When teaching ethics, don’t focus on ambiguity

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When teaching ethics, don’t focus on ambiguity

By Lauren | May 12, 2009

Recently, I was called upon to help a professional association organize ethics training for its upcoming annual meeting. The program chair, who was relatively new in the job, told me that he wanted to present case studies with “ambiguous” situations where the attendees could argue whether the association’s code of ethics had been breached or not. “We don’t want to go black and white here,” he said, “we want to focus on the grey areas. After all, these are sophisticated professionals. They already know what’s right and wrong. Oh, and can we do it without mentioning the word ‘ethics’? Our folks don’t like to be lectured.”

Oh, boy …

The program chair was well-intended, but way off the mark. By offering the kind of course he suggested, the association would have been sending its members several unfortunate messages: ethical issues are just matters of opinion (they’re not), sophisticated professionals can take for granted that they understand their ethical obligations (they can’t), and any discussion of “ethics” will preachy and dull (not necessarily), so it’s okay to skip it (it isn’t).

Let’s be blunt. The more sophisticated an audience is, the more they may believe it’s okay to be clever, fun to find loopholes, and reasonable to ignore the very real outrage they’ll face from the public if their excess of cleverness injures ordinary people. Was anyone more sophisticated than the financial wizards who tanked the world economy last fall? ‘Nuff said.

Good ethics training isn’t dull. With an experienced presenter and an engaging topic, an ethics course will draw in the audience, remind them that the world is watching and reaffirm their commitment to doing the right thing even when it’s tough. When designing an ethics training course, it’s usually far better to focus on the rights and wrongs than the “mights and coulds,” then deliver the message with humor and clarity. There’s plenty to talk about in the black and white range, and your audience will learn far more than if you stick with shades of grey.

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