Rules
Part of Leadership ethics: how decisions reveal values
What a serious leadership ethics checklist covers
Leadership ethics checked against last quarter's events, not beliefs: what reached you, what you decided, and who on your team tells you no.
This checklist does not ask what you believe. It asks what happened. Twelve items, each answerable from the last quarter's events, each with a passing form of evidence and a failing one.
The reason for the evidence-only rule is that leaders, asked whether they run an honest team, say yes. Asked to name the last time an ethical argument beat a commercial one, many cannot. The second question is the one worth asking.
What to take away
- Every item on this list is answered by naming a specific event. "Generally yes" is a fail.
- Four of the twelve are about what reached you and when. A leader who is not receiving bad news is not running an honest operation, whatever they believe about it.
- Three are about exceptions, incentives and the person who says no. Those are where a team's real rules live.
- Score it quarterly, alone, in writing. Then show the blank rows to someone who reports to you and ask if they agree they are blank.
What reached you
1. The last piece of bad news from two levels down. Name it, and the date. Pass: something in the last month, brought voluntarily, by someone who does not report directly to you. Fail: nothing, or only things that came through your direct reports after they had been tidied. If bad news only reaches you filtered, you are the last to know by construction, and the pillar on leadership ethics explains how that state is built without anyone intending it.
What reached you
- Bad news from two levels down, dated
- Last time someone told you that you were wrong
- Last report of a problem and who followed it up
- Reporter heard back within a stated time
2. The last time someone told you that you were wrong. Name the person, the topic and what you did. Pass: it happened in the last quarter, and you can say what changed as a result. Fail: you cannot recall one, or you can recall one and nothing changed. A team that has stopped correcting you has decided it is not worth the cost.
3. The last report of a problem, and who followed it up. Name the report, the person who owned the follow-up, and what the reporter was told. Pass: all three are known, and the reporter heard back within a stated time. Fail: the report is known but the follow-up is vague, or the reporter was never told the outcome. Where a report concerns certain kinds of wrongdoing it may also carry legal protection, as the UK's whistleblowing framework sets out; what applies to you is counsel's question, and this item asks only what you did.
4. The last time you said "I don't know" to the team. Pass: in the last month, on something that mattered. Fail: you cannot recall, or you recall one on something trivial. Leaders who never say it teach teams that not knowing is unsafe, and teams that believe that will guess rather than ask.
What you decided
5. The last decision where the ethical argument beat the commercial one. Name it, with the cost. Pass: one in the last quarter, and the people involved would describe it the same way. Fail: none, or one that cost nothing. A quarter with no such decision is either extraordinary or a quarter in which the argument was never made.
What you decided
- Ethical argument beat commercial one, with cost
- Every exception granted this quarter, in writing
- Each exception has an end date
- Last refusal, and the reason you gave
6. Every exception you granted this quarter. List them: who asked, what for, until when. Pass: the list exists in writing, each has an end date, and none was granted verbally. Fail: you are reconstructing the list from memory, or an exception is still running with no end. Exceptions are the team's real rulebook.
7. The last time you did not grant one. Name it and the reason you gave. Pass: it happened, the person understood what the rule was protecting, and you helped with the underlying problem some other way. Fail: every request was granted, or one was refused without a reason.
What your team is rewarded for
8. The target most likely to be hit by cutting a corner. Name it. Pass: you have identified it, and you have either changed it or you have a specific check on how it is being hit. Fail: you cannot name one. Every set of targets has one, and the leader who cannot find it has not looked.
What your team is rewarded for
- Target most likely hit by cutting a corner
- Top performer's last near miss and conversation
- Who tells you no, and was right
- Evidence they were not worse off
9. The top performer's last near miss. Name the incident and the conversation. Pass: something came up, you dealt with it the same week, and the team knows a conversation occurred. Fail: nothing has come up in a year, which is unlikely, or something came up and the conversation did not happen. Whether a rule reaches the people whose results the organization depends on is one of the markers the Department of Justice's compliance program guidance treats as evidence that a program operates rather than exists.
10. Who tells you no. Name the person who, in the last quarter, argued against something you wanted and was right. Pass: a name, an occasion, and evidence that they were not worse off for it. Fail: no name. A leader without one is being agreed with, and agreement is not the same as being right.
What it looks like from outside
11. The relationship you would not want described in print. A customer, a supplier, a partner. Pass: you have thought about it, there is none, or there is one and you have a plan with a date. Fail: there is one and you have decided not to think about it. What is owed to those parties is covered under customer ethics and supplier ethics; the point here is only that you know which relationship it is.
What it looks like from outside
- Relationship you would not want described in print
- A plan with a date, or none exists
- Who left, and why
- Reason checked with the people function
12. Who left, and why. Name anyone who left the team in the last year and whose reason, honestly stated, involved how the team operates. Pass: nobody, and you have checked with the people function rather than assumed. Fail: someone, and you did not ask, or you asked and did not act.
Scoring
Count the passes. Then ignore the count, and look at which rows failed.
What failing rows usually mean
Failing rows
- 1 to 4
- Information is not reaching you
- 5 to 7
- Decisions not visible or consistent
- 8 to 10
- Real incentives are not the stated ones
- 11 to 12
- External conduct managed by not looking
What it usually means
- 1 to 4
- 5 to 7
- 8 to 10
- 11 to 12
| Failing rows | What it usually means |
|---|---|
| 1 to 4 | Information is not reaching you. Fix this before anything else; nothing below is reliable until it does |
| 5 to 7 | You are deciding, but the decisions are not visible or not consistent. Write exceptions down and publish the reasoning for refusals |
| 8 to 10 | The team's real incentives are not the stated ones. This is the expensive row to fix, and the one that undoes the others if left |
| 11 to 12 | External conduct is being managed by not looking. Look |
A leader with passes on 5 to 12 and fails on 1 to 4 is in the most dangerous position on the table: making good decisions on bad information, and unaware of it.
The second half of the exercise
The second half of the exercise
- Take the rows you failed
- Show them without the reasoning
- To one person who reports to you
- And one who does not
- Ask whether they agree the row is blank
- Expect a pass to be corrected to a fail
They will sometimes tell you a row you marked as a pass is a fail. The bad news you thought reached you voluntarily was pushed. The exception you thought was closed is still running. The person you named as telling you no has stopped.
That correction is the checklist working. The items measure the events; the second half measures whether you see them, and most leaders skip it.
For a structured way to make those conversations easier, the questions in ethical frameworks are built for a decision, and most transfer to a conversation about a quarter.
Common questions
Can I score this for a leader who reports to me?
Only from the evidence, and only after asking their team the second-half questions. A score based on your impression of them is the same error the checklist exists to prevent.
What if item 5 has genuinely never come up?
Then look at item 8. A quarter in which no ethical argument was made against a commercial one, in a team with a target that rewards cutting corners, is a quarter in which the argument was needed and absent.
How is this different from the questions in the pillar?
Those ask what you believe. This asks what happened, with a date. Use both; trust the second.
