Transparency

September 20, 2012 By Leave a Comment

It’s happened again, the fourth time in the last six months.

I’ve encountered a professional who is fudging their credentials.

Each is a little different. One is claiming to be something but their professional training was not that specialty – kind of like a doctor trained in cardiology who finds dermatology more to their liking so they call themself a dermatologist and set up a dermatology practice.

Another person is stretching their years of employment and their title. I like to refer to these as tenure stretch and title stretch.

The other two have Linkedin profiles that present them as an expert but they don’t have formal training, credentials, or certification to support the professional title they use (title stretch). You may think I’m being picky or petty but I know one of these “experts” did some “expert” work for an organization and the results were catastrophic.

This is the 21st century and in the new world of work you can be what you want to be. It is possible to be self-made and self-educated and trained in the school of hard knocks – that’s fantastic! In no way do I mean to de-value that path to success. However, in some professions, there are ethical principles governing what you call yourself and in some states there are laws regulating professional titles.

I don’t have close personal relationships with the people I described above but there is enough information on the internet that I can easily find what they claim does not check out.

Reminds me of the plot in daytime soaps where the new doctor moves to town, commences doing surgery and treating patients only for it to be discovered several months or years later that they have no medical degree. Of course, much drama ensues.

Fiction is one thing; however, reality is another.

Message to individuals – you can fool some of the people but other people know. Be transparent. Yahoo, Radio Shack, and Notre Dame are just a few high profile, instructive examples.

Message to organizations – background check, background check, background check.

What do you think?

Filed Under: Career Invention, Human Resource Management Tagged With: , , , ,

Complicity 2

July 17, 2012 By Leave a Comment

The report on Penn State, Sandusky and his heinous behavior started me thinking again about complicity and the responsibility of leaders, especially gifted, charismatic leaders. The greater the gift, the greater the responsibility to ensure what is good and right prevails over that which is wrong and evil.

Because behavior modeling – copying someone else’s behavior – is the most basic and fundamental way that humans learn, the behavior of those in positions of influence is especially critical. Followers take their cue from their leader. If a leader can’t handle the responsibility commensurate with their gifts, they should step aside.

Someone recently reminded me of the scene from the 1987 movie Broadcast News where Aaron Altman (the talented but not handsome TV reporter played by Albert Brooks) says “What do you think the Devil is going to look like if he’s around? Nobody is going to be taken in if he has a long, red, pointy tail. No. I’m semi-serious here. He will look attractive and he will be nice and helpful and he will get a job where he influences a great God-fearing nation and he will never do an evil thing…he will just bit by little bit lower standards where they are important. Just coax along flash over substance…just a tiny bit.”

It is NEVER ok for children to be molested by adults, even when a charismatic leader or powerful institution allows it to happen. Never.

You probably won’t face anything as serious as child rape in your career but may see other forms of unethical behavior in your organization that you believe are wrong. Speak up and attempt to change the situation. And if that fails, you can leave. Doing nothing makes you complicit. Staying involved with and supporting an organization that allows wrongdoing makes you complicit.

I quit a good job over an incident of dishonesty. No one – my bosses, their boss or anyone up the ladder seemed bothered by what happened and basically ignored it. I decided not to be part of an organization so loosey-goosey on ethics. But that’s a topic for another blog post.

“All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing.” (Edmund Burke)

 

What do you think?

Filed Under: For Managers & Supervisors, General Management, Leadership Development, Organization Behavior Tagged With: , , , ,

Academic Dishonesty

July 5, 2011 By Leave a Comment

http://www.apa.org/monitor/2011/06/cheat.aspx

Check out this story.  It is mind boggling that more than half of the respondents in a survey of 40,000 high school students say they have cheated on a test in the last year.

Ask the students and teachers that you know about cheating and how it’s handled at their institutions.

Definitely time for public dialogue on this issue.

What do you think?

 

Filed Under: Recommended Reading Tagged With: ,