Bringing Innovation to the Age-Old Topic of Ethics

NORTHAMPTON, MA / ACCESSWIRE / May 25, 2023 / U.S. Bank

Foto: Accesswire

Photo: Katie Lawler, center, was recently recognized by Ethics & Compliance Initiative with its Carol R. Marshall Award for Innovation in Corporate Ethics.

Originally published on U.S. Bank company blog

When you think of ethics, a concept as old as time, you may not think of innovation. But as Katie Lawler, senior vice president and global chief ethics officer at U.S. Bank, will tell you, evolving how we think about ethics is innovative itself.

Lawler, who was recently recognized by Ethics & Compliance Initiative with its Carol R. Marshall Award for Innovation in Corporate Ethics, shared how she and her team are bringing innovative thinking to the bank and its 77,000 employees when it comes to doing the right thing.

What does it mean to be innovative in a topic that is centuries old? Why is it important?

I think it's going beyond your code of ethics, your employee ethics hotline and annual ethics course. It starts with looking at ethics as more than a set of rules.

It's about recognizing that much of our behavior is driven by the work environment we are in and being intentional about shaping a culture that supports good decision making.

When we created the Global Ethics Office, we started to look to organizational and behavioral psychology to understand how we might influence the environment for the better. We are learning from and partnering with the bank's behavioral scientists to understand what drives human behavior so we can be responsive to it.

Can you give some examples of how you're innovating ethics at U.S. Bank?

By incorporating psychological safety and behavioral science in how we think about ethics, we are focusing on creating the conditions for employees to be able to be at their best.

We're working closely with our in-house behavioral scientists. We want people in this company to tell us when there's an issue, an opportunity, a mistake, a new way of doing things. So we started with behavior mapping - asking ourselves, "What does it take for someone to come forward and speak up?" Then, what are the barriers and obstacles, or where it could break down? What are some interventions we could test to address those barriers? How do we make the process of coming forward less intimidating, and how do we build positive reinforcement for doing so?