Can workplace culture lead to unethical behaviour by employees?
New research suggests that, while sometimes unwittingly, corporations can indeed play a huge role in unethical actions by individual employees. This is done via organisational moral disengagement.
To many of you, that might come across as a no-brainer. However, a few things caught my (admittedly inexperienced) eye. First, the fact that this research is being done at all indicates a focus on a structural approach to unethical corporate practices (rather than on individual employees).
Second, there is a key point made about the importance of how unethical behaviour is framed. I was particularly fascinated by the use of language to make otherwise unethical practices seem minor. The example used in the linked article is seeing price-rigging as “stabilising prices.” How interesting!
I am curious what our community members think about this. Specifically, two questions come to mind:
- What, if anything, can be done when an employee notices that organisational moral disengagement is an issue in their workplace.
- How, as an HR professional, can you proactively avoid this disengagement in the first place?