{"id":1052,"date":"2015-09-21T09:00:52","date_gmt":"2015-09-21T13:00:52","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/aecom.com\/blogs\/?p=1052"},"modified":"2017-07-25T09:14:34","modified_gmt":"2017-07-25T13:14:34","slug":"why-ethics-training","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/aecom.com\/blog\/why-ethics-training\/","title":{"rendered":"Why ethics training?"},"content":{"rendered":"

Organizations often face a challenge motivating employees to take ethics training seriously. As the old adage goes, \u201cyou can lead a horse to water, but you can\u2019t make it drink.\u201d It\u2019s one thing to be recognized for developing an engaging, interactive training program, but it\u2019s another thing to attract the attention of busy employees and managers that already have a lot on their plates.<\/p>\n

Despite employees\u2019 competing responsibilities, ethics training is important and can have an impact on business, the company\u2019s reputation, and daily office morale. A company cannot afford to leave ethical decision making to chance because one hasty or ill-conceived action by an\u00a0employee can harm an\u00a0entire organization.<\/p>\n

For instance, treating a client to a seemingly innocent meal while competing for his\/her business could land the employee, the company and the potential client in hot water. Depending on the specific circumstances, this might reasonably be interpreted by the recipient as a reward for\u00a0preferential treatment in order to create an obligation to the other party.<\/p>\n

Effective ethics training is less skills-based and more focused on setting expectations of behavior in a variety of contexts. Therefore, it\u2019s helpful to use dilemma or scenario-based training of varying complexity that is reinforced regularly so employees can spot issues and make the right choices.<\/p>\n

For example, what does harassment in the work place look like? How do you react when a client requests a personal benefit? Is the customer always right? Or do we have established boundaries that can\u2019t be crossed?<\/p>\n

Employees usually know the answers to these questions in an abstract setting, but when an important contract or critical customer relationship is on the line, employees can feel pressured. This is why effective ethics training is more a matter of instilling values and promoting positive behaviors rather than solving any particular problem or reciting a dogmatic list of rules. The aim is to help employees make sense of what, at a glance, might seem like a convoluted situation and determine the ethical choice.<\/p>\n

AECOM requires all employees to complete ethics training and encourages them to think of it as something that is necessary for business operations, similar to established processes such as completing expense reports. Additionally, the firm\u2019s comprehensive ethics-and-compliance training program requires employees to acknowledge their understanding and commitment to the organization\u2019s purpose and core values annually.<\/p>\n

The majority of AECOM\u2019s success in getting employees to take ethics training seriously can be attributed to a handful of factors. It starts with the company\u2019s strong \u201cTone at the Top\u201d \u2014 which is the level of support and communication from senior executives and other leaders within the organization. Another factor is the company\u2019s culture \u2014 the support and encouragement employees receive from their peers in treating ethics training as an important business process. One way for managers to harness the power of positive peer pressure is to offer an incentive \u2013 perhaps a team lunch \u2013 to the first group that completes training.<\/p>\n

However, the single-most-important factor in getting employees to recognize the importance of ethics training is a manager who models the right behavior. If a manager consciously promotes ethics training as a priority, then it is more likely to resonate with his or her employees or project staff. What better way to get employees to renew their ethics training than by having their manager complete his or her training first and then saying \u201cI\u2019ve completed my Ethics training, have you?\u201d That manager can then more effectively communicate, both formally and informally, to his or her direct reports on how valuable ethics training really is.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s hard to overstate the importance of ethics training because it\u2019s part of the foundation of AECOM\u2019s ethics and compliance program. Indeed, it\u2019s one of the most important ways we can preserve the company\u2019s reputation, support our long-term prosperity and promote our values.<\/p>\n

Comment below to share why you think ethics is important as well as what factors create a successful ethics and compliance program!<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"Monique_HS_89x100\"Monique Nguyen, director of ethics and compliance training and integration, is based in AECOM\u2019s Arlington, Virginia, office. Monique has spent the last four years working in the company\u2019s ethics and compliance office, most recently, heading the company\u2019s global compliance-training program. She has been with the company for more than seven years and has a background in human resources for U.S. government contracting. <\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Organizations often face a challenge motivating employees to take ethics training seriously. As the old adage goes, \u201cyou can lead a horse to water, but you can\u2019t make it drink.\u201d It\u2019s one thing to be recognized for developing an engaging, interactive training program, but it\u2019s another thing to attract the attention of busy employees and […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":166,"featured_media":1054,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[106],"tags":[138],"yst_prominent_words":[561,2960,2950,2946,1302,2934,2943,2927,450,1299,1295,2921,2919,2955,2930,2924,1341,456,2926,2938],"class_list":["post-1052","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-ethics-and-integrity","tag-impact"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/aecom.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1052","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/aecom.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/aecom.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/aecom.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/166"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/aecom.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1052"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/aecom.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1052\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/aecom.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1054"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/aecom.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1052"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/aecom.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1052"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/aecom.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1052"},{"taxonomy":"yst_prominent_words","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/aecom.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/yst_prominent_words?post=1052"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}