With all of the political campaigning, a report released this fall by the Josephson Institute received very little attention and unfortunately should have been both front page news and the lead story for every major media outlet. This annual report of over 36,000 students revealed poor work ethics where 60% of American high school students in order to improve their performance cheated on a test with 28% said that they stole from a store.

What is even more incredible is the disconnect between these students’ behaviors and their personal beliefs. Ninety-two percent of these students believed that their personal characters were satisfactory with a whopping 74% agreeing to the statement: “When it comes to doing what is right, I am better than most people I know.” From the sound of these findings, no wonder we have politicians who believe that their misleading to false ads are O.K. and that they did nothing wrong.

The results of this survey confirmed earlier surveys. In 2005, Donald McCabe at Rutgers University published a survey where more than 70% of students admitted to cheating at least once on a test. Cheating is not just reserved for highs school students. McCabe also surveyed graduate students and discovered cheating attitudes for:

• 56% of business students
• 54% of engineering students
• 48% of education students
• 45% of law school students

The ramifications from this research are far reaching. For example, business ethics has been the talk of many with the Enron executives and various other business executives being indicted. With over 1 out of 2 believing that cheating is OK, can this be part of the reason? Capitalism does not make people unethical. People are unethical before they enter the business marketplace.

In education, more and more is written about how parents are responsible for the conduct of their children. Yet, when almost 1 out of every 2 teachers cheated at some time indicates that the issue of work ethics or what I call attitudes of performance is just as much about teachers as the parents.

And in our society where many of the laws are written by lawyers who have been elected to office, is it a wonder that there is an attitude of going around the law when almost 1 out of 2 have an acceptable attitude about cheating?

Ethics is critical to any society not only surviving, but thriving. These surveys indicate that the U.S. business, education and future are at risk. When young people to adult U.S. citizens can hear and see their leadership including:

• U.S. President who said: “I didn’t have sex with that woman”
• U.S. Senator who said that his lawyers approved a report for a land deal where he made over a million dollars for land he did not own
• U.S. Senator who resigns due to unethical conduct with U.S. pages.
• U.S. citizen/lobbyist indicted for bribery
• Employees of elected city, state and federal officials being indicted for extortion, racketeering, fraud, etc.

Should we be surprised when 2 out of 3 young people feel that their behavior is better than everyone else’s even though almost 2 out of 3 young people have cheated on a test?

Tags: attitude, business ethics, character, education, freedom, leadership, performance, Poor Work ethics, resultattitude, business ethics, character, education, freedom, leadership, performance, Poor Work ethics, result

Share This

Most authorities agree that there is room for improvement in business ethics. One of the most problematic questions raised in relation to business ethics is whether or not businesses can become more ethical in the real world. The majority opinion on this issue suggests that government, trade associations, and individual firms can indeed establish acceptable levels of ethical behavior.

The government can do so by legislating more stringent regulations. But, rules require enforcement and when in many cases there is evidence of lack of enforcement even the ethical businessperson will tend to “slip something by” without getting caught. Increased regulation may help, but it surely cannot solve the entire business ethics problems.

Trade associations can and often do provide ethical guidelines for their members. These organizations within particular industries are in an excellent position to exert pressures on members that stoop to questionable business practices. However, enforcement and authority vary from association to association. Moreover, exactly because trade associations exist for the benefit of their members, harsh measures may be self-defeating.

Employees can more easily determine and adopt acceptable behavior when companies provide them with a “code of ethics.” Such codes are perhaps the most effective way to encourage ethical behavior. A code of ethics is a written guide to acceptable and ethical behavior that outlines uniform policies, standards and punishments for violations. Because employees know what is expected of them and what will happen if they violate the rules, a code of ethics goes a long way towards encouraging ethical behavior. However, codes cannot possibly cover every situation. Companies must also create an environment in which employees recognize the importance of complying with the written code. Managers must provide direction by fostering communication, actively modeling and encouraging ethical decision making, apart from investing in training employees to make ethical decisions.

Sometimes, even employees who want to act ethically may find it difficult to do so. Unethical practices can become ingrained in an organization. Employees with high personal ethics may then take a controversial step called “whistle blowing.” Whistle blowing is informing the press or government officials about unethical practices in an organization. Whistle blowing could have averted disaster and prevented needless deaths in the Challenger space shuttle disaster, for example. How could employees have known about life-threatening problems and let them pass? Whistle blowing on the other hand, can have serious repercussions for employees; those who make waves sometimes lose their jobs.

Tags: business, business ethics, ethical behavior, ethical guidelinesbusiness, business ethics, ethical behavior, ethical guidelines

Share This

Some say that work ethic in America is in decline, but is it really or are Americans simply getting too over weight and feel more lackadaisical when performing tasks? Is this then triggering a perception of laziness in some and a work effort riddled with excuses, delegation and blame gaming with most?

We have so many important jobs in our society that must be done, but if everyone is lazy, has a poor diet and refuses to put forth their best efforts, then all the work cannot get done on time and correct the first time. This in fat will lead to inefficiencies, increased costs and more work being created.

If more work is being created due to humans working less in their own civilizations then they will need to import others to help them do the work. But if they import a lesser class of citizen to do this work then they will cause animosity amongst the masses and further hardships down the road in the form of protests, demonstrations, boycotts and angry underpaid, under appreciated, second class citizen work force.

The poor work ethics and work force of America today is leading to an over all economic decline and tearing down at the fabric of society as a whole. We need a war on mediocrity, laziness and this new paradigm of “blame game” style excuses being currently promoted by Donald Trump’s Reality TV Series; “You’re Fired” and we may wish to consider the affect this change in attitude is having on our over all civilization. So, consider this in 2006.

Lance Winslow

Tags: Decline, Work Ethics in AmericaDecline, Work Ethics in America

Share This