FT Syndication Service
London: What do you do if you work in the human resource (HR) department of an organisation and you know that a friend, a single parent poised to take on a very large mortgage, is about to be made redundant? Do you tell or keep mum?
This it is the sort of issue that an increasing number of finance professionals are discussing as their bosses recognise the need for training in ethics.
At Instinet Europe, the Nomura global securities subsidiary, chief operating officer Clive Triance instigated an ethics training programme this year and now all 200 employees in the London office have completed the course.
To begin with some staff were sceptical about the programme, thinking it related to compliance or social responsibility issues. But on completing the one-day programme responses were very good, Mr Triance says . "I think people felt better when they left the course."
The aim of the debate was to get to the core of employees' values in business and life, he says.
The programme was taught by Roger Steare, visiting professor of organisational ethics at Cass Business School, London, who describes himself as a corporate philosopher.
There may be no right answers to the questions posed, but in the situation of the HR manager and the soon-to-be-made-redundant friend, there was an outcome. The HR manager told the friend about the impending redundancy, the conversation was overheard and both were fired.
Values of staff put to the test
Della Bradshaw | Published: June 08, 2008 00:00:00 | Updated: February 01, 2018 00:00:00
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