Book Review

24/06/2006
Mike Smith

‘Ethicability—how to decide what’s right and find the courage to do it’ by Roger Steare

'Ethicability—how to decide what’s right and find the courage to do it’ by Roger Steare

‘Ethicability’—remember that word. It helps us ‘how to decide what’s right and find the courage to do it,’ according to Roger Steare . He has written this book to provide an ‘ethicability framework’, consisting of 20 core questions for each person to ask themselves in helping to decide what is right in business and workplace decision-making.

The book aims to ‘fill a void’—to help all those in business, industry, enterprise, the service and financial sectors, governments and NGOs, to ‘resolve a wide range of moral dilemmas’. One can’t help feeling that if only the late publishing tycoon Robert Maxwell, famed for his disappearing pension fund, or Kenneth Lay of Enron, had read this book, thousands of jobs would have been saved and history might have taken a turn for the better.

Steare says that there are three dimensions to ethics: the Principled Conscience; the Social Conscience; and Rules Compliance. No prizes for guessing which he regards the best. ‘Principled Conscience,’ he writes, ‘helps us to decide what’s right by considering principles such as fairness, courage and kindness. It comes from deep inside. It is our moral DNA.’ It is what makes us ‘moral grown ups’. Social conscience also ‘helps us to decide what’s right by considering the consequences, both good and bad, of our actions on others.’ We should guard against marginalising minorities, or saying that the ends justify the means. Social conscience is ‘an important step in becoming a moral grown-up’. Rules Compliance, meanwhile, also tells us what’s right, especially when we can’t always agree what’s right ‘or when some people just don’t seem to have a conscience at all’. But Steare warns that too many rules tend to make us lazy in taking responsibility for our actions and ‘we can never write enough rules to cover every situation’. As Michael Kirkwood , Managing Director of Citigroup, comments: ‘One of the reasons we have so much regulation is because we cannot reply on people stopping to think about what’s right.’

Under ethics, Steare looks at the word Integrity, which he describes as reputation, honesty and trustworthiness. But it is much more than that: it is ‘the principle that defines all our other principles’ and is another way of looking at our Principled Conscience. Tax avoidance, for instance, might be legal, but is it always right?

Under integrity, Steare includes the four cardinal virtues of the ancient Greek philosophers: prudence, justice, fortitude and temperance. To which, he says, we should add the three theological virtues of the mediaeval church: Faith, Hope and Love (or Charity). But Steare would also like to add Excellence and Respect—‘the ones I encounter most in my work with people and organisations’, in his role as an occupational philosopher.

This leads on to a nice acronym: we can begin to ask the RIGHT questions where RIGHT refers to:

  • Rules--what are the rules?
  • Integrity—how do our principles guide us?
  • Good—who would benefit and how?
  • Harm—who could be harmed and how?
  • Truth—are we being honest and accountable?

    • And in testing our decision-making, among the 20 questions we should ask ourselves are:

  • How would we feel in their shoes?
  • What would be the adult thing to do?
  • What would build trust and respect?
  • What would stand the test of time?
  • Have we the courage to do what’s right?

    • The book concludes with the true scenario of an ethical dilemma faced by a senior human resources executive, named Jane, given confidencial company information, who was caught between her loyalty to the company and loyalty to a fellow employee. Should she tell her friend, about to buy a new apartment believing she had a secure job, that her business unit is about to be closed down? The book studies all the options open to Jane, and what course of action she eventually took.

    This gem of a book is peppered with quotable quotes from the wise and eminent, and concludes that in the end ‘the enemy is within’. The dust jacket even includes a ‘credit card’ for each reader to keep, on which is printed the 20 core questions to help us decide what is right.

    Reviewed by Michael Smith

    ‘Ethicability—how to decide what’s right and find the courage to do it’ by Roger Steare ,

    Roger Steare Consulting Limited, 68 Lombard Street , London EC3V 9LJ .

    Copies can be ordered from: www.rogersteare.com