Unleash the Positive Power of Ethical Leadership
By Linda Fisher Thornton
I have been thinking about how lightly some leaders take the subject of ethics. Some ignore ethical issues altogether or think ethical issues are unimportant compared to concerns about profitability. It’s a risky choice to take ethics lightly. Why? Unlike heart or kidney transplants, there are no “ethics transplants” for people who have made bad ethical decisions.
By Linda Fisher Thornton
Most people think about ethics, at least some of the time. Ethics comes to mind during ethics training, ethics conversations, when people are thrown into ethically complex situations, and when trying to understand current events.
By Linda Fisher Thornton
The question of the day is “How does “shallow thinking” lead to ethical mistakes?” By shallow thinking, I mean thinking that is limited in breadth and depth.
Think about taking a stroll on the beach as you read the characteristics of shallow thinking below. How do these characteristics describe the kind of thinking that can lead to ethical mistakes and decision gridlock?
By Linda Fisher Thornton
Ethical thinking and critical thinking are both important and it helps to understand how we need to use them together to make decisions.
Critical thinking helps us narrow our choices. Ethical thinking includes values as a filter to guide us to a choice that is ethical.
Using critical thinking, we may discover an opportunity to exploit a situation for personal gain. It’s ethical thinking that helps us realize it would be unethical to take advantage of that exploit.
By Linda Fisher Thornton
Using the commonly taught types of thinking is very useful in life, and helps us be better professionals and business people. But there’s a catch.
Critical thinking can help you understand why a problem happened. It won’t help you find the most ethical solution to the problem once you identify it.
By Linda Fisher Thornton
Ethical leaders understand that their role revolves around adding value for others, not for themselves. They are careful to avoid taking advantage of situations for personal gain or for the gain of their colleagues or friends. This other-centered focus keeps them thinking about how what they do will impact those they serve and others in the community.
By Linda Fisher Thornton
This post will explore the interesting relationship between leadership mindset and competency. Which is most important? What happens to our leadership capability when our mindset is out of date?
How we think about something impacts what we do about it. Nick Petrie, Center For Creative Leadership, writes in Vertical Leadership Development Part I that “In terms of leadership, the stage from which you are thinking and acting matters a lot. To be effective, the leader’s thinking must be equal or superior to the complexity of the environment.”
By Linda Fisher Thornton
As humans, we are flawed thinkers who easily fall victim to biases and traps. The biases and traps we so easily fall into reshape our thinking in ways that can lead us to make bad decisions.
As you review the list of leadership traps below, think about how each can lead to unethical thinking and actions.
By Linda Fisher Thornton
This series includes 10 quotes (linked to blog posts) to inspire you and help you improve your leadership and leadership development as we head into the new year. Part 1 includes the first 5.
By Linda Fisher Thornton
Leading in the “figure it out” space is one of the most important roles of ethical leadership. When the way forward isn’t clear, and there are ethical issues to be considered, the best leaders admit that the next step is not clear cut and will need to be worked through. They start a conversation with their teams to engage them in the messy process of considering the most responsible way forward.
By Linda Fisher Thornton
Talking about controversial topics has become a daunting task. There are some things we can do, individually and collectively, to improve those difficult conversations. The important points below may be useful to review as ground rules for discussing potentially emotionally charged issues:
By Linda Fisher Thornton Great attention is often paid to values in defining and marketing an organization. But what happens after that? It’s the ongoing dialogue about how to apply those values that brings them to life. Some leaders assume that if…
By Linda Fisher Thornton
Dialogue is a powerful tool for developing ethical organizations. Workplace issues are complex and opinions vary about what ethical leadership means. This combination creates a kind of “murky uncertainty” that keeps leaders from giving us their best, most ethical performance.
By Linda Fisher Thornton
Workplace issues are complex and opinions vary about the right thing to do in challenging situations. This complexity and uncertainty combine to create a “murky uncertainty” that may keep people from giving us their best, most ethical performance.
By Linda Fisher Thornton
Ethical awareness may have been considered private in the past, but it has become easier to observe in a society that is always socially connected. Since ethical reputation is a defining element in individual and organizational success, it is time that we consider ethical awareness as a key element of experience when selecting leaders for our businesses, community organizations, governments, and nations.
Leading in Context 