You've Got to Be Kidding!: How to Keep Your Job Without Losing Your Integrity

Myth 8: “A Person Cannot Be Talked into Acting with Greater Moral Courage”

Reality: I know for a fact that this is false because of what I’ve seen during my interactive ethics training. Employees have “aha” moments all the time and experience ongoing development of individual moral judgment (thank heavens). And nothing stimulates this growth more than examination of the ethical dilemmas that are likely to affect your company.

People often ask me, “Why don’t you, as an ethicist, tell your seminar attendees what to do and what not to do?” I always respond by reminding them that not even a psychiatrist tells you what to do. All anyone can do is help a person understand the ramifications of his or her actions. In the end, it’s up to every person on his or her own to make personal choices about right and wrong.

Ethics training is most effective when it asks questions that help people think through their dilemmas. Lecturing, sermonizing, telling, or reading about moral dilemmas have little impact—and would likely put my attendees to sleep. Likewise, casting shame and assigning blame on someone at the point his hand is in the cookie jar, so to speak, yields very ineffective results. It’s not until people actually address and discuss relevant moral and ethical dilemmas that they care about—with people they care about (their coworkers)—that change occurs.