Organizational culture is built and sustained in the corridors of business from sea ports to coal mines, from the office cubes to the retail storefront, and at the shop floor through the airports. Today, it is mission critical to develop the front line of your workforce, to model through the middle. In a recent episode on SCCE’s podcast, Compliance Perspectives, I discuss strategies for developing front-line management around leading conversations that put company principles into action.
There is a lot of discussion around the importance of the top at the top when launching Ethics and Compliance (E&C) initiatives. But when it comes to corporate culture, the tone on the ground is where the most impact resides. Why?
1. Front-line leaders lead the business AND they are the gatekeepers of corporate culture. They are in the most influential position to cultivate the environment for employees to raise concerns and ask questions. In fact, research shows that nearly 60% of employee will go to their front-line supervisors to report misconduct.
2. Compliance and ethics needs to be embedded into the business. Connect front-line management’s responsibilities to the business and its overall goals by putting compliance and ethics at the forefront. This ensures that the manager is actively present and accessible when employees have concerns.
In this podcast episode with Adam Turteltaub, Vice President of Strategic Initiatives and International Programs at SCCE, I discuss recommended solutions plus:
- Best practices on how compliance officers can drive home the importance of setting the tone for local leadership
- How compliance leaders can develop a program with impact
- Techniques that help make managers more willing and frequent voices for compliance and the organization’s values
- Building measurable metrics
- The value of providing managers with a toolkit for communicating with their direct reports
Listen in as I explain how front-line leaders can take greater accountability to architect culture on the ground: http://complianceandethics.org/marsha-ershaghi-on-setting-the-right-tone-on-the-ground-podcast/