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termination paperwork with the employee and explain the handling of final wages due.

Expect the unexpected. While one employee might break out in tears at the news, another might start yelling and screaming and throwing things. You can often defuse these situations by applying the following techniques:

•Empathize with your employee. Be understanding of your employee’s situation and sincerely show your concern for his or her well-being. If your employee becomes emotional or cries, simply hand the person a box of tissues and proceed with the termination.

•Be matter of fact and firm. It’s your job to maintain a calm, businesslike demeanor throughout the termination meeting. Don’t negotiate with your employee or lead him or her to believe that he or she can do something to change your mind. Insist that the decision is final and not subject to change.

•Keep the meeting on track. Don’t allow the employee to steer the meeting from the main goal of informing him or her about the termination. If the employee becomes abusive or uncontrollable, inform him or her that you will end the meeting immediately if he or she can’t maintain control. Be prepared to call security if necessary.

A termination script can be a very helpful thing to have during the termination meeting. Not only will it help to ensure that you don’t forget to mention an important piece of information, and it will provide one last piece of documentation for your employee’s personnel file (which you should retain for at least seven years after terminating the employee). Rehearse your script several times before you go into the termination meeting.

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P O P Q U I Z !

It’s better to terminate employees who have no hope of becoming productive members of your team sooner rather than later. Reflect for a few moments on what you have learned in this chapter; then ask yourself the following questions:

1.What are your termination policies?

2.How do you handle layoffs?

3.What kinds of documentation do you pull together before you terminate an employee?

4.Describe how best to conduct an employee termination.

5.How do you handle employees who become upset or belligerent during a termination?

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C H A P T E R 1 6

V

Ethics and Office Politics

IT’S A NEW WORLD OUT THERE . . .

Ethics and . . .

The impact of office politics on organizations.

Understanding values and ethics on the job.

Creating a code of ethics.

The power of office politics.

Who’s hot (and who’s not).

Managing your boss.

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ETHICS AND OFFICE POLITICS

If you’ve been in business for any time at all, you know that ethics and office politics are very powerful forces in any organization. Ethics is the framework of values that employees use to guide their behavior. Unfortunately, people are not perfect, and ethics is something that’s often absent in organizations, as the string of relatively recent business failures attributed to less than sterling ethics in some seemingly upstanding businesses bears testament to. There’s more pressure than ever for managers to model ethical behavior and to ensure that their employees follow in their footsteps, and it’s the wise manager who quickly gets with this particular program.

The other powerful force in organizations, office politics, represents the relationships that you develop with your coworkers—both up and down the chain of command—that allow you to get tasks done, to be informed about the latest goings-on in the business, and to form a personal network of business associates for support throughout your career. On the positive side, office politics helps ensure that employees work in the best interests of the organization. On the negative side, office politics can degenerate into a competition, where employees concentrate their efforts on trying to increase their personal power at the expense of their coworkers and—ultimately—their organizations.

ETHICS: NOT JUST FOR BREAKFAST ANYMORE

Reading the headlines in any newspaper over the past couple of years might lead you to believe that the vast majority of business leaders must all belong to a big club of liars and cheats. The good news is that the vast majority of business leaders actually do know the difference

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between right and wrong and, now more than ever, businesses and the leaders who run them are trying to do the right thing. Not only do they want to do the right thing to be on the right side of the ethics fence, but also because it’s good for the bottom line.

Ethics is in. And that’s not a bad thing for any of us.

Defining Ethics

Ethics are standards of beliefs and values that guide conduct, behavior, and activities. Ethics provide boundaries for our actions and help us do the right thing—not just talking about doing the right thing, but really doing it.

While we may disagree on exactly what qualities ethical people exhibit on the job, we can generally agree that some or all of the following personal qualities constitute ethical behavior:

•Honesty.

•Integrity.

•Impartiality.

•Fairness.

•Loyalty.

•Dedication.

•Responsibility.

•Accountability.

Remember: When you set an example as an ethical leader, your employees will be encouraged (and expected) to follow your example, too. Managers have a responsibility to try to define an organization’s culture and ethics, live up to them, and encourage others to adopt them.

Creating a Code of Ethics

Many organizations have found that it’s best not to leave ethics to chance. Rather than let their employees feel their way around in the

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dark or be left uncertain whether a particular practice is ethical, these organizations have adopted their own written codes of ethics.

A code of ethics is a complement for existing company policies and procedures, not a replacement for them. While most people would probably agree that stealing, sharing trade secrets, sexually harassing a coworker, and other unethical behavior are unacceptable, putting these standards into writing gives this understanding real weight—especially when breaching them may be grounds for dismissal.

A good code of ethics is built on the following foundation:

1.Compliance with internal policies and procedures.

2.Compliance with external laws and regulations.

3.Direction from organizational values.

4.Direction from individual values.

Specifically, a code of ethics must address some very specific issues in addition to the more generic ones listed above. Here are some of the most common issues addressed by typical codes of ethics:

•Equal opportunity.

•Sexual harassment.

•Diversity.

•Privacy and confidentiality.

•Conflicts of interest.

•Gifts and gratuities.

•Employee health and safety.

It’s not enough, however, to simply have a code of ethics. The people in your organization must breathe life into it by also living it. The best code of ethics in the world is worthless if it’s just filed away and never used.

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What’s in a Comprehensive Code of Ethics?

According to the Ethics Resource Center web site (www.ethics.org), a comprehensive code of ethics has seven parts:

1.A memorable title: Examples include Pricewaterhouse’s “The Way We Do Business” and the World Bank Group’s “Living Our Values.”

2.Leadership letter: A cover letter briefly outlines the content of the code of ethics and clearly demonstrates commitment from the very top of the organization to ethical principles of behavior.

3.Table of contents: The main parts of the code are listed by page number.

4.Introduction-prologue: This part explains why the code is important, the scope of the code, and to whom it will apply.

5.Statement of core values: The organization lists and describes its primary values in detail.

6.Code provisions: This part is the meat of the code, the organization’s position on a wide variety of issues including topics such as sexual harassment, privacy, conflicts of interest, gratuities, and so forth.

7.Information and resources: Places that employees can go for further information or for specific advice or counsel.

LIVING ETHICS

It’s one thing to have a code of ethics; it’s another thing altogether to behave ethically in all of your day-to-day business transactions and relationships. Ethical challenges are everywhere in business, and it’s your job to apply your organization’s code of ethics, your own personal ethics, and no small amount of common sense as you work through them. Here are some common ethical dilemmas; how would you handle them?

•A vendor gives you free tickets to a sold-out NFL football game.

•An employee begs you not to discipline him for breaking company rules.

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•You find out that an employee knowingly sold an unnecessary product to a client in order to reach a sales quota and win a trip to the Bahamas.

•You discover that one of your best employees didn’t graduate from college as she claimed in her job application.

•You know that a product you sell doesn’t do everything your company claims it does.

Every day we our faced with all sorts of ethical choices on the job. Here are six keys to making better ethical choices in your own work life (ETHICS):

1.Evaluate circumstances through the appropriate filters (e.g., culture, laws, policies, circumstances, relationships, politics, perception, emotions, values, bias, and religion).

2.Treat people and issues fairly within the established boundaries. Fair doesn’t always mean equal.

3.Hesitate before making critical decisions.

4.Informthoseaffectedof thestandard/decisionthathasbeenset/made.

5.Create an environment of consistency for yourself and your working group.

6.Seek counsel when there is any doubt (but from those who are honest and whom you respect).

OFFICE POLITICS

How political is your office or place of work? If you’re like most managers, you can likely relate more than one or two stories of business associates who have had their careers trashed by being on the wrong end of a political maneuver by someone in their organizations. No matter how much you might try to prevent it, when your organization has two or more employees, you can be sure that office politics are going to be a part of the equation.

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