Building Workplace Integrity

Integrity Management System A set of interrelated components and their interactions developed, maintained, monitored and improved as a practical system for preventing, detecting and sanctioning corrupt practices. It is what the organisation does to ensure that its operations are corruption free. Our integrity management system has been designed to help organisations conduct business, even in the most challenging of markets, without compromising their ethics.

Integrity management should not just be viewed as a misconduct-limiting organisational instrument. Instead, strategic integrity management should be used to foster ethical behaviours that ultimately drive firm performance by stimulating and empowering positive behaviours

Integrity management then becomes an active part of every core process of an organisation that develops shared values along the organisation’s strategic priorities, its core competencies, and among its internal and external stakeholders.

Please note that we use the terms integrity, ethics, and character interchangeably.

Elements of Integrity Management

• Integrity policy and Code of Conduct
• The organisational structure: allocation of roles and responsibilities
• Integrity controls and procedures for all key processes
• Integrity assessment
• Integrity audits
• Training programmes and awareness raising
• Communication with internal and external stakeholders
• Monitoring and investigation of corruption related cases
• Reporting as regards integrity performance
• Integrity management reviews

Integrity management creates a dynamic capability that aligns, shapes, extends or modifies an organisation’s resources and processes towards higher levels of performance.

Integrity management drives performance through building a culture of integrity, managing risks, strengthening internal and external reputation, and improving competitive advantage.

Investment in an integrity management program is not just a checklist item that protects the firm’s license to operate. It is a program that addresses and integrates ‘best practices’ systematically into daily operations and makes them part of a shared managerial agenda, daily routines, and explicit performance rewards will not only eradicate bad behaviours it will improve overall firm competitiveness.

Integrity Management will also help to overcome structural obstacles to innovation and differentiation, as it becomes a competence enhancing organisational capability.

Research (Fuerst & Schotter, 2011) has shown that the effective implementation and application of Integrity Management system as part of an integrity and compliance program is the most important indicator of its credibility, its effectiveness and of the capabilities of ethical oriented management.

The model bears potential for innovation and differentiation as it forces management and employees to challenge common assumptions about the appropriateness of objectives and the way business is being executed.

Leadership should always promote and follow the highest ethical standards pro- actively.

A highly ethical manager that acts in line with critical values as an individual but fails to communicate those values is not empowering his colleagues and subordinates to act ethically themselves

All management levels should generate an atmosphere where employees can speak-up, raise concerns and discuss integrity dilemmas before these dilemmas turn into negative outcomes for the entire organisation or parts of it.

Management should actively encourage all members of the organization to develop innovative ideas and business solutions based on integrity and compliance standards.