Ethical behavior is critical to the success of your career and your organization, but ethics are not always black and white. Many factors affect how people respond in ethically gray situations, including conflicts of interest, fear of failure, and business pressure. To ensure you have a strong ethical compass, you need to be informed and prepared.

In this course filled with practical examples and live-action scenarios, you will learn what organizational ethics are, why they are so important, and how to handle ethical issues that arise in the workplace. This course teaches you how to conduct an ethical self-check, apply ethical standards to your work with stakeholders and coworkers, and report any ethical dilemmas that arise. It also covers case studies and hypothetical situations on some behaviors and expectations you can put in place to promote ethical behavior from top to bottom.

Performance Objectives: Upon completion of this course, you should be able to:

• Define Washington State common ethics laws and policies, including the Ethics in Public Service Act (Chapter 42.52 RCW) and associated rules (Chapter 292-100 WAC).
• Identify why ethics are important.
• Understand the role of the ethics WA Executive Ethics Board as well as the complaint process.
• Define common ethical issues such as use of state resources, conflicts of interest, outside employment, gifts, and limited “de minimis” personal use.
• List resources available to employees such as the WA Executive Ethics Board website.
• Identify additional ethical considerations for managers.

Intended Audience: All audiences.