Out of the mouths of sitcom writers comes the latest lesson on how businesses should handle ethical issues in the workplace. Check out the Oct. 9 episode (perhaps on your TiVo or on NBC.com) of the TV series “The Office,” which was devoted to educating the employees of the fictional Dunder-Mifflin paper products office in Scranton, Penn., on ethics The episode proves the adage, “It’s funny because it’s true.”
The sitcom, in its fifth season, stars Steve Carell as branch manager Michael Scott, a character marked by a total lack of self-awareness of how incompetent, insensitive and clueless he is.
In this episode, the new human resources manager, Holly, puts on a business ethics seminar for employees at the insistence of corporate in New York City, which is placing renewed attention on the subject after corporate VP Ryan Howard is busted double billing sales as both offline and online. He’s been kicked back to the Scranton office where he started as an intern. Why Ryan isn’t in jail, much less still on the company payroll, even in the Scranton outpost, is never explained.
Holly invites employees, under a vague promise of immunity from Michael, to disclose unethical behavior in which they may have engaged. A few relatively minor infractions are admitted. Accountant Oscar Martinez admits sometimes taking a long lunch. Kelly Kapoor admits to downloading pirated music onto her company computer (which in the real world opens the company to significant liability). But Meredith Palmer, a customer relations rep, trumps them all by admitting that over the previous six years, she’s had sex with a manufacturer’s rep in exchange for discounts on supplies that D-M sells, plus, as she added, discount coupons to a steakhouse.
Holly, who wishes Michael had not extended the immunity offer, thinks Meredith should be fired, but Michael resists. In private discussions with Holly, Michael is reluctant to act, describing his employees as “family,” which Holly says is, legally, not the case. This illustrates a conflict that likely occurs in real workplaces where mid-level managers disagree on how to deal with an ethical situation and managers who are required to enforce a corporate ethics policy fail to do so because of their aversion to confrontation.
“It turns out being the morality police does not make you popular,” Holly observes.
And when Holly tells corporate about Meredith’s breach, the corporate HR executive, “Kendall,” completely undercuts Holly.
“I’m not sure these circumstances warrant any action,” says Kendall, in a speakerphone conference call with Holly and Michael in Michael’s office. In the scene, the door to Michael’s office is wide open, enabling everyone else in the office to hear the conversation, violating the basic rule that HR issues are to be kept private.
Sadly, ethics issues are trumped by the bottom line. “To be honest the company’s getting a discount during a tough time on our balance sheet,” says Kendall. “I don’t think the right thing for our company to do is turn our nose up at that.”
To be sure, in a sitcom as off-the-wall as “The Office,” the situations are exaggerated for comic effect, but who hasn’t encountered dilemmas that pit ethical concerns against financial ones?
The episode also highlights another issue where management wishes only to be “in compliance” and nothing more. Before hanging up, Kendall admonishes Holly: “Your task was to get signatures from employees that they had completed the training.”
Who hasn’t heard that before?
Even the madcap comedy of “The Office” contains a pearl of wisdom. Amid a discussion of copping office supplies or hanging out at the water cooler too long, Oscar argues that business ethics shouldn’t be just about enforcing “the corporate anti-shoplifting rules.”
“Ethics is a real discussion about competing conceptions of good,” he said.
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