More on Employee Ethics
The Detroit News claims in this article that rank and file employees have joined the fray of workplace ethical infractions. Essentially, with all of the focus on senior management, there has been little coverage of the misconduct of rank and file employees. Some interesting statistics cited in the article:
- Employees calling in sick have hit a five-year high, and three-fifths of those who do so aren't sick at all
- A survey last year of 1,316 workers by Kronos Inc. reported that more than one-third of workers say they lied about the need for sick days.
- More employees are stretching the reasons for taking time off, even claiming that a common cold warrants a medical leave.
- Job applicants reporting false academic credentials have hit a three-year high, with 12 percent of resumes containing at least some phony information.
Rank-and-file employees are less likely than managers to report misconduct they observe: 44 percent say they resist doing so, compared with 28 percent of managers and younger managers with three years or less experience are nearly twice as likely as older or more experienced managers to say they feel pressured to violate ethical principles.
An some of the reasons....
- Stresses brought on by accelerating corporate change. There is evidence that misconduct increases in companies where mergers, acquisitions and restructurings are under way.
- In other cases, employee dishonesty is a sign policies are outdated.
- What if the truth will do so much career damage that a face-saving lie seems better?
I think that some of what may be going on here is the idea that we are expected to available on on call all of the time. If we expect our employees to work around the clock and drop their plans at a moments notice, how are they expected to attend to family and personal matters. Sometimes they have to lie to take care of things that they shouldn't feel badly about addressing. Obviously, I would never condone lying on resumes, claim a parent dies three times or fudging the numbers. But, when employees have to lie about time off or takes mental-health days because they've worked themselves into a state of exhaustion, something is wrong.
