While many people this week are celebrating Hanukkah, getting ready for Christmas or eagerly waiting for the 100th Episode of EthicalVoices on Monday….ethics issues continue unabated. This week there were a number of interesting articles on ethical leadership, GenZ and Capitalism and two great ethics resources.
Pam Campbell, APR, Fellow PRSA, the Director of Public Affairs at the Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City, Oklahoma City Branch discusses a number of important ethical issues, including:
1) Conflict of interest issues with non-profit boards
2) How non-profit board can help prevent ethical issues
3) How to effectively fight disinformation
This week in PR ethics there were a number of interesting ethical issues raised related to greenwashing, wokewashing and non-profits as well as a chilling report than 75% of all business workplace conversations will be recorded in analyzed in less than a few years.
Ken Hunter, the President and Chief Strategist at The PowerStation and a part-time lecturer at Rutgers University. He discusses a number of important issues, including
1) What to do ethically when your company is accused of making people sick
2) How to make ethical issues seem less like personal attacks
3) What to do when your boss makes unethical promises
4) Dealing with media bias
This week, (well two weeks) the most interesting ethical issues I found tended to have an international flavor, and the Public Relations and Communications Association (PRCA) and ethics was central to many of them. There are also two very interesting (and free) ethics Webinars coming up in the next week.
Kelly Davis, the Public Relations Sequence Head at the University of South Carolina, discusses a number of important issues, including:
1) How to avoid landmines and understand the fine lines in public affairs and lobbying
2) How can nonprofits ethically get their message out when faced with well-funded opponents?
3) Ethical issues with data, media and society
4) How to make sure you are sharing accurate information
Following are 100 ethics issues the students and I identified and discussed. These stories were ripped from the headlines. If you missed them, they are worth another review. They make great reading and great discussion over Zoom
A number of ethical issues this week dealt with technology issues and setting boundaries. What happens when the algorithms become too efficient and lead companies to actions that may be “too human” or inadvertently racist?
Joining me on this week’s episode is Ron Culp, the director of the Public Relations and Advertising Masters Program at DePaul University.
Ron discusses a number of important topics, including:
1) What to do when asked to make absurd and misleading claims
2) Why PR professions need the industry to have their back
3) Where companies make mistakes in countering disinformation internally
4) How to make your company attractive to potential employees
Claims of ballot fraud and lists of Trump supporters for potential retaliation are not the only hot ethical issues of the week.
Since those have received so much attention, I wanted to highlight some other interesting issues.