Comment: Teaching ethics may stop more scandals

By This Is Money
Updated: 03:47 EDT, 23 May 2011

Let's educate tomorrow's workforce about ethics so they know to avoid business wrongdoing, says senior marketer Peter Dart of advertising giant WPP.

Life lessons: Children should be exposed to real-life ethical dilemmas that they might face in future

The personal protection insurance mis-selling scandal is likely to rumble on for a long time, with banks and building societies setting aside huge sums for compensation to customers and fears that this might spill over into the selling of mobile phone insurance.

In its recently published annual review, the Financial Ombudsman Service singled out high-pressure selling tactics and questionable value for money as some of the practices in this industry.

It is a shame that the massive overpricing of personal protection insurance (PPI) - which is meant to cover borrowers if they become unable to pay loans - and mis-selling will leave a bad taste for consumers.

This is particularly so at a time when further redundancies are likely to come, especially in the public sector, and it could still be a worthwhile product.

I overheard a discussion about this whole sorry saga at a boardroom meeting the other day, with one colleague remarking that someone higher up the 'food chain' must have known what was going on, but just turned a blind eye.

And indeed, it seems to me that we hardly go a week without yet another business scandal breaking involving dishonest or irresponsible behaviour.

In all these cases the wrongdoing isn't necessarily on the part of one person but is almost endemic and seen as 'normal' behaviour until it is pointed out.

With so much regulation and compliance governing business and industry, and companies implementing their own guidelines to ensure employees adhere to certain codes of practice, what else can be done to prevent inappropriate behaviour? There may be an alternative way of dealing with this.

An interesting survey released last week, called Should Ethics Be Taught?, caught my eye.

It was commissioned by an educational organisation from statistics compiled by Professor Leslie Francis of Warwick University and looked at the moral values of 10,000 13 to 15-year-olds in England and Wales, with interesting results.

Whilst 90% of teenagers believe a good work ethic is important and three quarters believe that a job provides a sense of purpose, there is still a worrying number who would be prepared to cheat or steal; 9% of respondents felt it was OK to shoplift and 22% of youngsters see nothing wrong with travelling without a ticket.

The survey's key recommendation was that in order to improve on these statistics, ethics should be taught in schools.

We all know the excessive pressure that teachers are under in just completing the curriculum and preparing their students for the world of work and university.

But it seems to me that part of preparing students for the workplace must be ensuring that they have been exposed to real-life dilemmas that they may face, and are provided with an ethical framework in order to be able to respond and have principles to stand by. That is why I am impressed by the new Money & Morals schools programme website.

Containing more than 100 real-life dilemma case studies and courses, it is a unique website for schools to teach ethical values to students so they can see their actions and behaviour has consequences for themselves and others.

The teenagers of today are the decision makers of tomorrow. They are the workforce we will all be employing, from junior level to those climbing the career ladder to become top professionals.

It makes sense to ensure that part of their education focuses on providing a set of values.

If we want to prevent anything like the PPI scandal from happening in the future, money and morals should be embedded as a key part of the education system. It is good for business, good for students and good for society.

• Peter Dart is a senior marketer at Sir Martin Sorrell's WPP. He is Trustee of the Education & Employers Taskforce and takes an active interest in how the worlds of business and education can work more closely together.