by Chelsea Evans

Created on: September 28, 2010

     Within the business world of today, there have been many cases of unethical business practices that have been noted across the industry. In order to avoid these kinds of conflicts, there are a few steps that can be taken within every company to ensure that nothing questionable is going on within its walls. These include developing a code of ethics within the organization, holding ethic training workshops for employees, and setting up an anonymous hot-line for employee use in questionable situations.

     The first way to avoid unethical business conflicts is for the company in question to develop a universal code of ethics for their company. This code should state the company’s core value as well as how they expect their employees to act upon these values. It should be distributed to employees, customers, and stakeholders of the company. In order to distribute to these target audiences, the code should be presented to all new and existing employees directly, as well as being posted in a public setting, such as a company website in order to make this known to people outside of the direct company sphere. This code of ethics serves as a set of standards for the company that shows its target markets the manner in which the company will be conducting business.

     The next step in avoiding unethical situations within the business place is to educate employees not just about the company’s ethics, but on the topic of ethics in general. In order to make sure that companies are working within ethical standards, the employees of these companies have to have a working knowledge of ethics and what it means to their daily work. Thus, the implementation of company ethics workshops is an essential tool on the journey to avoiding unethical business practices. These workshops are a simple tool that can communicate the importance of ethics in a way that will educate several employees at one time which will put all employees on the same page as to how the company is expected to be run.

      The last main step to avoid unethical business practices within the workplace is to set up an anonymous hot-line for employees to use in cases of questionable situations within the company. This hot-line is something that employees should be educated of within the companies workshops. Employees should be encouraged to use this hot-line in the event that they note any suspicious activities going on within the organization. This will keep people on their toes and working within the ethical standards for the company, while ensuring employees that they have a way to report issues that they do not agree with that happen within the companies internal environment.

     While these three strategies will not guarantee that all ethical wrongdoings will be avoided within a company, taking these incentives to stop unethical actions before they happen will help to keep the company in check. Hopefully with the education of employees on the topic of ethics and what they can do to work within ethical guidelines, the business world can be a much more trusting environment as a whole.

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