In Ethics for the Real World, Ronald A. Howard and Clinton D. Korver, when creating a corporate code of ethics, the step of testing the code includes three steps. List and describe each.

Question

What will be an ideal response?

Answer 1

Check the logic. First, look at the standards through the lenses of universality and reciprocity. Ask whether you would want others (such as corporate competitors) to follow the rules, and whether you would be comfortable with others applying the rules to your company.

Check for focus. While it may seem counterintuitive to cut items from what is designed to be a comprehensive corporate code of ethics, the truth is that eliminating ethical statements that are irrelevant to a corporation’s line of business or unlikely to arise will make it easier to create a code of ethics that provides guidance for the types of issues that employees will deal with regularly. Howard and Korver advise removing prudential issues from the code of ethics; while it is important, for example, to stress the importance of keeping up with industry-related news and knowledge, this particular conversation has no place in an ethical code. The authors also recommend avoiding vague words (such as “respect”) that are laudable pursuits but provide little concrete guidance on behavior. Additionally, while positive ethics (goals such as honesty and charity) are important, they are also limitless; as a result, corporations may choose to leave these out of ethical codes and instead leave them to values statements. New York Life Insurance Company, for example, identifies its core values as Humanity, Integrity, and Financial Strength. These positive elements know no upper bounds, so it would be difficult to incorporate them into a code of ethics.

Test-drive for usefulness. This is the step of the testing process in which corporations determine the practicality of proposed ethical standards. Howard and Korver suggest asking, “How well do our standards operate in everyday life? Are they practical? Do we really mean them?” Think about whether there are times when a particular ethical statement need not hold true.