Open AI Arms Race: Doomsday or Productivity Godsend

There is hot global debate —maybe even an arms race — about Open AI and the blockbuster San Francisco-based start-up app ChatGPT. Is it the harbinger of humanity’s doom as predicted by Elon Musk and Stephen Hawking in 2017 or…

Bad management practices killed employee surveys. 7 ways to get reliable employee feedback

In the wild pandemic world of constant fear and change, management needs feedback from employees to keep them aligned, motivated, safe, and innovative. Are employee surveys still useful — given how they have been carelessly overused and in the face…

Driving Bias Out Of Selection, Performance & Promotion Decisions

The homicide of George Floyd in Minneapolis and the divisions in our national politics has dramatically raised the topic of race relations and equality at work. Diversity and inclusion is frequently a difficult subject of "haves" and "have-nots," with perceptions…

7 steps to renewing your commitment to diversity.

Over five years of writing blogs, I have noticed that posts on diversity and inclusion are often the least read. Today, are you ready to reflect on the nation’s crisis with civil rights and social unrest and the failure of…

Actions to combat the rise in positive drug tests

A new analysis shows that the rate of positive drug tests for the U.S. workforce rose to a 14-year high in 2018. The increase raises difficult questions for employers concerned about maintaining drug-free workplaces and preventing drug-caused workplace accidents in…

Technology geek, mission, and business ethics

The irony could not have been stronger. On my news feed, I saw that legendary Medtronic founder and technology geek Earl Bakken died at age 94. Then, just below, I spotted another headline reading, “Will Silicon Valley Ever Act Ethically?”…

California Supreme Court’s New Legal Standard Makes It Difficult to Classify Workers as Contractors

Yesterday the California Supreme Court adopted a new legal standard that will make it much more difficult for businesses to classify workers as independent contractors, drastically changing the legal landscape across the golden state. The misclassification of workers can result…

Has the #MeToo Movement shocked your complacency? Take these 7 steps!

The frightened employee called our ethics hotline 17 years ago to report that her former boss, a Vice President, was harassing her at her apartment building. He would show up at her apartment building, despite it being halfway across the…

Employees and Consumers Prefer Ethical Behavior and Environmental Sustainability

Are you looking for that new disruptive innovation and business model? Awesome! In your hot pursuit of disruptive innovation, it is important to remember that the demise of many once innovative, or even long-standing brands hasn’t been a bad financial…

Three Lessons to Learn from the Zenefits Scandal…

During the past week, Zenefits’ founder and CEO, Conrad Parker, resigned over a breaking scandal that Zenefits had hired benefits brokers who were not licensed to sell Zenefits’ services in Washington State and other jurisdictions. And worse, that Zenefits had…