What does it mean to be ethical?

To be ethical is to be moral. And that’s a loaded term.

Morality is about values. What we think is good or bad. It’s judgements we make about ourselves and about others. Generally – if something is good for us – we think it’s good and if it’s bad for us – we think it’s bad.

People with more developed sense of values will extend their concern for benefit or harm to other people. Most often family members or members of our tribe. Humans are tribal animals. The way this works is – if it is good for our tribe, it is good. If it is bad for our tribe it is bad.

This is why people who may be very ethical to members of their peer group don’t see the problem with being unethical to people deemed to be outsiders.  This seems hypocritical and it is. If something done to you is bad but the same thing done to someone else is ok – the thing being done isn’t inherently bad, you are just judging it to be so based on how you personally are impacted. Hence, the accusation of hypocrisy.

But what is really happening when people think and behave this way is that their sense of ethics and morality is not fully developed. They limit their moral reasoning to themselves or their tribe, however that is defined (politically, racially, religiously, etc).

What makes Humanism so important is that it is a reminder that we need to extend our circle of compassion and concern to everyone.  Humanism is an explicit rejection of tribalism.  If it hurts me, then it probably hurts other people and even if I don’t know those people, it’s still wrong.  Instead of being ethical in a hypocritical way, we strive to be more consistent in our application of ethics equally to everyone.  I say strive because our instinctual tribal impulses make that hard to do.

Regardless, if you find yourself reveling in the hardship of others (the other tribe, or political group or whatever), please stop. Remind yourself they are human too and that you should apply the same compassion to them as you do to yourself. To me, that is what it means to be ethical.

If you want to learn more get my book: The Humanist Approach to Happiness: Practical Wisdom  This book will help you better understand how and why to integrate your ethics more fully into your everyday decision making.

If you are looking for professional or personal development programs that will help you actualize these principles in your daily life – consider taking these 2 courses:
https://humanistlearning.com/socratic-jujitsu/

https://humanistlearning.com/generationaldivide/

Both of these courses will help you rethink how you approach conflict with other people.  Or – if you want a more indepth course of study about applied Humanism – take my course; Living Made Simpler http://humanistlearning.info/livingmadesimpler1/

Ethical Interactions

A true leader is someone other people want to emulate. Treating other people with respect is step one.

There is a lot of discussion about ethical leadership.  We want our leaders to be ethical. But what does that really mean?

Ethical leaders are people who make ethical decisions, certainly. But it’s also about how they interact with and treat other people.  And this is really the big secret about ethics. Ethics isn’t about how we should behave. It’s about how we want other people to treat us.

If people are honest with us, it makes our lives easier. If they consider us as someone worthy of basic justice, it makes our lives easier.  If they treat us with respect, it feels great because we know, they are less likely to lie, cheat or steal from us.  Ethics is about us, and our goals dreams and desires and how WE want to be treated.

When you understand this, you begin to understand how important it is to extend the same sort of respect you want to others.  And yes, this is a lot like the golden rule. Treat others as you wish to be treated. But it goes deeper than that.

The reason to make sure your interactions with other people is ethical is not just because you should. It’s because these other people have a choice. They are autonomous and want to be treated with respect to and ethical people don’t tolerate unethical behavior for very long. They will not want to hang out or do business with you if you yourself are not ethical! Plus treating other people ethically also makes you feel good. Being ethical is something you do for you because it’s how YOU want to be treated. I really don’t understand why people choose otherwise.

To make sure your interactions are ethical, start by considering whether you are approaching other people with respect.

Ethics are grounded in respect. Every human rights document and Humanist manifesto starts with a foundational statement that every human is worthy of dignity and respect. This is not just a catch phrase. It actually means something pretty important. Every person you meet, everywhere in the world is a real person and they are worthy of the respect that you would give to any fully autonomous human. When you get this, it changes everything.

When we don’t consider other people as fully autonomous, we tend to see them through the lens of our own needs and wants and that’s not only not very respectful, it’s also not very effective and it can causes us to put our own needs, wants and desires above the other persons. And that is what leads us to behave unethically.

In contract, when you recognize and respect the autonomy of other people, your expectations for them change. They are no longer someone who either helps you or hurts you. They are someone you are hoping will help you and not hurt you. This no longer about you – it’s about them. This slight shift in focus is what real respect feels like. And it has a profound impact on how you treat other people and how you are treated by them in return.

When you view someone with respect, you see yourself in them. You are them to a certain extent and the thought of hurting them by being unethical becomes unthinkable. This is the truth that all the different variations of the golden rule try to capture.  It’s about recognizing and respecting the reality of the human you are interacting with and treating them accordingly.

Why is Ethical Decision Making So Hard?

4 steps to ensuring your decision making is ethical.

It turns out that ethical decision making isn’t easy. If it were, people would not struggle with this.  Here are 4 tips to help you make better, more ethical decisions.

1) Decide on your ethics. You cannot make ethical decisions if you have no concept of how to judge whether something is ethical or not.  Most ethical systems are basically the same, so it doesn’t really matter which one you pick. As long as compassion is ranked high on your list of things to care about, your ethical system will be consistent with most of the rest of humanity, who are the ones who will judge whether your decisions are ethical or not.

2) Be Prepared to Make Hard Decisions. A lot of people seem to be under the impression that ethical decision making is easy. All they need to do is apply their ethics.  It doesn’t work like that.  The big decisions, where what is good and bad is obvious, don’t require you to decide anything. What is hard is deciding between the better of two goods or the lesser of two evils. Those are the situations that require ethical decision making. Accept that up front and have the courage to decide what you think is the most good or the least evil. The essence of ethical decision making is, after all, the act of making a decision. It is sometimes unpleasant, but be prepared to do it anyway, or admit that your decision making isn’t based on rational ethics.

3) Learn How to Think Well. In order to make good decisions, you have to have some basis of deciding. This is where critical thinking comes in. First, to be ethical, you have to know what is true and what is false. This is the foundation of ethical decision making. If you think something is true that isn’t, you could end up doing something unethical by mistake.

4) Use your ethics to decide. Think through your options and work hard to figure out what the best solution to your problem is. Use your ethics as a guide to what you think is the most good and the least harmful.

So there you go. Ethical decision making requires you to think about your ethics so that your decisions do the most good and the least harm. At the center of this is thinking. Take the time to learn how to think well and your ethical decision making should improve too.

The High Cost of Being Unethical

Why pretending that you don’t need to prioritize ethics is hurting you.

I’m pretty lazy. I don’t like to do things that cause me more work.  This is one of the main reasons why I prioritize being ethical.  It saves me a lot of grief. I avoid scandal (unless someone else draws me in against my will). I avoid mistakes that were easily avoided. Plus, being responsible for my actions makes me work harder and I feel like I get more done. My ethics don’t allow me to excuse myself for not doing what I’m supposed to do.

All these benefits also transfer over into the workplace.  A study by the Josephson Institute reports on the cost of unethical behavior in the workplace is eye opening (see: http://josephsoninstitute.org/pdf/Report_HiddenCostsUnethicalBehavior.pdf)

Here are a few of the costs associated with unethical workplace behavior:

• Lost sales
• Costs associated with legal fees resulting from scandals and problems
• Employee fraud (estimated at $600 billion/year)
• High employee turnover is pretty expensive
• Costs associated with intentionally sabotaged projects
• Costs associated with poor problem solving resulting for poor communication and withheld information

So the question we need to ask ourselves is – is allowing our ethics to lapse for expediency really expedient?  I don’t think so. It’s like anything. There is always a cost associated with your actions. Choose your actions wisely, prioritize your ethics, and make your life a little bit easier and better as a result.