Ethical Integrity in the Workplace

Ethical Integrity in the Workplace

Ethical Integrity in the Workplace

Introduction Ethics is not about what we say or what we intend, it is about what we do. The heart of integrity is demonstrating consistency between ethical principle and ethical practice. Integrity is a measure of character. In organizations, there must be a form of core values or principles that people understand and accept. Many people believe that they have to compromise their integrity in order to get ahead in the corporate world.

Creating Loyalty

Integrity in the workplace relates to employee commitment and loyalty. Employees in my opinion will be truly loyal when they believe their workplace has ethical practices. It is up to the leaders in workplace to ensure employees are presented with values, policies, labor practices, fairness, honesty etc. and to make sure it begins dealing with them. “According to a nationwide study tracking integrity in the workplace, the results are mixed, and indicate a number of challenges to business leaders. It should be of great concern that only half of American working adults believe their senior executives are people of high integrity. Only slightly more (fifty-six percent) feel that integrity policies have been well communicated in their workplaces or that there is little pressure to cut corners on ethics/compliance issues.” (Marr, 2001)

Although I know of ethical integrity being compromised in the workplace in one of my previous jobs, however I am not at liberty to disclose that information due to the nature of the job. There are many jobs such as my previous job, where information cannot be discussed or repeated and the military is a prime example. “Public Administration employees, including federal, state, and local government employees, are among the most negative about ethics in their workplace. Only twenty-seven in the government were comfortable reporting misconduct, compared with forty percent in Health Services, forty-one percent in Retail Trade, and thirty-nine percent in Financial Services.” (The Hudson Institute, 1999)

The Importance of Integrity

When a person has integrity, his actions match his words. Based on employee awareness today, most industries or organizations face more ethical challenges than others do. One reason that I find we scuffle with preserving our integrity in the workplace is that we misunderstand our primary purpose for working. Most people would say that they work to earn a living, because they enjoy it, or so they can afford the “nicer things” in life. From a Biblical sense, that I learned from a class that I have taken at my church is that God has a different perspective. In the New Testament, Paul writes “And whatever you do, whether in word or in deed, do it all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him” (Col: 3:17) He continues by saying “Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart, as working for the Lord, not for men, since you know that you will receive an inheritance from the Lord as a ...