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As more and more employees with post-materialist values enter the workforce, employers who fail to consider the changing ethical standards that accompany these values will suffer the consequences of their choices. New Ethics in the Office Robert A. Giacalone Acting Director, Center for Ethics and Organizational Integrity Fox School of Business and Management Temple University Philadelphia, Pennsylvania Most of the ethics violations that catch the public attention these days are related to loss of money, loss of power, and loss of esteem. When a society considers ethics violations only in materialistic terms, the response is to create laws like Sar- banes-Oxley, which are designed to protect against financial misconduct. Unfortunately, that's not the whole story. There is evi- dence that, around the globe, people are becoming relatively less interested in materialistic values and more interested in an emerging set of post-materialistic values. I say relatively, because there's no expectation that people are going to live in mud houses and give up their cars. But people whose ba- sic security needs have been met are shifting their attention to post-materialistic values that revolve around community connectedness, interpersonal relationships, quality of life, and family. The numbers of people adopting these values are stag- gering. In 1970, for every four materialists, there was one post-materialist; by the mid-1990s, the ratio was four to three. These values are changing in industrialized countries throughout the world. As one might imagine, post-materialistic people are inter- ested in working at companies whose values match their own. They want to know if their organization is socially respon- sible and ecologically sound. They're interested in issues of community well-being. In my work with companies, I have heard stories about senior-level executives who won't accept positions if the job will require them to spend too much time away from their families. I know of companies that are losing well-paid employees because workers are more interested in quality of life than money. It isn't just that these individuals have different values than traditional materialist employees, but that they increasingly are redefining their values prefer- ences in moral terms. As more post-materialists join the workforce, we will see 24 BizEd SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2006 a change in what's considered ethically ac- ceptable behavior in the workplace—a shift toward concern with unethical actions that harm people in nonfinancial ways. One cur- rent example is the increased interest in bul- lying. There have always been mean kids on the playground and abusive bosses in the corner office, so why is there an interest in the topic now? There's been no change in the law—what has changed is people's sen- sitivity. We also see more companies wres- tling with environmental issues or making provisions for employees who need child care or elder care services. As time goes on, companies that ignore these issues will be seen as ethically cavalier or socially irresponsible. At the moment, we as a society haven't quite sensitized organizations to these types of ethics violations. Years ago, in a similar fashion, society slowly became aware of the mis- treatment of women and minorities. Long before any laws were instituted, people had a sense that such mistreatment was occurring. The first step toward correcting a problem is for a significant percentage of the population to agree that one exists. Very few business schools are teaching their students about these post-materialistic values, yet I think it's impor- tant that we train business students to consider them. In my classes, I'm enlarging the scope of ethical concerns to include issues that have little financial implication. I talk about trends in society that business has instigated and ask students about the impact of these trends on people. I have students look at what is and isn't acceptable in the workplace, including issues of supervisor abuse and long hours. Many students are familiar with these issues from their own life experiences, but never considered them from an ethical stance. More and more are beginning to understand that issues such as quality of work life are not simply about profitability, but about hu- man dignity and ethics. Students need to see that the competitive edge will go to the first companies to figure out how to deal with these new kinds of ethical issues. From a practical standpoint, managers are going to have to rethink their definitions of what is ethi- cal in the workplace. Of course, no one is asking companies to ignore those ethical issues with financial implications. But as more and more employees with post-materialist values en- ter the workforce, employers who fail to consider the chang- ing ethical standards that accompany these values will suffer the consequences of their choices.