Small Business Ethics

While talking with an attorney friend of mine, our topic of discussion was about professional behavior in the marketplace. She reminded me that attorneys have very specific ethical and professional standards that are published, plus a well-developed monitoring organization, complete with sanctioning authority.

The story is quite similar for CPAs, architects, medical doctors, or any securities representative such as stock brokers, financial planners, etc. Much of the behavioral track these professionals run on is pretty well spelled out for them. Not that the members of these groups need to be led or coerced into good professional behavior. It's just that, when in doubt, they have published guidelines with which to refer.

Small business owners operate in the same marketplace as the so-called professionals. Indeed, they are often our clients and customers. We serve the same businesses and consumers as other professionals, plus we enter into similar relationships, contracts and agreements. And we often find ourselves perched precariously on the same horns-of-a-dilemma as other prefessionals, But here's the difference: The Universal Small Business Code of Professional Conduct and Ethics doesn't exist.

Small business owners, like all humans, ultimately behave according to their own moral compass, sense of fair play and inclination to deal in good faith. When we find ourselves in a quandary over how to respond to a difficult situation that is in the gray area of a contract, we're on our own. When we are faced with an ethical issue that would challenge King Solomon, there is no sanctioning body or support group to dial up, to to whom we can email a "scenario."

There are many ancient codes small business owners can turn to for behavioral guidance in the marketplace, such as the last three of the Ten Commandments. But in terms of a handy guide, I think philosopher and 1957 Nobel Prize winner for literature, Albert Camus, may have given us the best ethical vector when he wrote, "Integrity has no need of rules."

Wise small business owners know that life is much simpler, and exceedingly more rewarding, when we just do the right thing.