Why Do You Need Code of Conduct Training for Your Organization?

What is Code of Conduct Training?

Most companies have developed a code of conduct and ethics and distributed that code out to their employees. That said, just distributing a company’s code is not doing enough to create a strong ethical culture and to teach employees about the organization’s mission and core values. Code of conduct training is imperative to make sure that employees understand the materials and actually work towards creating an ethical workplace. Interactive ethics training that’s focused on real-life scenarios gives employees a chance to apply your organization’s code and to fully understand it. In addition, successful training encourages employees to think through ethical dilemmas and to understand the implications of different decisions they might make. Just reading the policy doesn’t allow employees the opportunity to test their understanding and to apply the code’s principles to real-life scenarios. Quite simply, code of conduct training is the most fundamental piece of any organization’s compliance training program.

Why Should Your Organization Implement Code of Conduct Training?

Creating an ethical culture through code of conduct training within your organization is a worthwhile goal in and of itself, however, providing ethics training to your employees should be more than just a moral decision. The modern workplace is fraught with potential ethical issues that employees may face which can lead to lawsuits, fines, etc.. Insider trading, conflicts of interest, fraud, gifts and favors, and technology use are just a few common areas where employees face issues that are covered in an organization’s code of conduct. An effective code, coupled with a well-designed code of conduct training program, gives employees the tools they need to approach these areas of concern with confidence that they’re behaving ethically, and helps organizations avoid costly employee mistakes. More often than not, when an employee behaves unethically or makes a decision that goes against the organization’s code of conduct, it’s because they didn’t know that what they were doing was unethical. Or in some cases, they didn’t realize that what they were doing actually violated the law. Effective ethics training teaches employees how to face situations that pose ethical questions, and it walks them through the nuances of complicated situations that they’re likely to encounter in their everyday work life.

3 Key Elements of Successful Code of Conduct Training

Custom Training to your Workplace – The U.S. Department of Justice’s guidance, “Evaluation of Corporate Compliance Programs,” stresses that employer’s code of conduct training should be “appropriately tailored” to the types of issues employees may face in real life. Every organization is different and a one size fits all approach to code of conduct and ethics training just won’t work. The code of conduct training course should focus on key concepts to your organization. In addition, the training should include your organization’s actual code within the training so that they are required to review it, and given the chance to apply the principles to actual situations. With Traliant’s conduct training program, course scenarios can look like they are taking place in your actual workplace as well.

Explores “Gray Areas” – The line between ethical and unethical behavior is something that intelligent people may disagree on in many situations. An effective code of conduct training course will explore these types of “gray areas” and give employees the opportunity to think about how they would incorporate the organization’s core values in various situations. By forcing employees to think through real-life scenarios that they would face in your workplace, they’ll actually take actionable guidance away from the training program. 

Encourages Ethical Behavior – The most important part of an effective code of conduct training is that it simply encourages employees to behave ethically in the workplace. While most employees believe in helping to create an ethical workplace, an effective training program can help make that ethos a core principle for all employees in your organization. By training to your organization’s actual code of conduct, you can ensure that your mission and core values are understood and prioritized by all employees.

How Traliant Can Help You Provide Code of Conduct Training

Traliant provides custom code of conduct and ethics online training for the same price or lower than what employers typically pay for off-the-shelf conduct training. If you’re used to paying typical industry license fees for online ethics and compliance training, you’ll be amazed at how affordable our custom code of conduct training courses are. Also, through the use of scenarios, learning games, and interactive exercises, your employees learn exactly the information they need to create an ethical workplace. You can learn more about Traliant’s Code of Conduct and Ethics Online Training Course here.