Mr. Seidman is of the view that ethics training needs to be re-framed and re-contextualized from conventional training. He asserts that the moment a company says, “we need to train our people on ethics,” the company starts treading the wrong path. This is simply people believe they are already ethical, perhaps more ethical in their view more than their colleagues or even bosses. So in their view, people already know they are ethical and they don’t want to be trained for what they know. He therefore asserts that re-framing and re-contextualizing engages the very people who think they are already ethical to react differently. Because then, what they receive training on is on matters that concern them and they want to become better at.

Mr Seidman feels that the history of ethical though isn’t helpful because those that teach ethics tend to teach it as a noun. This has to do with compartmentalization. And the moment ethics are separated into classes devoted to it, it disjoints the teaching of ethics from how we do things as opposed to what we do. And life is more than just what we do but how we do what we do.   He also talks about the unclear laws and rules around the historical thought of ethics and makes the case that it is no longer sustainable to apply the laws around traditional thought of ethics to the current organizational and societal contexts. He says that rules are over- and under-inclusive and laws reflect a floor, rather than a ceiling on appropriate conduct. And in as much as laws and rules are enacted in an effort to create predictability and certainty, it has not always worked because of the variation in human conduct.

I do believe it for the simple fact that the world has become a global village and small enough to be held accountable no matter where in the world it might be located. The surge of online accountability has made it difficult to do business in disrepute. People share reviews, they rate services, and their complaints about a company’s bad service are accessible to everyone in real time. So the economy is taking shape and only the trusted will be in position to stay in business in the long run.

Shifting from a program to a cultural approach to ethical behavior is keenly important in the church where I serve. Because we represent an institution that is built on an ethical foundation from our founder, our Lord Jesus Christ. So for us, ethics should be culturally embedded. I believe modeling an ethical culture by the leaders in our church as well as constantly talking about ethics as a culture as well as rewarding exemplary ethical behavior should be able to shift our church organization to become more ethical as culture.