Everyone
hopes that they work for an organization that has the general idea of what
being ethical is about and that they in turn expect the same type of ethical behavior
from their employees. Is that
organization just about making money or do they really care about their
customer and their employees as a whole?
Does the organization hold simple truths about who they are so that
everyone is aware of them? I believe my organization
does this as well as my department.
In
chapter 6, Transmit Your Values
Denning talks about three basic elements of ethics:
·
Trust: idea that we will engage and behave
ethically toward each other
·
Loyalty: to the organization and fellow
employees within that organization a commitment to not fail that trust while
doing their said duties to the organization
·
Solidarity: taking an interest and genuine concern
for other people and taking action on behalf of your fellow coworkers even if
is not in line with your personal interests
These components I feel
are important in any setting not just in business but in a personal setting as
well. Who doesn’t want trust, loyalty
and solidarity? In the organization
world it can be the glue that holds a business together and without it may well
fall apart.
For my department I can
say that we have these three basic but most important elements. We must trust our director is going to do
his best to get us the training materials we need to keep up with regulations,
the space we need to be able to speak with students, and go to bat for us when
he knows we are behind in our work. He has to trust that we not take advantage
of him by constantly coming in late or leaving early, lying about our work, or
not being truthful with our students. He
doesn’t have to always check that we are doing our work and that we are doing
it correctly because he has faith and trust in our abilities.
His
trust in us shows in the many opportunities we are afforded (being able to work
overtime when needed, traveling to conferences and campuses) and upper
management sees this as well. They are
not asking him why we are doing what we do they are praising him for how well and
efficiently we do our jobs and that we get a majority of our students paid
their financial aid.
This
trust leads us to loyalty because without trust there would not be any
loyalty. Our department has continued to
experience growth in the last 4 years and we have had very little turnover
since I started (we only lost a former director and one counselor because they
didn’t adhere to these three basic components).
When there is talk of getting other positions within our department I
get phone calls and emails from people in other departments and some who for
other companies who want to come work for our department. Not because financial aid is so much fun and
challenging but because of that trust and loyalty that our department has for
one another.
It
can be seen on a daily basis when you walk by our area. We work closely together and the common goal
is to provide the best service possible for our customers—the students and
campuses. It is this trust and loyalty that
makes our department cohesive in many ways.
If one of the counselors are out the others jump in and help. There is no worry that someone’s work won’t
get done because we trust each other to help out even if there is a conflict of
personalities between counselors the director knows we will work together. He doesn’t have to worry that the work will
not get done.
The
third component solidarity is something that we have but not to the degree that
we should. This is one area that as a
department we must work on to make us stronger and more cohesive. Because we work so closely some personalities
do not mesh well though on the outside it is not something you may be able to
spot right away. Some of us truly care about
the interests of others however there are a few that are only looking out for themselves
and they will make a point of letting you know that they are helping you out
just in case you forget. It is not about
trying to crush others to get ahead in the organization. We are all in this together.
This
is not what solidarity is about and there are some courses of action that are
currently being taken to help in this area.
There will be a retreat with team building exercises that will hopefully
bring us together as a team and make us more cohesive. It will be a great chance to come together
and get out some of these underlying issues that we have. Once this is done the department will then
truly be able to say that we are a genuinely ethical community.
As
for the organization itself I think that solidarity is something that needs to
be practiced across the board. ERAU is
one university though we have two main campuses (Daytona and Prescott) and the
worldwide headquarters there is not the feeling of being one university. For example, the state of the university
address is split up so that Daytona has one and then WW has one. Distance
is not an issue as we are right down the street from the campus. I believe that there needs to be some
education about the differences but most importantly the similarities between
the campuses. We are one university and
this needs to be conveyed to each campus.
There
was a time when students were not told that worldwide was an option to get an education
if they couldn’t afford to attend the main campuses. The suggestion was to attend another
college. Why take money away from our
own university? This was because there
was a lack of education in what ERAU had and still has to offer. There is a new program that is starting next
fall called the 2+2 where a student attends the worldwide campus for the first two years and then
transfers to the Daytona campus for the last two years. It is a
first step but it needs to be pushed at all levels. We are here for the same reason and that is to give
students the best education possible.
No comments:
Post a Comment