A634.7.4.RB – Ethics and Behaviors
Ethics and Behaviors
According to LaFollette (2007), a psychological egoist claims to define the reason why we behave the way we do and points out that we act congruence to our self-interest yet cannot clearly explain the rationale behind our interests. Ethical egoist, on the other hand, claims that there is only one moral standard that is to say that we should act and behave in manners that maximize our self-interest (LaFollette, 2007). LaFollette (2007) further stated that although morality does not dictate that we have to sacrifice our self-interest for others and visa vi, that does not mean that we have to take advantage of other’s vulnerability nor mistreat and abuse others.
All management team, as well as the members of the workforce of every organization, must have a formalized code to live by for a successful organization to operate ethically and morally. It is of utmost importance that all members of the workforce from the CEO and members of the executive team to the non-management level to have a full understanding of how their personal values impact others. Their perception of themselves affect their stakeholders and the entire organization and their community, therefore, they must hold themselves accountable morally and legally to gain success ethically.
My Organization
Adventist Health System is a faith-based national healthcare leader that focuses on serving the community with Christ’s healing ministry and incorporates Christian values at every level of service. As a cutting-edge healthcare organization, Adventist Health System’s reputation for healthcare excellence is well known nationally and rates as one of the highest in employee engagement and satisfaction (Gallup, 2015). Executive leadership has focused on creating an environment of care in meeting the current and future needs of our patients, employees, and the dynamic changes in healthcare in the nation. Proactive in stance Adventist Health System has been developing a campaign that can launch a new paradigm in healthcare in the 21st century (https://www.adventisthealthsystem.com/page.php?section=about).
At Adventist Health System, growth and diversification, are driving how finances and our workforce are managed to direct a higher level of scalability and flexibility. The required regulatory changes are forcing our Executive Leadership in restructuring cost management, engaging employees in decision-making to fully leverage talents, developing future ethical leaders, and data changing resulting in adopting new technologies that reinforce imperatives’ P&L and cost governance heading to a value-added analysis and reporting.
Organizations like Adventist Health System offer leadership training courses/sessions to ensure diverse ethical leadership skills and knowledge for their employees’ personal and career development. Companies may provide a more comprehensive leadership development programs, but at times, they may offer more specified career-specific courses. To retain high-performing talents or workforce, offering a leadership program to develop the workforce’s future is only to organizations like Adventist Health System’s benefits creating a positive and ethical organizational culture and employee commitment and an environment of ethical and moral collaborative work (J. McGuirl-Hudley, personal communication, July 13, 2018). As Gallagher (2013) noted, “all actions have consequences.”
My Leader
When management establishes and abides by the codes, he or she made accountable for it will make a significant difference in the workplace culture and environment. Management’s established codes can give a guideline for how an individual with the management position should behave. It can also stimulate a positive emotion when one behaves in a way that exemplifies the code as well as triggers a negative emotion when one behaves in a manner that violates the code (Khurana and Nohria, 2008).
Leadership is the ability to influence, motivate and enable others to contribute toward the effectiveness and success of the organization and capacity to step outside the culture to start evolutionary change processes that are more adaptive (Yukl, 2012). Leadership and management although can be mostly linked to an oligarchic reality, both can equally serve a purpose since one is unsustainable without the other and apropos with leadership (Obolensky, 2010).
Opal Howard, East Florida Region, Executive Regional Human Resources Director is an excellent example of a leader who consistently practiced the process of leadership based on Yukl’s description. Opal joined the family of Adventist Health System at a young age as a Human Resources Assistant in the Florida Hospital Orlando Human Resources Department. Opal worked herself through college while advancing in the Human Resources department. She was an HR Specialist, Generalist, Recruiter, Manager, and Director until finally being promoted to lead the Human Resources Department for the East Florida Region of Florida Hospital.
George (2012) indicated that to become an authentic leader we need to gain self-awareness that involves real-world experiences. In the workplace, Opal, Executive Regional Human Resources Director for the East Florida Region is very open with her positive criticism when she notices or realizes that members of her team are overworking themselves to the extent that sometimes it affects their judgment and quality of work. As the leader for the East Florida Region for Human Resources, leadership, and employees consult with Opal for any employee-related issues and sometimes personal related. Critically assessing the situation gives her the ability to recommend an appropriate ethical resolution.
In one of the conversations I had with Opal, she mentioned that she believed a leader could fail by wearing too many hats and lose perspective of what is really important, as she has experienced while wearing two hats and performing a dual role. She at times has felt she is failing her team. Fortunately, her team members are very skilled, performing with excellence, and with high ethics which makes it easier for her to perform well in a dual role capacity. She believed that building a culture on an institution of trust and high moral standards based on confidence and a high level of ethical behavior is consequential to the success of a team. Kendrick (2011) defined a transformational leader as one who centers their energy on the team members, motivating them to achieve a higher level of performance to support the development of the leader from every member of the team.
Conclusion
Northouse (2016) described an authentic leader in three differing perspectives. In an
intrapersonal perspective, authentic leaders lead genuinely and from ethical convictions. Next, from an interpersonal standpoint, the authenticity of a leader materializes in the interactions between a leader and a follower. Moreover, from a developmental perspective, authentic leadership is developed over a lifespan and possibly ignited by a significant life event (Northouse, 2016, p. 196).
Assessing and analyzing the different departments at Adventist Health System, I can identify with our leadership team from the C-Suites to the mid-level management who are practicing upward and ethical leadership. Our CEO encourages and empowers his Executive team to be open and transparent about their ideas, recommendations, business operations best practices, etc. They have a weekly open discussion and decide what is best for the organization as a whole. They then share those decisions to the employees by holding Town Hall meetings.
Effective, ethical leaders concentrate on their instinct to navigate change in their workplace environment and their capabilities to “reinvent themselves to adapt to those changes” (Rowe & Guerrero, 2012, p. 128). For leaders to succeed in change navigation and reinvention of self, a leader must be adaptable in changing their thinking and attitude, and they must have the capability to change or improve their skills, aptitudes, and behaviors.
References
Gallagher, C. (2013, Jan 27). Business ethics keynote speaker – Chuck Gallagher – shares
straight talk about ethics [Video File]! Retrieved from
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gUJ00vNGCPE
George, B. (2012). Inner work for authentic leadership. Harvard University. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SmPu2LQ84ts
Kendrick, J. (2011). Transformational leadership changing individuals & social
systems. Professional Safety, Vol. 56, No. 11, p. 14. Retrieved from: http://vw9tq4ge9f.search.serialssolutions.com/?ctx_ver=Z39.88-2004&ctx_enc=info%3Aofi%2Fenc%3AUTF-8&rfr_id=info%3Asid%2Fsummon.serialssolutions.com&rft_val_fmt=info%3Aofi%2Ffmt%3Akev%3Amtx%3Ajournal&rft.genre=article&rft.atitle=Transformational+Leadership&rft.jtitle=Professional+Safety&rft.au=James+%22Skipper%22+Kendrick&rft.date=2011-11-01&rft.pub=American+Society+of+Safety+Engineers&rft.issn=0099-0027&rft.volume=56&rft.issue=11&rft.spage=14&rft.externalDocID=2506796721¶mdict=en-US
Khurana, R., & Nohria, N. (2008). It's time to make management a true profession. Harvard
Business Review, 86(10), 70-77
LaFollette, H. (2007). The practice of ethics. Malden, MA: Blackwell Publishing.
Northouse, P. (2016). Leadership: Theory and practice (7th ed.). Los Angeles, CA: Sage
Publishing
Obolensky, N. (2014). Complex adaptive leadership (2nd ed.). London, UK: Gower/Ashgate
Rowe, W. G., & Guerrero, L. (2012). Cases in leadership (3rd ed.). SAGE Publications, Inc.
Weinstein, B. 2012 (2012, Aug 24). Keynote speech excerpts from the ethics guy [Video File].
Yukl, G. (2012). Leadership in the organization (8th ed.). Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall
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