{"id":3064,"date":"2011-04-11T13:04:00","date_gmt":"2011-04-11T13:04:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.certitrek.com\/nlpa\/2011\/04\/11\/if-procurement-doesnt-teach-ethics-to-it-people-who-will\/"},"modified":"2021-07-01T08:43:58","modified_gmt":"2021-07-01T12:43:58","slug":"if-procurement-doesnt-teach-ethics-to-it-people-who-will","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.certitrek.com\/nlpa\/blog\/if-procurement-doesnt-teach-ethics-to-it-people-who-will\/","title":{"rendered":"If Procurement Doesn&#8217;t Teach Ethics To IT People, Who Will?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>This post could apply to any department in any organization. I\u2019m going to pick on IT because IT people at all levels have vendor interaction.<\/p>\n<p>Don\u2019t miss updates on Procurement &amp; Supply Chain, Subscribe here!<\/p>\n<p>Let\u2019s say an IT person is offered an item of nominal value from a vendor \u2013 a logoed laptop bag, for example. Or is invited to lunch. Or is invited to a cultural event.<\/p>\n<p>I would guess that most would accept the offers.<\/p>\n<p>But should they?<\/p>\n<p>Well, let\u2019s explore this for a second\u2026<\/p>\n<p>Sure, most of us in the procurement field feel that accepting a gift of such high value from a vendor is not ethically proper. Maybe we\u2019ve had procurement training that covered ethical matters. Or there\u2019s a policy. Or we\u2019ve just heard conversations in the procurement department about what\u2019s inappropriate and what\u2019s not.<\/p>\n<p>But do you think IT professionals hear about ethics as much as procurement professionals do?<\/p>\n<p>Based on my experience interfacing with IT professionals, I would say \u201cno way!\u201d Most have some degree of ethical understanding, but probably don\u2019t concern themselves with the finer points of ethics.<\/p>\n<p>Some have the attitude that, as long as accepting a gift from a vendor was not the reason a buying decision was made, everything is fine \u2013 no ethical line was crossed. And, in the spirit of things, that argument may sound logical.<\/p>\n<p>But there are some things that this mindset doesn\u2019t take into consideration:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>The fact that we never really can control what influences us subconsciously<\/li>\n<li>The fact that accepting gifts may create the perception that someone is being \u201cbought\u201d by a vendor<\/li>\n<li>The fact that accepting gifts increases vendors\u2019 overhead costs which, in some form, get factored into higher pricing to eventually be paid by the buying organization<\/li>\n<li>The fact that accepting gifts contributes to a culture where everyone thinks it\u2019s OK to accept gifts and the proliferation of such behavior will likely lead to some decisions being made with total disregard to ethics at some point<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>But IT professionals don\u2019t learn that stuff in college. How, then, will they learn the finer points of ethics. Who is supposed to teach them?<\/p>\n<p>In my opinion, it is the procurement department\u2019s job to bring up the importance of ethics training to top management. And top management, in consultation with the procurement department, should take the lead in implementing enterprise-wide ethics policies and training.<\/p>\n<p>That way, it\u2019s a company initiative requiring compliance, not a procurement initiative. Ethics is a business matter, not just a procurement matter.<\/p>\n<p>However, if top management doesn\u2019t come through, a procurement department shouldn\u2019t sit idly. The procurement department should step up and take the lead.<\/p>\n<p>It will be more challenging without top management driving the initiative, but allowing a vendor gift free-for-all should not be considered an option in any environment. Even in IT.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>This post could apply to any department in any organization. [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":12,"featured_media":4040,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3064","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-procurement"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v19.13 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>If Procurement Doesn&#039;t Teach Ethics To IT People, Who Will? - Next Level Purchasing Association (NLPA)<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.certitrek.com\/nlpa\/blog\/if-procurement-doesnt-teach-ethics-to-it-people-who-will\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"If Procurement Doesn&#039;t Teach Ethics To IT People, Who Will? - Next Level Purchasing Association (NLPA)\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"This post could apply to any department in any organization. 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