Madoff was released on $10 million bail. The primary concern about this story is that Madoff was a highly regarded Advisor, practically above reproach,with heretofore unquestioned integrity. The man was an icon, as one of the founders of the NASDQ exchange. The damage to investor confidence may be considerable.

There are numerous other examples of fraud, deception, and thievery on an even larger scale. Some scandals reach into the hundreds of millions, perhaps billions. The Forbes Magazine “Corporate Scandal Sheet” (Patsurius, 2002) listed over twenty big ones, while acknowledging “chronicling every corporate transgression would be impractical.” Names like Enron, Global Crossing, Adelphia, Time-Warner, Bristol-Meyers, Haliburton, K-Mart, Tyco, WorldCom, and Xerox are on the list. But there have been many more. In fact, cheating, falsification, and “crooked” accounting seems rampant. Everyone from big brokerages, accounting firms, manufacturers and retailers had their turn.

So who can you trust?

Enforcing Corporate Honesty

The Sabanes-Oxley Act (2002) was enacted following the Enron scandal. The law strengthens reporting requirements and directs corporate oversight and internal controls. But can external requirements work when the rewards for a little corruption can be so astonishing? Obviously not. Corporate scandals continue unabated. There is a “risk-reward” equation in operation that seems to favor taking chances. Ethics and honesty often lose out when confronted with the possibility of huge financial rewards, the profitability demands of shareholders, and the relatively small chance of legal recourse.

The Consequences of Dishonesty

The consequences can be severe. Not the jail terms, personal disgrace and business failure, but the taint of the entire business community and the distrust of even reputable businesses. Commerce can grind to a halt, liquidity shrivels, and financing may be practically unattainable. Consumers may curtail their spending, investments and purchases. Promises, guarantees, and contracts will be under suspicion, or of limited meaning. These are the consequences of dishonesty. If we can’t trust each other how do we transact business?

Copyright © 2008, Dr. Ben A. Carlsen, MBA. All Rights Reserved Worldwide for all Media. You may reprint this article in your ezine, newsletter, newspaper, magazine, website, etc. as long as you leave all of the links active, do not edit the article in any way, leave my name and bio box intact, and you follow all of the EzineArticles Terms of Service for Publishers.

Ben A. Carlsen, Ed.D, MBA, is an experienced CEO and manager. Dr. Carlsen has over 30 years experience in management, consulting, and teaching. Currently the Head of the Business Department at Everest Institute, Hialeah, FL., he was Chairman of the Los Angeles County Productivity Managers Network and President of the Association for Systems Management (So. Calif. Chapter). Additional information can be obtained at http://drben.info

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Tags: business, ethics, workplace, code, professional

If you are a small businessperson then chances are you have had a situation occur where another small business or larger competitor has used the local Government code enforcement officer to harass you. This is a common occurrence and it is unfortunate that they do not teach this at the SBA seminars.

The good old boy network that occurs in most cities is alive and well in the United States of America. This occurs both in large cities and small towns. Competitors know that if they can get the local code enforcement officer to come over and find a violation in your business that it will slow your business town and therefore give them the edge.

It is too bad that people do not have more integrity than that and too bad it competitors call in competing companies for violations. Of course if you are violating the law he should not be violating the law, but we know that many of the rules and regulations from the municipal level all the way to the federal level are quite onerous and this is unfortunate.

It is literally impossible to follow all the rules or for that matter even know all the rules. In my 27 years in business as a Franchisor, I cannot tell you how many times our franchisees just starting out in their local areas had to deal with competitors who called them into the code enforcement. Often they had done nothing wrong; except step on the toes of an existing businessperson, which was well-connected in the city.

Sometimes, a smart code enforcement officer will realize that the complaint coming in is from a competitor and simply make a visitation to the company or business involved in the complaint. This is an opportunity for you as a small businessperson to talk to the code enforcement officer and ask them if they can help you comply with all the rules.

This way they will explain what the rules are and which rules they are most apt to care about. Being on a first name basis with the code enforcement officer in a local municipality is a smart thing to do for any businessperson.

It is extremely important for you to realize that these things happen and although it may be personal between you and your competition; it is not personal between your company and the code enforcement officer. If you are breaking the law he will have to comply with the law and it behooves you to learn exactly what the law is and the intent so that you can remedy the situation without further problems from the code enforcement officer.

When a competitor makes a false complaint they actually end up hurting themselves and therefore it is unwise to turning your competitors unless they are ripping off customers, polluting the environment or doing something that you know to be harmful to others.

Simply turning in your competitors for a minor violation or infraction will only cause you to have a war with that competitor and just imagine all the different regulatory bodies that there are in our government and what you will do if each one of them comes to visit you during a one month period.

In fact it will be impossible for you to get any work done or make any money. So before you go in turning your competitors remember the Golden rule. Oh and one last thing; if a competitor turns you in for something that means they consider you a threat and that means you must be doing something right. Consider this in 2006.

“Lance Winslow” – Online Think Tank forum board. If you have innovative thoughts and unique perspectives, come think with Lance; WorldThinkTank. Lance is an online writer in retirement.

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Tags: military, ethics, code, medical, profession, accounting

First: Hard Work – Continue to be consistent in terms of what you are doing and actively pursuing. Hard work pays off if you follow through with a plan of action. Stay focused.

Second: Take Instructions And Guidance From Your Business Coach

Your coach (upline) wants you to be successful. They will show you the best way to promote and market your business that leads to consumer/public interest, desired customer spending and yields pure profit.

Third: Eliminate “Dead Weight” Mentalities

When people try to improve their personal situation; financially and physically, they encounter a lot of criticism and negativity.

Let us examine that for a moment. If someone is so consumed with what YOU are doing to the point that they take “personal shots” and levy harsh remarks, ask yourself or if possible, ask that person why does it bother them about what you are striving to do. Watch the response you get… a blank stare, shrugged shoulders, confused/dazed look as though they can’t believe you would ask them that, an indignant attitude, verbal hostility or a defensive stance.

Such reactions are a defense mechanism designed to conceal the true culprit: “jealousy”.
In a strange small way, it can be flattering but instead of allowing their issues to “poison your purpose” let it “motivate your momentum.”

Fourth: Use past failures as an educational tool. If you have been down this road but stumbled, assess where you went wrong and coordinate an alternate route. For instance, say you did not get a lot of prospects the first time. Alright, try Online Marketing which has tons of free tools to drive traffic to your advertisement or website.

If you keep these elements in your “playbook” and comply, you will attain that home-base championship title that is yours forever.

Maxine Telford-Wolfe is a loving, doting wife and mother of three busy children. They keep Maxine on her toes. They also serve as her inspiration to succeed in life. Maxine enjoys working from home. Her favorite things to do are perform Yoga, Pilates and Taebo to exercise the mind and body. Humanitarian issues are dear to Maxine’s heart. The plight, suffering and starvation of young children resonates with Maxine. She has sponsored children from other countries and will continue to do so.

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Tags: define, ethics, business, code, corporate

Eighteenth century thinker Denis Diderot once noted, “There is no moral precept that does not have something inconvenient about it.” The underlying truth of that statement is one reason some people seem to have difficulty operating an ethical home business. Ironically, however, those seeming inconveniences can actually turn out to be advantages. Those who try to short-cut real important business values aren’t doing themselves a favor on either an ethical or a financial plane.

The temptation to skirt ethics comes from our strong desire to generate profits and to experience personal success. Most people who operate their own businesses are very driven by their aspirations and when all that seems to stand in the way of greater profits is an ethical question, they may be tempted to turn a blind eye to what is right.

That willingness to overlook principles might seem like a solid business decision in terms of the bottom line. Even if it is, of course, its reprehensibility and contribution to the worst parts of our society should dejustify the unethical behavior. However, a closer examination of most ethical shortcuts reveals that the “easy but questionable” way usually isn’t the sound business decision in terms of the profit levels, either.

That’s because our home businesses are based on our word and honor. This is especially true of online enterprises, where our perceived credibility is largely determined by our history of clean dealings. Although it may be possible to grab a few quick bucks disingenuously, doing so is likely to have longer-term repercussions on one’s reputation that will cost more in the long run than what is immediately generated.

Additionally, the Internet never forgets! A questionable auto salesman may be able to last awhile, as advertising and blind luck may lead others onto his lot. Those who make buying decisions online, however, are already positioned to do quick research about those with whom they may be dealing. All it takes is a little bit of “Googling” to reveal complaints, allegations and criticisms of unethical players. An ethical compromise in pursuit of fast money will haunt online vendors and service providers indefinitely.

When I teach and mentor new online home business owners, I make a point of reminding them not to compromise their ethical standards. Not only is that important on some deeper level, it is also a core component of long-term success. Ethics breaches do nothing to help home-based businesses, but do risk destroying them.

As you grow your home business, remember that the inconveniences of maintaining the highest possible standards also supply you with the building blocks by which you can construct a recognized foundation for honesty and fair dealing. That kind of reputation can be the difference between barely eking out a living and being a home business success story.

Elias Georgi makes it easy to build your home based business and earn a substantial income. Learn how to increase your income in the comfort of you own home with minimal effort by visiting here.

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Tags:ethical, theory, code, business, issue

I remember a “Business Ethics” seminar I took in college that confirmed everything my parents had taught me as a child. I heard clearly that capitalism was not an easy way to steal money from others but a way to make an honest living by providing a service or product to people who needed and wanted it. This secured my desire to become a businessman. During my career, I have held different positions in small, medium and even large Fortune 100 corporations. I have had the opportunity to work with great visionaries, empty “suits”, assembly workers, and, yes, those individuals who only wanted to get all they could while doing as little as they could.

The one constant I have always seen in the U. S. free market system is that a quality company with a quality product or service using quality employees always seems to do better over the long term than the snake oil vendor. Successful companies work hard to inject ethics and morals in everything they do and they take responsibility for their actions. Quality business leaders do not expect a “bailout” or feel they even deserve one. If they cannot assemble a team of enthusiastic employees who can achieve success, they clearly understand and believe they should fail and do something else. I have been involved with several business bankruptcies and none of the owners or employees of these companies felt anything but shame and failure for having left suppliers with debt, employees without a job and customers without a supplier. These leaders might have failed but many of them took their failure personally and worked as hard as they could to pay off all their debts and satisfy everyone who lost due to their bankruptcy. Those without ethics and morals merely started up a new corporation with a new name and immediately began to take advantage of others and repeat their failure.

I have been absolutely amazed at the automotive industry that very easily and arrogantly asked for taxpayer bailouts and are quick to blame the current economic crisis rather than themselves and their management teams. In our free enterprise system, a company that cannot manage its assets properly, has a product or service that the public wants to buy, and makes a profit for its shareholders goes out of business. Granted its employees, customers and suppliers lose money because of this situation but then they all find a replacement company and continue on with their futures.

Our free market concept is not extremely complex but must include ethics, morality and responsibility to achieve the highest of success and quality. The U. S. business model, for many years, was that ethical and quality concept the rest of the world not only envied but hoped to become. Even the Russians and Chinese, our fiercest Communist enemies for decades, are now embracing capitalism because we have become the world’s superpower with our ethical and quality business model.

Now here we stand about to enter 2009, and hopefully the last year of our largest economic downturn in the past 50 years, watching the CEO’s of the “Big Three” fail to admit their lengthy management failure which has allowed labor costs to be double any other auto manufacturer and provided exorbitant retiree pension and health care costs. For decades the “Big Three” bowed to their labor unions and were able to pass all the costs along to the consuming public with little or no competition to keep them honest. They fought and fought against every U. S. government agency that sought higher C.A.F.E. standards when oil was $25 a barrel but now believe they can retool and achieve amazing products and standards within the next two years if the US will only loan them a mere fifty billion dollars. This equates to $200 from every American man, woman and child living in the U. S. Our auto industry was, for several decades, the best in the world and an example of what innovation and technology could achieve. Many of us, in the business world, studied case after case on General Motors in business school and were impressed with the success and vision of the U. S. auto industry.

While this is an astonishing and sad commentary on the ethics and morals of the management of these companies, I find something else even more disgusting. The media and many politicians are now discussing a “pre-packaged bankruptcy” as a possible answer to their management failure. While all of us have sometimes slipped from our ethical pedestal, this suggestion is the ultimate loss of ethics and responsibility in our society.

I always advise my clients that bankruptcy is a process to be avoided at all costs. It is the point of ultimate failure by every business entity. If a business is having severe problems, the company and its management should do the right thing and negotiate with all parties to solve its problems and do everything to stay out of bankruptcy. Bankruptcy is only good for lawyers and takes over complete control of a business. How many businesses run by lawyers and courts ever succeed? Bankruptcy, by definition, normally requires the vast majority of all parties lose money and should only be used as an absolute last step. Bankruptcy has no ethics or morals. It carries a stigma for many years and labels the company as being unable to negotiate, succeed or perform a valuable service for the public. What makes anyone want to buy a car from a manufacturer that entered bankruptcy because they could not properly manage their company?

The auto industry should take the responsible and ethical route to solve their problems. They should negotiate with their employees, unions, retirees, suppliers and customers to fix their issues. They should also immediately work to change their corporate culture and reinstate a sense of ethics, integrity and responsibility in their employees which probably entails changing senior management and the Board of Directors who have now demonstrated their inability to run their companies correctly.

I am not naive enough to believe that the unions, employees and some suppliers will do what is necessary to become part of the solution and bankruptcy could ultimately still be required to achieve the end goal of saving these companies. This would be a gross injustice to all concerned because the legal costs would be astronomical and the company culture would probably not see the change needed to again make the auto industry the best in the world. I would love to be able to discuss with my grandchildren their business college case studies on General Motors. I remain very optimistic that ethics, morals and responsibility will once again become a part of the U. S. business culture.

As to our politicians, I am not as optimistic since we have seen that many of our elected officials vote based upon constituent polls and campaign contributions from lobby groups. I agree with the vast majority of Americans who give the US Congress a very dismal approval rating. Their agenda is focused more on their next election than on ethical and responsible decisions for their constituents. It is also a sad commentary on America’s sense of ethics and responsibility when a convicted felon in Alaska came very close to winning reelection to the Senate. His Republican colleagues in the Senate are extremely happy he did not win because many of them would have had to take a new poll in their states before deciding whether to allow a felon to be seated in the next session of Congress.

A very positive note in this situation is that a review of American history reveals that ethics, morals and responsibility become more prevalent in the US after a serious financial recession. Religion and personal introspection seem to become more important to the American citizen when his or her savings and retirement accounts loose half their value. Church attendance, volunteering at charitable operations, spending time with our children and even family dinners all see increases during recessions and I’m sure that will be the case when history is recorded on the 2008-2009 recession. Those politicians running for reelection in 2010 should be prepared for this moral shift.

Our current economic downturn is not the last we will see in our lifetime and the US will recover and be better afterward as has been the case in the past. However, I do hope that we can say the same thing about our ethics, morals and business responsibility.

Mel Luigs is the President and CEO of AML & Associates, a national management consulting company, providing a “Part Time” CFO for small and medium business that want to grow and expand. He is a highly accomplished executive with a solid history of developing critical business solutions and demonstrated leadership in both small and Fortune 500 companies. He has a strong combination of operational and financial expertise in both the manufacturing, retail and franchise business areas along with a solid background building strong working relationships, growing small companies or departments, building customer oriented teams and obtaining results. His company website is http://www.aml-associates.com

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Tags: business, code, ethics, issues, moral

Success gained through greedy behaviour (greed is an excessive and selfish desire to acquire or possess more than what one deserves) is normally not sustainable. Over the years we (unfortunately) witnessed many incidences of greed that eventually turned sour. This case study highlights some of the dangers and consequences of uncontrolled greed.

The discussion is done under the following headings:

* Making a quick buck;
* Scheming;
* Fraudulent behaviour.

Making a Quick Buck

Greedy business people often belief that they can (and should) make a quick buck when the opportunity arises. One method that they often use is to inflate profit margins. This is especially done in times of shortages or with new clients.

One of the suppliers of raw materials to many of our manufacturing clients had a reputation of taking new clients for a ride. When an important product was in short supply this company decided to inflate the price to around 30% higher than the market price. Their clients had no option and buy from them.

This strategy did, however, prove to be very shortsighted. One of our clients and another manufacturer were not pleased with the situation (to put it mildly). Both of them explored the international markets and they then built direct relationships with the suppliers (of many raw materials). The extra profits that the greedy supplier made turned out to be his last. The market turned against him and rather bought from the more honest suppliers at stable prices.

Schemes

Some greedy operators are excellent schemers. They would work out schemes where they normally have little or no risk compared to their “victims”. They often have nothing substantial in their own personal make-up and experience. Most of their “victims” also tend to act on greed. Unfortunately many of them cannot afford to lose their life-savings, homes, etc. in these schemes. Some of these schemes (especially pyramid schemes) are totally fraudulent.

We have met many greedy schemers over the years. One that stands out is a serial schemer that caused many harm over the years (also towards himself and his family). His schemes are, however, (almost) legal. He would typically create a business plan that seems fantastic. For this he would do his homework and with much passion and hype he would sell his idea to unsuspecting partners. They would eventually learn that his ideas were not really that practical, that figures were totally inflated, that his knowledge were superficial and that many of his assumptions and claims were outright lies.

Although the above mentioned culprit has not done anything (yet) that can take away his freedom he has lost many excellent opportunities in his chosen fields. Some of his more experienced and financially sound partners were prepared to walk the extra mile with him. They have now lost their respect for him. In the business world (that is smaller than what most people think) his name has also been severely tarnished. I would imagine that his self-respect must also be rock bottom by now.

Fraudulent Behaviour

Many greedy operators would stop at nothing to achieve their goals. They would forever push the envelope. In the beginning they would probably get away with something small, then graduate to more serious “offenses” until it spiral out of control.

Our company worked with a few people many years ago. They were responsible for their company’s procurement. We initially had an excellent relationship. Then we started to feel uncomfortable about some subtle remarks that they made in friendly conversations – they hinted on receiving kickbacks. When these comments increased we stopped doing business with them.

These guys went ahead and formed fronting companies for some of their activities. They also embarked on mutual-beneficial relationships with some of their big suppliers. Kickbacks were used extensively. This behaviour continued over many years. Many people were aware of it, but were too afraid to do something (due to the influence and threatening behaviour of the perpetrators).

Eventually a new senior director was appointed in the company. He took it upon himself to clear the company of corruption and request a detailed forensic audit. All of the culprits (including the suppliers) are currently being charged for fraud, theft, corruption and racketeering. The asset-forfeiting unit is also on their trail and their company started civil proceedings against them. At a time where these people would normally think of retirement they are now faced with public humiliation, financial ruin and long jail sentences. Their families are also severely traumatised.

Summary

We live in a world where money is being seen as success. Many people are not prepared to do what it takes to be financially successful – hard and smart work (and probably a bit of luck too). They want instant gratification and take short-cuts. It often starts out small and then snowball into gigantic proportions. Eventually success that is attained through greed tends to be hollow, not sustainable and it can have grave consequences.

Copyright© 2009 – Wim Venter

Wim Venter is the CEO of Ventex Corporation, a business development consultancy. To receive more information on how to start a new venture, to grow it sustainably and to finally harvest it successfully, sign up for our free newsletters or contact us via our website.

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Tags: ethics, work, business, moral, code

Business profitability depends upon attaining any number of sub-goals. Business success results from attributes such as creation of products and services that are wanted and needed, excellent employees that are skilled-knowledgeable and a management team that is inspiring the work force and customers. Make a difference socially and still survive as a business, endeavor to have the following ethical policies and practices:

• Environmentalist: preservation through conservation and consciousness. Reducing possible damage.
• Promote equal employment
• Provide safe, clean, healthy work environment
• Protection from sexual harassment
• Fair compensation
• Permanent employment
• Help generate money for all: Do not exploit the market.
• Critical thinking participation
• Charity: Give Back
• Live by the Golden Rule.

Social Venture Giving: if company makes only withdrawals from society–material resources, human resources, energy, wealth-and does not invest in society then it depletes itself in the long run.

Social Responsibility is a strong thread to business success. Public service is an investment. Do not separate the well-being of the company from the well-being of the community. Contribute to provide the community access to day to day elder care and day care. Family Leave Policy sends a message we care. Fund education, give back to the community. Implement and be part of community programs with local schools and community organizations addressing youth and environmental issues. Keep competitive edge, increase productivity and quality. To survive and prosper, remember that labor is not another business expense. Employees are assets to be developed, not cost to be cut.

Carmen L Camacho, location Puerto Rico USA. Carmen’s Desk, Virtual Office Assistant, environmentalist, artisan. click here

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Tasg: ethics, resonsibility, code, moral, business

Let’s be clear here, I’m not actually receiving a pile of cash from uncle sam. If I were you, I’d be happy to hear that, because hey, uncle sam is you, and you’re already funding several other bailouts. Even if you like my article, I bet you’re not willing to pay me a million bucks for it.

Do I actually need a bailout? Sure. Everyone needs a bailout. Everyone needs medicine, everyone needs therapy, everyone needs to be told what to do and how to do it and everyone needs a bailout. You can’t expect me to make all the right decisions all the time, can you? And if I happen to make a little mistake or ten that would put me in the hole, you don’t really expect me to bear the brunt of my own decisions… do you? Are you some kind of crazy Republican?

You feelin my drama here? I was a little heavy on the sarcasm, but the snarky tone behind it was pretty real to me. At least a few days ago. Yesterday, it changed.

Typically, I run with the elephants. Not always and not a party-line thing, but more often than not, at least in principle if not execution. My circle is mostly elephants. I get most of my news from my circle. Somehow the news finds them more often than it finds me (must be working more) and so my news comes pre-flavored. Like many, I run with like-minded beasts and typically the flavor suits me and I roll the same way. Once in a while though I find myself upside down-supporting a point I am not sufficiently educated on with someone from the other tribe who’s challenging my Republican-ness, or more likely not my actual Republican-ness but some point of view that’s associated with Elephant thinking, like a topical manifestation of my politics. I know that sounds like a rash.

That just happened yesterday, and in fact it did feel a bit like a rash. Something I’d considered part of me became uncomfortable when exposed to the light and I found myself compelled to be rid of it. My circle of friends and family had been bitching about the Detroit bailout, the UAW, and all things assocaited with the automaker bailout. People who are normally conservative, in the literal sense, were outspoken and in a bitter way. I was somewhat part of that and had voiced my displeasure at the thought of my taxes and future taxes being committed for me to bail out businesses that were, I thought, suffering the consequences of their own bad decisions. Detroit has a rap of being behind the curve in quality, safety, and economy. I used to be in the auto marketing business, and it was considered common knowledge that the Japanese started doing things really well in the 70s and, learning at every opportunity, really started eating our lunch and never stopped. This was largely the fuel of the argument.

Interestingly, the fuel of the argument was based on a trend. That trend, though unchecked for a long time, has more recently evaporated. The inertia it had built lives on with gusto and most people don’t know that the truth has changed. What! How can that be?

Yesterday I emailed a friend in Michigan and brought up the topic of the bailout. I mentioned that my elephants were seething about it. My friend responded quickly that Michigan was seething about the bank bailout and in a very circumspect manner pointed out the details of how Detroit automakers had, in fact, glosed the gaps. Quality? better than the Japanese in many examples, on par in many others. Safety? Same thing. Emissions? Doing just as well, thank you and in economy, doing BETTER than the Japanese for comparable vehicles. I’m a data junkie. When I say I was in the auto marketing business, I was in the auto quality measurement business for a well known market research firm. My friend had provided proper citations and I felt no compulsion to challenge them because I know my friend and I’d put my own money on him being right. It’s all out there. The part where I ate crow in regard to the Detroit Bailout Bill was in completely missing the inter-related nature of the banking and automaker bailouts.

Automakers all over, Domestic, Asian and European, are tanking in sales, which I attributed to the economy. I was aware that the Japanese builders, Toyota in particular, lost money for the first time since 1937, but I really didn’t connect the causality of the relationship (at least partial) between the banking issue (not the issues of the general economy, but the lasting tightening of the lending market) and the automaker’s financial issues. I knew people couldn’t get loans and weren’t buying cars, but I mistakenly thought it was a Domestic problem.

I also realized that the Detroit Bailout Bill inherited all the bad mojo from the banking bill. It seemed to come and go with less attention and iterations than the automaker bailout plan. The first one stirs things up and the second one gets double heat. The clencher for me personally was a personal discovery. After I realized that it’s not about quality, safety, emissions or economy of the vehicles from Detroit, and after I realized the very direct causal nature of the banking problem to auto sales and after I realized the one-two effect, the last ingredient that had stirred me to anger was national pride. This ties back to the misunderstanding about the vehicles themselves, but the pride component was what gave me my venom – I felt that I had been let down by American manufacturing and that we were all paying for it. Almost like being embattled in a war out of negligence – that was my emotion.

So here it is – I’m sorry. I think I probably made a mistake in my simplistic judgement. I’ll get my facts straight and think about it some more.

I have friends who have lost their homes, some who are getting really creative with trying to make a buck and some are just living scared. Some public services that rely on state or federal funding are lacking too, and some of these groups are getting creative also. I recently came across a group in Palm Springs that is raffling off a house to earn money to provide services to challenged citizens in the area. They provide job training and other self-sufficiency training and services, and raffle sales help pay for it. To me, that’s the epitome of the American way, getting creative and helping people out, good old-fashioned neighborly support and American resolve. And no, it’s not a house that someone foreclosed on, it’s a brand new house and the builder is part of the project.

So, how did I get a bailout? I got schooled a bit for making conclusions without all the details. My friend helped me get my focus back on my own work and on helping those around me. I think that’s better than a bailout.

DesertARC provides vocational training, job placement and employment, independent living support and more to citizens with challenges. Their Dream home raffle is a great way to support others… and win a $1.2M house along the way. Kind of a personal bailout. – Dan Patrick

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Tags: personal, ethics, code, professional, social

How in the world did I get scammed by a 100% satisfaction or your money back guarantee offer? You’ll probably be a bit surprised, if you haven’t fallen victim to this scam as of yet. Check this out!

I’m attending what I felt was a relatively expensive seminar when the orator goes into his sales pitch to sell another one of his seminars.

“$4,000.00! Is he kidding me?” I thought to myself.

I knew for certain that there was no way anyone could convince me to pay $4,000.00 to go to a seminar knowing what my bank statement looked like during that period.

But guess what? This particular salesman said some magic words:

“If you are not a millionaire in one year using the skills I will teach you at this seminar, you will get 100% of your money back!”

“Whoa! Wait a minute! How can I lose with an offer like that?” I thought.

I thought either one or two things would happen.

1. I would become a millionaire in a year! (Yeah, Baby!)

or

2. I would get 100% of my money back. (Not a bad investment!) I didn’t see anyway there was to lose! “I’ll take it!” I ecstatically thought.

While digging in my purse for a couple of credit cards to pay for this “much too expensive” seminar, I pictured myself enjoying my million dollars. I was overly excited!

I was passionate, very ambitious, an extremely hard worker and had specialized skills. All I needed was that last piece of the puzzle of how to turn my skills and passions into a means of supporting myself. I was ready!

“Teach me how to turn my skills into millions!” I thought.

Well, I soon discovered on my first day at this “make me a millionaire” seminar that my eyes weren’t able to “see” this million dollar picture very clearly. Here’s the Deal:

1. The offer wasn’t made in writing. There was no way to really prove the orator made such an outstanding offer stating these magnificent 100% guaranteed results.
2. When I got to the seminar, he stated a long list of “impossible” tasks that must be completed in order to get a refund.
3. I say “impossible” because he did everything possible to make sure no one would be eligible to request a refund.
4. The seminar did not deliver on its promise. Instead of teaching success skills, we were bombarded with offers to purchase other programs that “promised” to get us to that million dollar mark.
5. I lost $4,000.00 (plus hotel and plane fare) and a lot of time attending what turned out to be a huge lot of infomercials and a scam.

I learned an important and expensive lesson. Here are some “How to Avoid The 100% Guarantee Scam” tips I will share with you:

1. Before falling for the 100% guarantee or your money back offer, get the terms of the offer in writing.
2. Find out exactly what needs to be done to get your money back and how long it will take to get the refund.
3. Find out how the money will be refunded (as a credit for future purchases or your money back.) When we know better, we do better!

Self-Empowerment is the key to never getting scammed again!

YOUR LIFE really can be as beautiful and as bountiful as YOU create it to be! Self Empowerment is the Key!

Karen E. Smith is the author of Energy Diet, a self empowerment eBook. She is also a book reviewer for AnimatedBookReviews, a book review web site featuring reviews of empowerment books that motivate, inspire and educate.

Please visit The Energy Diet Book Web site to learn how you can empower your life here

AND Please visit The Animated Book Reviews web site for some empowering books for
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Tags: business, ethics, code, society, article

Have you ever wondered what fair trade companies actually do? And just because they say that they are ethical and you should buy their products, how can you know they can truly be trusted?

If you’ve ever found yourself asking these questions, then check out these simple tips and guidelines to help you navigate the world of ethical trading and ensure that your shopping experience is a positive one.

Firstly, what does ‘fairly traded’ actually mean?

When a product is described as ‘fair trade’, it means that producers were paid decent wages (often two to three times more than standard, and certainly not the minimum wage), working conditions were humane, sustainable working practices were followed, and that all of these were closely monitored.

Fair trade companies purchase from producer groups as directly as possible, eliminating unnecessary or exploitative middlemen. This means there is no sub-contracting and out-sourcing. Supply chains must be transparent.

After all, so many companies distance themselves and their brands from the products they sell and the factories where production takes place. There’s a good quote from Helen Woodward, an important US copywriter in the 1920s, which illustrates the gap between the aspirational image of a brand and the often grim reality of how the products are actually made:

“If you are advertising any product, never see the factory in which it was made…Don’t watch the people at work…because, you see, when you know the truth about anything, the real inner truth – it is very hard to write the surface fluff which sells it”.

Put simply, fair trade companies are the opposite of that. There is no hidden secret behind the brand, because these are companies that are taking a holistic view of business, in which they have resolved to eliminate exploitation of workers and the environment.

So what do these companies actually do?

The answer is very simple. In many ways, they are just like any other business or enterprise. They are selling just like ordinary companies, because increasingly ethical trading is moving away from its origins as handcrafted ‘world’ or maybe even slightly hippy goods into the mainstream. Essentially, the market is demanding good products that are made according to ethical practices. That’s why you’ll now find a host of ethically-sourced products, including jewellery, clothing, furniture and much more.

Even some of the biggest chain stores now stock ethical products and ranges. In the late 1990s students and activists were attacking the likes of Starbuck’s for exploiting workers, but now Starbuck’s is one of the biggest buyers of fairly traded coffee in the world. WalMart also stocks ethically-sourced products. This is a world that’s changing radically all the time.

So how can I trust these fair trade companies?

Good question. And totally legitimate. After all, in many cases you as the customer may be being expected to spend a little bit more to help a social cause. So you have every right to question their authenticity.

There are a number of certification bodies and standards organisations that you should look out for when you’re shopping or consuming. For commodities such as coffee and chocolate, in the US you should look out for the Fair Trade Certified stamp, while in the UK, it’s the ‘Fairtrade Mark’ scheme run by the Foundation of the same name.

For finished goods such as jewellery, check out membership of the World Fair Trade Organisation or the British Association for Fair Trade Shops (BAFTS). And ask your ethical store what makes them so. Information about producers and transparency over production methods is important.

Today we are seeing a rapidly growing alternative system of trade which ensures that producers and workers in developing countries get a better deal from international trade. There are a whole host of fair trade companies, as well as conscious consumers, at the forefront of this developing system, because ultimately, it’s trade, not aid, that’s helping to bring millions of people around the world out of poverty.

Nicholas Watson is a commentator on fair trade issues. He is also founder of the Online Fair Trade Store

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Tags: ethics, code, conduct, business, behaviour