The two steps to foster the change process in organizations include improving sound ethical behavior within the organization and focusing on the capacity for leaders to follow instead of lead. These are significantly essential steps, even in public health settings. It is important for many organizations, small or large to understand that ethical behavior in the workforce come from senior management and supervisors, according to the results of a recent study from Deloitte & Touche USA (n.d.). “In order to encourage high ethical standards within our organizations, we first have to provide an environment that is conducive to ethical behavior,” says Sharon Allen, chairman of the board at Deloitte & Touche (n.d.). “However, management and leadership have a huge responsibility in setting examples for their organizations and living the values they preach if they want to sustain a culture of ethics” (Schurr, 2007). Many of the unethical behaviors come from top management level, because I think lower employees don’t usually act unethically that will cause great impact in the organization.
In order to foster change process, organization can have control over preserving its ratings and status by acting according to their said values, mission, and vision of the organization. By no means, it could save itself because most importantly, corporate leaders have a duty to build and foster a values-based culture that thrives on high ethical standards and makes corporate and social responsibility a top priority ( Deloitte & Touche, n.d). Only by instilling these values in organizations will they be able to bestow a promising future to the next generation. The flip side of leadership is followership. This is because it stands to motive that if leadership is significant to management performance, followership must have something to do with it too. The two sides are both important and connected to each other. But inquisitively, followership gets only a small portion of what leadership does. Furthermore, effectiveness in leadership means also effectiveness in followership.
When I was working on my bachelor’s degree, I had a temporary position to supervise commercial cartridge department within Ink Cycle. Well, as a supervisor of Ink Cycle, I worked like a worker (i.e. with my followers), rather than supervising them. This is to help them with needed materials in building and flushing commercial cartridges. I worked with the employees to also speed up production capacity and set example for what or how they should perform their tasks. I felt like I was actually working to improve my followership skills, as an effective leader. On the other hand, improving my followership skills means improving the leadership aspect of it. Therefore, improving leadership skills improves management capacities, and raises the probabilities for better performance.
Public health officials, and other community health leaders are confronted with many different ethical problems. For example, Community Health Nurse (CHN) leaders can be confronted with ethical problems in increasing numbers and difficulty (Jenkins, 1989). According to Jenkins (1989), to tackle successfully with ethical dilemmas, nurse leaders must be aware of leadership qualities that include ethical responsibilities while using proper actions to solve problem of this kind. The attitudes, collaborations and conducts of employees at workplace must be understood and can be relevant in the organizational success. However, if you take a closer look at the many roles leaders have in the business world, you might notice that many of them are followers as well as leaders. Most executives, within organizations, while they may lead their specific departments, must answer to someone higher in the organization— organizational culture to foster change process (Laureate Education, 2008). Even the CEOs of Fortune 500 companies must report to and follow board of directors. The article by Heifetz & Linsky (2002) provided a perfect example of encouraging and adopting a culture where people comes first, and where we can have the capacity to solve other people’s problem. The idea is that we can’t force people to make difficult decision. But in our desire for order, leaders can tend to make the means for the end (Heifetz & Linsky, 2002). Therefore, acting to interrelate with followers is another way of improving employees’ satisfaction and happiness in an organization.
Heifetz, R. A., & Linsky, M. (2002). A Survival Guide for Leaders. Harvard Business Review, 80(6), 65-74
Jenkins, H. (1989). Ethical dimensions of leadership in community health nursing. Journal of Community Health Nursing, 6(2), 103-112 10p.
Laureate Education (Producer). (2008). Leadership, professionalism, and ethics in public health practice: Using creative tension to facilitate change [Video file]. Retrieved from https://class.waldenu.edu
Schurr, A. (2007). Ethical Behavior Starts at the top. Network World. Retrieved from http://www.networkworld.com/newsletters/2007/0423itlead1.html
Deloitte & Touche USA LLP. (n.d.). Leadership Counts. Deloitte. Retrieved from http://www.deloitte.com/assets/Dcom-UnitedStates/Local%20Assets/Documents/us_2007_ethics_workplace_survey_011009.pdf
