In the post-Enron era, most companies have adopted codes of ethics and codes of conduct. But what are they worth?
Not much, according to European corporate compliance survey, reports The Lawyer.com. In fact, not worth the paper they're written on.
While 99 per cent of companies had codes of conduct or statements of values and principles, it's news to the workforce. Few general counsel expect they'll be getting more money for compliance, which suggests compliance and ethics are not high on the priority list, and more than half reckon that conflicts with other business priorities are stopping their companies from investing more time in tackling compliance and ethics issues.
Last year I drew everyone's attention to Enron's code of ethics.
Clearly, that was no aberration. Don't fall for the line about bad apples. There's something wrong with the barrel.
Naturally, because companies are more interested in making profits and having larger market shares. They are not interested in developing and adhering to ethics. Had they really followed ethics one would have never seen tobacco companies making so much money.