Have you ever seen something wrong... but you stayed silent about it?
Katie Shonk (2020) shares a personal story in a blog post about a good intentioned, but rather crass effort that they made to shut down a homophobic comment made at their wedding reception. Even though Shonk does not identify as gay, she took offense at this comment and made the decision to call out the comment as unacceptable. She wanted to be a good ally. When we hear people say things that are offensive or rude, it can be difficult to speak up, especially if we aren’t the ones that comment was about. When we do, it can be easy to come across as self-righteous and create more tension. So, what are we meant to do when we see biased or antisocial behavior?
As a university employee I am required to complete standard HR training on a yearly basis. One of these training sessions is related to harassment prevention. Last year our training was revamped to include bystander intervention and a section on the importance of diversity and inclusion in the workplace. A strategy to help change attitudes around inappropriate conduct at work involves getting otherwise uninvolved parties, bystanders, to speak up when they see something wrong (Lee et al., 2019). I’ve seen my department enact a policy over the last year in an effort to address bias in student instructor selection. The University removed instructor names from the enrollment process so that students would not be able to look up often biased reviews on instructor rating websites and prevent students from avoiding instructors with foreign sounding names. The effort did not result in the desired outcomes, as there were workarounds that allowed students to still discover who their instructor was and switch sections based on their research. My biggest takeaway from these kinds of bystander intervention training is that doing or saying something (so long as it puts no one in harm's way) is better than staying quiet which can perpetuate harmful behavior. I can see my organization trying something out that didn’t quite work. I believe that the policy will be reversed, but this should not be seen as a failure, but rather the discovery that one particular effort to minimize bias did not do the trick.
Values & Ethics in my Organization
It helps to understand my own values thoroughly in order to see how they align with my choice of work. I have a regular contemplative practice in my life that I use to help me identify my core values and to ensure that I am living in accordance with them (McGehee et al., 2017). Time and time again, I re-discover that connection to others, stewardship of the Earth, and learning & sharing knowledge, among other values guide my decision-making. My employer outlines their own stated values, mission, and vision on their website which include "collaboration... teamwork, ethical and responsible behavior... in a culturally diverse community that supports the unique needs of each individual," (Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University, 2023, para. 1). I get to see how these values play out in the “mundane and everyday practices” within my department (Grandy & Sliwa, 2015, p. 423). ERAU’s mission is in alignment with my own values of learning and sharing knowledge and connecting with others in a unique way. I spend every day of my work in conversation with the students I am assigned to support. I have a manageable caseload so that I can provide each student with personalized advice and really take the time to understand their situation, strengths, opportunities, and their motivations for pursuing higher education. Overall, I am happy with the employer that I work with as I feel that I can exercise my own personal values at work every day.
References
Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University. (2023). Values, mission and vision. Values, Mission and Vision | Embry - Riddle Aeronautical University. https://erau.edu/leadership/president/values-mission-and-vision
Grandy, G., & Sliwa, M. (2015). Contemplative leadership: The possibilities for the ethics of Leadership Theory and Practice. Journal of Business Ethics, 143(3), 423–440. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10551-015-2802-2
Lee, S. Y., Hanson, M. D., & Cheung, H. K. (2019). Incorporating bystander intervention into sexual harassment training. Industrial and Organizational Psychology, 12(01), 52–57. https://doi.org/10.1017/iop.2019.8
McGehee, P., Germer, C., & Neff, K. (2017). Core values in mindful self-compassion. Mindfulness in Behavioral Health, 279–293. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-64924-5_11
Shonk, K. (2020, July 13). Moral Leadership and the Role of Unconscious Bias [web log]. Retrieved August 10, 2023, from https://www.pon.harvard.edu/daily/leadership-skills-daily/moral-leadership-and-the-role-of-unconscious-bias/
Comments
Post a Comment