Creating and maintaining a consistent ethics program is a challenge for multinational organizations and establishing a network of ethics ambassadors is one way to help meet this challenge. This paper aims to summarize the role of HR in encouraging an ethical culture; looks at how to recruit ambassadors and establish a network; and examines some of the challenges.
The report upon which this paper is based draws on the experience of one of the authors as an ethics practitioner in a large multinational company, and an Institute of Business Ethics (IBE) survey of large companies taken in 2010, compiled from 12 responses from companies across different sectors, of which six are headquartered in the UK, four are headquartered in continental Europe, one in the USA and one unknown.
An ethics ambassador network is a cost‐effective way of ensuring that ethical values are embedded throughout an organization. An effective network can help mitigate integrity risks and encourage a culture that is supportive of high ethical standards and legal requirements.
This paper provides HR practitioners within multinational organizations with an insight into how they can facilitate the use of ethics ambassadors. A more in‐depth examination of the subject is published in the IBE's good practice guide, Ethics Ambassadors, available from www.ibe.org.uk
