How do You Spell Success? E-T-H-I-C-S!

No matter what the business, what the company or what the industry, these five points apply across the board for all. Examine, after reading this, if your ethics training incorporates these concepts as the foundation of building a truly successful enterprise.
Don’t think so, read on.

E = Experience. Experience is not what happens to you, but what you make of what happens to
you. Learn from the lessons of life and use that wisdom. Values are caught not
taught. Think back, who modeled those life values to you, that wisdom that
stands the test of time? Identify, embrace and integrate those values and
in every decision you make in life. The result, is a person of true character that
people admire respect and with whom, they want to do business.

T = Training. Train yourself to keep asking the question: “Am I doing the right thing,
at the right time for the right reason?” This question is bound to keep you more
ethically focused. If companies don’t train their people to focus on this
question consistently, they leave themselves open to a greater chance of an
ethical lapse or legal trouble. The more we train people to consider things from
an ethical viewpoint, the better equipped we are for getting and keeping our
business relationships.

H=Hindsight. Hindsight gives us that opportunity to, hopefully, look more objectively into the
past in order to analyze, discern, and when necessary, make appropriate
changes. Hindsight makes the wisdom of past experiences available to us to
discern whether we have lived our values, acted ethically, and were “other-
centered” in our business dealings. Our obligation is to learn, assess, and adapt
to be more value based and principle driven in our business dealings.

I= Intuition. What does your ”gut” tell you is the right thing to do? Be attentive to it as it
affects all areas of your life. View intuition as your personal moral code,
because deep down, you know what’s right and wrong! Tap this “gift” of
self reflection for it will lead to better decisions, which lead to better results!

C= Customer. Ask yourself, are you making a sale or making a customer? Whatever your
answer is, is where your values lie! Here’s where people go “astray.” Your best
advertising is word of mouth. Your worst advertising is word of mouth. What’s
the difference? How you treat customers consistently and what is treatment
based on, is your values, your ethics and the focus of building
relationships. This is what builds or destroys your reputation,one way or the
other.

S= Stewardship: Stewardship is what we after we say we believe. Your mission statement, your
values statement, your corporate social responsibility, every internal/external
communication ,ie. website, social media, etc., all must reflect your
commitment to stewardship. If these are not consistently reinforced, acted
upon and communicated regularly, these statements, beliefs, etc. are called
into question and will negatively affect your business relationships

So how do you spell success?

fbucaro

Like you, business ethics and ethical leadership expert, Frank Bucaro has seen the challenges and problems of corporate leadership, particularly over the past few years in regards to poor decision-making, SEC violations, and record breaking financial settlements in a number of different industries. With over two decades of executive training, speaking, writing and with real life experiences, his view and approach to ethics in the workplace is uniquely different. He emphasizes that ethics is a moment-to-moment choice and has little to do with position, titles, personalities or education. Ethics is everybody’s responsibility from the top down. His goal is to help organizations to: a. Strengthen their ethics training initiatives in order to significantly decrease the odds of an ethical/compliance violation. b. Energize, train and motivate employees to understand the value of consistent “high road” behavior as a business advantage. c. Support individuals and thereby the organization by contributing to its success by quality, ongoing values based leadership development. Frank is known for his very practical, slightly irreverent, yet somewhat humorous approach to ethics and leadership development. His conversational style and real life stories connect with his audience in a personal, intense and practical level. Companies such as Bayer Healthcare, BP, ReMax International, EnMax Energy, Danone, etc. have partnered with Frank when they want to proactively stress the message, tools, insights and practical applications that good ethics IS good for business!