Ethisphere Releases Insights from the 9th Annual Global Ethics Summit to Drive Business Ethics
Diverse community of multinational and industry leaders challenges companies to do more to address integrity worldwide
New York, NY– June 8, 2017– Ethisphere, a global leader in defining and advancing the standards of ethical business practices, announced its official release of video recordings highlighting the 2017 Global Ethics Summit® held in New York earlier this year. The Global Ethics Summit is an annual gathering of hundreds of compliance, communications and legal professionals sponsored by Ethisphere. It is held in New York City and is widely considered the premier event for ethics-minded professionals looking to improve upon best practices in the development of positive, ethical business cultures.
“The belief that you’ve arrived when it comes to ethics and compliance is one of the most dangerous beliefs of all—leading directly to complacency, which leads to the erosion of a culture of integrity into mistakes becoming calamities,” said Ellen R. Marram, Lead Independent Director, Eli Lilly and Company, and Member, Board of Directors, Ford Motor Company during a keynote session at the Summit. “It’s vital that companies sustain their ethical journeys and continue to improve their cultures of integrity, through benchmarking, learning from each other and sharing best practices.”
“As governments around the globe are contracting their scope, it’s gratifying to see global companies take a leadership role in sharing practices that advance both company performance as well as advance society,” said Ethisphere’s Chief Executive Officer, Timothy Erblich. “We at Ethisphere are honored and humbled to bring forth a diverse collection of multidisciplinary leaders to advance a platform of collaboration. Now more than ever, creating and supporting a culture of integrity with a focus on the long term is a sustainable business advantage.”
With ethical culture and performance perennially at the heart of conversations during the Summit, a renewed dialogue focusing on topics such as leadership diversity, sports integrity and a rigorous commitment to human rights inspired the delegation to move beyond traditional compliance and governance to enhance company values, social character, stakeholder trust and collective action.
Gender diversity was among the hotly debated topics at this year’s Summit and it has become a key component of the ethics landscape. Companies who have made a point to address this concern are likely to score higher on the ethics scorecard and, as a result, benefit from what Ethisphere calls the Ethics Premium, which illustrates how companies that are ethical (appearing on the annual World’s Most Ethical Companies® list), on average, do six percent better financially against the S&P 500. An ethical approach, which places value on equity is not just the right thing to do, it makes good business sense.
“Probably the most important thing that we do is talk about it [diversity] constantly” said Kelly Mahon Tullier, Executive Vice President, General Counsel and Corporate Secretary at Visa, Inc. while speaking on a panel on leadership through diversity. “Tone at the top is so important…constantly bringing our conversation back to talent and making sure we have diverse representation not just throughout the organization but at the very highest levels. You have to force that topic.”
The annual recap of the Summit captures just some of the many inspired and interactive discussions that took place over two days. The recap can be found here: https://events.ethisphere.com/wp-content/uploads/2017-Global-Ethics-Summit-Recap.pdf.
Ethisphere’s Business Ethics Leadership Alliance (BELA) community had a pivotal role to play in sharing in these discussions with other respected luminaries from corporate, academic and professional service backgrounds culminating in a faculty representing over 60 different organizations. Among those organizations that profiled new faculty leadership at the Summit were:
Eli Lilly, Dell, VF Corporation, Whirlpool, United States Olympic Committee, Microsoft, International Centre for Sport Security, Novartis, Panasonic, Shift, Visa, Western Union, ON Semiconductor, Walmart, Nokia, Ingredion, Bayer, Realogy, NYU Stern, Jones Lang LaSalle, National Basketball Association and Parsons.
“What’s even more important than having some ‘lighthouse projects’ is having business people involved in integrating and embedding compliance and jointly driving this,” said Summit newcomer Thomas Pfennig, Head of Compliance at Bayer AG during his panel discussion on how to better foster a speak up culture at a company.
“What I am most proud of is that our ethics and compliance programs live and breathe in the hearts and minds of the senior leadership and it’s not just a paper program,” said Michael McLaughlin, Sr. Vice President Employment Law and Chief Ethics & Compliance Officer at Dell, highlighted at a plenary session on integrity and M&A activity. “Our leaders get it, and that’s illustrated by the fact that when we send a note out on an important compliance topic or request time for a meeting to discuss compliance, the vast majority of our senior leaders engage. They make the connection between good compliance and good business and that makes a huge difference at Dell.”
The complete archive of session recordings can be seen on the Global Ethics Summit website: https://globalethicssummit2017.com.
The 10th Annual Global Ethics Summit connecting over 500 distinct leaders will take place at the Grand Hyatt in New York City March 14-15, 2018.
About Ethisphere
The Ethisphere® Institute is the global leader in defining and advancing the standards of ethical business practices that fuel corporate character, marketplace trust and business success. Ethisphere has deep expertise in measuring and defining core ethics standards using data-driven insights that help companies enhance corporate character. Ethisphere honors superior achievement through its World’s Most Ethical Companies® recognition program, provides a community of industry experts with the Business Ethics Leadership Alliance (BELA) and showcases trends and best practices in ethics with “Ethisphere Magazine”. Ethisphere is also the leading provider of independent verification of corporate ethics and compliance programs that include: Ethics Inside® Certification and Compliance Leader Verification™. More information about Ethisphere can be found at: https://ethisphere.com.
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