For example, consider the following case study, taken from my Street Level Ethics class and based upon a real incident:

You've been underwriting a performance bond for an experienced construction firm. Everything you reviewed looks favorable, and you gave the bond your final approval just before leaving the office this afternoon. First thing tomorrow morning, you plan to finalize the paperwork and call the agent to tell her of the approval.

Tonight is your regular Alcoholics Anonymous (AA) meeting. Upon arrival, you notice several new faces. It's always good to see others making the decision to turn their lives around. After everyone settles into their chairs, one of the new visitors stands up to introduce himself. To your shock, he turns out to be the president of the construction company whose bond you just approved. He admits emotionally to the group he had fought against the idea of coming to the meetings. He was sure he really didn't have a problem he couldn't work out on his own. What finally changed his mind was a “tough love” confrontation with his bookkeeper and job foreman that morning. His drinking had led him to slack off on supervising his jobs, and he had been treating the company bank account as his personal party fund. Both employees informed him in no uncertain terms he was endangering the company's ability to survive, they were tired of covering up for him, and if he didn't get help, they were quitting. He promised them he'd do what it took to straighten himself out. And he's sure they can get the company back to full health if they can finish the jobs they currently have underway, plus the new one he just won the bid for and will start work on as soon as his performance bond comes through. He asks for the group's help in keeping his pledge.

The next morning, you sit at your desk and stare at the bond application that no one except you knows you've already approved. What do you do now?

Like many “right versus right” scenarios, in class I've found that some folks think this an easy question, while for others it's a true rock crusher. The eye opener usually comes when they compare answers and find the seemingly reasonable, honest, intelligent person right next to them came to the totally opposite conclusion. Once they compare reasoning, the frequent response is, “Well, I'm still not sure I agree with you, but I can certainly see where you are coming from.” At that point, each can reconsider: “Do I still think my answer the best, or has something revealed to me by the other possibilities changed my mind?” With repeated practice, always with the recognition that multiple choices may still be “right,” you gain better insight into which of your own decision processes, assumptions and preconceptions may be helping or hindering your ability to make consistent, dependable decisions when facing tough choices. In consistency and dependability lie the foundations of trust. And what is a more fundamental asset in an industry of intangibles such as ours than trust? It is, after all, what we sell–future promises in return for current premiums. Without trust, we are all in a heap of trouble.

Although a complete study of ethics is beyond this article, let me summarize the three guidelines I find most useful to help you make a decision in situations such as the case study above.

1. Situation-based: what is the best outcome possible given this set of
circumstances

2. Rule-based: follow the rules, and let the chips fall where they may

3. People-based: following the Golden Rule, what would you have others do if faced by the same situation.

Each approach has its strengths and weaknesses, but by following one approach consistently, you can attain results that are seen as fair, consistent and trustworthy–even by those who don't personally care for the outcome.

Situation-based

You've already approved the bond. Letting the approval stand gives the contractor's employees continued work and helps him turn his life around. And it was only by his effort to make things right that you found yourself in a position to learn the new information. Because all of the other underwriting data checked out, this new information does not seem to create enough extra risk to justify the damage to multiple parties (including the obligee, which will incur a significant delay on getting its new building if it has to start negotiations with another contractor) that will result if you deny the bond.

Rule-based

If your focus is the underwriting rules, as much as you sympathize, the fact remains that if his financial and supervisory difficulties had come to light during your underwriting process, you would have denied the bond. So you have no choice but to deny it now.

But there is a crucial problem with that seemingly easy answer for rule-based folks. According to the rules of Alcoholics Anonymous, anything said at an AA meeting is supposed to be strictly confidential. In addition, you are not to reveal who attended the meeting to anyone outside. You agreed to these rules when you entered AA. As my late father (and long-time AA member) summarized that confidentiality: “The meeting never took place.” If you consider AA rules, then you must issue the bond, as anything else would betray your confidentiality pledge–including if somewhere down the road you had to admit how you learned the new information.

Which rules do you choose to follow?

People-based

You not only understand how he could do what he did in his position, you've been in his position. That's why you are at the meeting. There is no question in your mind that your life would have been much different if your support group and boss hadn't rallied around you when you needed help.

Can you do any less for this new fellow traveler?

You can see that good, honest folks can still arrive, in a completely ethical manner, at opposite decisions. Because each choice can be “right,” it follows no one who chooses different than you is “wrong.” We simply arrive, through a solid process of following valid guidelines, at different possibilities. Yet you must choose. Either you issue the bond or you don't.

And this is what makes ethical study and decision-making practice not just the latest CE requirement, but a critical skill in all of our everyday actions. Making tough choices, especially when confronted with multiple “right” answers, becomes an opportunity to enhance trust, rather than a frustration to be avoided
at all costs.

This March, honor National Ethics Month with a new commitment to yourself, your staff, your clients and all the other possible stakeholders, to improve your ethical skills, make better decisions, and build trust in yourself and our industry.

You might reward yourself with some of that new CD from Eric Clapton and Steve Winwood. Why, I remember the time I first heard “Dear Mr. Fantasy”…