SOUTHERN AFRICAN REGIONAL POLICE CHIEFS CO-OPERATION

ORGANISATION (SAPRCCO)

SAPRCCO WOMEN TRAINING CONFERENCE

GOVERNANCE ETHICS AND PUBLIC PERCEPTION FOR PROFFESSIOANL

POLICE SERVICE: TOWARDS BUILDING ETHICAL ORGANISATION
By Dr Andrew Mushi1-Mzumbe University

Introduction
This brief presentation will mainly focus on issues related to building ethical institutions.
Specifically it will address issues related to concept of ethics; ethical duties of leaders/managers;
ethics in organisations; ethics and fair treatment; designing and implementing codes; building an
ethical agency and resolving ethical dilemmas.

The concept of Ethics

Ethics are the set of moral principles that guide a person's behavior. These morals are shaped by
social norms, cultural practices and religious influences.
Ethics reflect beliefs about what is right, what is wrong, what is just, what is unjust, what is good
and what is bad in terms of human behavior. They serve as an area to direct how people should
behave towards each other, understand and fulfill their obligations to society and live their lives.
Even though ethical beliefs are held by individuals, they can also be reproduced in the values,
practices, and policies that shape the choices made by decision makers i.e. leaders on behalf of
their organizations. Ethics applies to all aspects of conduct and is relevant to the actions of
individuals, groups and organizations.
Examples of ethical practices

 lawyers must hold client conversations confidential

 accountants must display the highest levels of honesty and integrity in their record
keeping and financial analysis
 professional organizations and licensing authorities such as state governments, set and
enforce ethical standards
 Police officer must treat any suspect with respect.

Ethical Duties of a Leader/Manager

Getting employees to act ethically in the workplace starts at the top level and it begins with
ethical leadership," Thornton said. "Ethical leaders have a tremendous impact on how people in
their organizations behave and what they achieve."
1
Dr Andrew Mushi is Governance and Development lecturer at Mzumbe University, Dar Es salam Campus College.
Contact: amushi@mzumbe.ac.tz

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 • Make ethics a clear priority. Being an ethical leader means going beyond being a good
person. Ethical leaders make ethics a clear and consistent part of their agendas, set
standards, model appropriate behaviour, and hold everyone accountable.
• Make ethical culture a part of every personnel-related function in the
organization. Leaders must work hard through hiring, training, and performance
management systems to bring in the right employees and then help employees internalize
the organization’s underlying values.   
• Encourage, measure, and reward ethical leadership at multiple levels. Ethical leadership
from the top is very important (because it creates an environment in which lower-level
ethical leaders can flourish), but ethical leadership at the supervisory level has a huge
impact on followers’ attitudes and behaviour.  Organizations may want to channel
resources toward developing ethical leadership in their supervisory-level leaders.

Ethics in Organisations
Organization ethics refers to the code of conduct of the individuals working in a particular
organization. Every organization runs to serve citizens or earn profits but how it execute its duty
is more important.
Organization ethics is the way an organization should respond to external and internal
environment refers to organization ethics. Organizational ethics express the value of organization
to its employee and other entities irrespective of government.

Basic Ethical Elements in Organisations

There are at least four basic elements that aim to create an ethical culture and behavior of
employee within an organization.
 A written code of ethics and standards (ethical code)
 Ethics training for executes, managers and employees
 The availability of ethical situational advice
 Confidential reporting system
The employees must know what is acceptable and what is unacceptable in a working place and
their differences. They are best demonstrated through acts of fairness, compassion, integrity,
honor and responsibility. The key for business owners and executives is ensuring that all
employees understand these ethics. One of the best ways to communicate organizational ethics is
by training employees on company standards”.
Examples of organizational ethics include:

 Uniform treatment, social responsibility, financial ethics, considerations

 Ethical foundations/values for an amazing organization include:
 Respect, honor, integrity, customer focus, result oriented, risk taking, passion,
persistence.
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Ethics and Fair Treatment at Work
Ethics are the principles of conduct governing an individual or a group; specifically, the
standards you use to decide what your conduct should be. Ethical behavior depends on the
person’s frame of reference.

Factors affecting ethical decisions

• Normative judgments: Judging something as good or bad, right or wrong, better or
worse.
• Moral standards (Morality): Society’s accepted standards for behaviors that have
serious consequences to its well-being. Behaviors that cannot be established or changed
by decisions of authoritative bodies. Behaviors that override self-interest.
i) Ethics and Fair Treatment at Work
• Ethics and the law

i) A behavior may be legal but unethical.

ii) A behavior may be illegal but ethical.

iii) A behavior may be both legal and ethical.

iv) A behavior may be both illegal and unethical

ii) Ethics, Fair Treatment, and Justice

• Distributive justice: The fairness and justice of a decision’s result.
• Procedural justice: The fairness of the process by which the decision was reached.
• Interactional (interpersonal) justice: The manner in which managers conduct their
interpersonal dealings with employees

What Shapes Ethical Behavior at Work?

• Individual factors
• Organizational factors
• The leader’s influence
• Ethics policies and codes
• The organization’s culture

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Human Resource’s Role in Fostering Ethics and Fair Treatment
Why treat employees fairly?
They’re not employees, they’re people” According to Management guru Peter Drucker
i) Avoidance of employee proceedings
ii) Enhanced employee commitment
iii) Enhanced satisfaction with the organization, with jobs, and with leaders
iv) Increased organizational citizenship behaviors
Designing and Implementing Codes
Code of Ethics may be regarded as the main instrument to institutionalise ethics within
organisations is both a governance tool for the organisation's relations with its stakeholders and a
strategic management tool as it provides guidance for decision-making. It is implementation can
be achieved through;
• Introduction of ethical training activities;
• Appointment of an ethics and compliance officer
• Creation of an Advisory Board with tasks of supervision and specific decision powers,
e.g. in terms of sanctions – come up with ethics committee
• Creation of a "whistle-blowing" mechanism (for employees as well as external
stakeholders to send warnings or to report unethical activities);
• Setting up an internal Ethical Auditing function, which broadens the financial and
management auditing activities in order to check the ethical nature of the company's
behaviour and procedures;
• Developing corporate reporting activities (social accounting, social and ethical
accountability, sustainability reporting), with which the organisation periodically
communicates a measure of the social, environmental and economic impact of its
activities to the outside, as well as an evaluation of the results obtained in relation to the
commitments undertaken the Code of Ethics.

Building an Ethical Agency

Research shows that success in building ethical cultures in organisations, groups, agencies etc.
depends a lot on the commitment of its leadership and management.
• It is also believed that thinking beyond project to its impact on the stakeholders and
having ongoing communication about ethical behaviour helps agency teams weigh the
long- term consequences of their decision. For Example in a procurement process the
lowest bidder may have the best price (i.e.) but could cause problems that end up costing
thousands millions of money after the contract is underway.

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 • Building and ethical agency pays since it;
– increases employees’ satisfaction
– reduces costs and enhance performance and stronger ethical culture
– increase retention rate of valued employees
– builds ethical culture
– reduces internal threats caused by misconduct and boost productivity and
performance
Leaders/Manager what do they need to do?
Implement comprehensive ethics and compliance programs which include:
– A code of conduct.
– A way to report observed violations anonymously.
– A mechanism for employees to seek advice on ethical matters.
– Training for all employees on code of conduct and ethics policies.
– A mechanism to discipline employees that violate the code or ethics policies and
evaluation of ethical behaviour as a part of regular performance appraisals
As a leader what do you need to do? For Public Administrations
• Work to establish procedures holding individuals and their organizations accountable for
their conduct and support these procedures with clear reporting of activities and
accomplishments.
• Act as stewards of public funds by the strategic, effective and efficient use of resources,
regularly re-examining the efficacy of policies, programs, and services and, seeking to
prevent all forms of mismanagement or waste.
• Encourage open expression of views by staff members within their organizations and
providing administrative channels for dissent; protect the rights of whistle-blowers,
provide assurance of due process, safeguard against reprisal and give support to
colleagues who are victims of retribution.
• Seek to correct instances of wrongdoing or reporting them to superiors as well as seeking
external sources of agencies for review and action if remedies cannot be assured by
reporting wrongdoing internally.
• Support merit principles that promote excellence, competence and professionalism in the
selection and promotion of public officials and employees and protect against biased,
arbitrary and capricious actions.

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 • Promote proactive efforts to increase the representativeness of their followers and the full
inclusion of persons with diverse characteristics.
• Encourage their followers to adopt, distribute and periodically review a code of ethics as
a living document that applies principles of this code and other relevant codes to the
specific mission and conditions of the organization.
• Therefore building ethical cultures in organisations depend largely in leaders.
• If leaders come up with the mentioned ethics and program is expected to integrate the
dimensions of comprehensive approach which are compliance and integrity (Maesschalck
in a 2005 Public Integrity article)
• Compliance focuses on external controls upon external controls concerning conduct,
oftentimes specifying rules that followers should follow. However, they are not the
building blocks of ethical culture
• While the integrity approach focuses upon internal controls—like deliberation, ethical
judgment and character—which appear to be critical factors for leaders who successfully
build ethical cultures in their organizations

Resolving ethical dilemmas

Ethical dilemma is the situation where by a respective organisation/institution has pre-set code of
ethics but still unethical behaviour persists.
Examples of ethical dilemmas (workplace)
1. Conducting Personal Business on Company Time … use of company’s resources
2. Taking Credit for Others' Work
…. If three members of a five-person team did all the work, do those three members
demand to receive proper credit while pointing out that two members of the team did not pull
their weight? or ….. if all employees accept equal praise even though only a select few did the
real work (a leader do not let this happen)
3. Harassing Behaviour
Ethical dilemma is the situation where by a respective organisation/institution has pre-set code
of ethics but still unethical behaviour persists.
Steps to be followed in resolving the ethical dilemmas
1. Understanding of code of ethics available within the organisation, governing policies and
procedures, org organization structure and country laws regulating ethics
2. Share dilemma with your supervisor and explore advantage of his/her knowledge and
experience
3. Discuss your dilemma with your colleagues within your organisation

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4. Speak with pears from other companies without exposing company secret. They might
have encountered similar situation and can provide guidance on how to handle the same.
5. Read past news articles about other companies faced with your specific dilemma