As leaders, we should always stay morally engaged. Ethics and morals are things people learn as children. Proverbs says, “Train up a child in the way he should go; even when he is old, he will not depart from it” (Proverbs 22:6 ESV). So then, how does a person become morally disengaged?

Bandura (2016) describes human behavior as being guided by moral standards and the deterrent for conduct unbecoming. However, in some situations, humans become disengaged and commit terrible acts against humanity. Bandura explains that moral justification, masked language, advantageous comparisons, displacement, and diffusion are some methods used to disengage our morality. For example, people act as groups or organizations, like soldiers, following orders when their disengagement from morality begins. As leaders, we must lead with moral and ethical boundaries to avoid disengaging others from morality. Voltaire puts it this way, “If you can lead people to believe absurdities, you can get them to commit atrocities” (Bandura, 2011). Generally, these atrocities are visible in the relationship between prison guards and prisoners or in the business world, where taking risks has large payoffs but crosses boundaries and cheats others out of significant investments. Taking shortcuts may look tempting, or not questioning authorities about questionable tasks may be considered okay, but they are the beginning of moral disengagement.

Saha (2014, p. 31) says, “Corporate Ethics is much needed to stress the importance of sustainability, social development, stakeholders and consumers satisfaction.” Ethics and morality play a more prominent role in organizations and inspire the ongoing evaluation and revisions of the choices and actions to reach the intended outcomes (Koehn, 1995). One can only be aware of moral and ethical leadership demands by understanding oneself. The morals and ethics one values will be the compass that guides one's actions (Lakshmi, 2014).

Here is something to think about. What moral and ethical dilemmas has your organization faced? Did they stay morally engaged in dealing with the dilemma?

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ARE YOU MORALLY ENGAGED?

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