Ethics Study and Training: Troubling Findings
A few of the IABC study’s findings on ethics also warrant concern for those on an upwardly-mobile career path. The majority of participants reported that they had little if any academic training or study of ethics. 30% said they had no academic ethics study of any kind, and another 40% of the practitioners in the study said they had “a few lectures or reading on ethics,” as shown in the pie chart below. These figures mean that 70% of the professional communicators we surveyed could be ill-prepared to face an ethical dilemma if they have had no professional experience with ethics to support them.
Practitioners who advise on ethics reported that what they have learned about ethical issues comes from professional experience rather than academic study. Professional experience with ethics has to be earned over time, and younger practitioners are at a disadvantage when faced with a dilemma, often having little prior experience with such situations. These professionals might make mistakes even with the best of intentions due to unforeseen consequences or duties.
Using one of the rigorous, analytical means of ethical analysis available in moral philosophy allows decisions to be articulated to the media and others in defensible terms. Further, those who had no ethics study could be unintentionally limiting their career opportunities or their suitability to be promoted into senior management. The qualitative data in this study revealed that practitioners saw advising on ethical dilemmas as a main route to higher levels of responsibility within their organizations.
Source: IABC Research Foundation
The finding that little or no ethics training or study is held by public relations practitioners with a university education is not a new concern. The Commission on Public Relations Education, a group of experts who periodically examine public relations curricula and recommend modifications, recognized the dearth of ethics study in their 2006 report (see: http://www.commpred.org/report/). The group recommended the following actions at universities and colleges offering courses or majors in public relations:
•A consideration of ethics should pervade all content of public relations professional education.
•If a curriculum cannot accommodate a dedicated ethics course, short one-hour courses or mini-seminars can provide a meaningful ethics forum for undergraduates. (p. 4)
The commission noted a need to elevate in importance “Particular issues and trends in the public relations field such as ethics and transparency” (p. 43) in undergraduate education. These experts argued that an education in public relations “can provide a body of knowledge about the process of ethical decision-making that can help students not only to recognize ethical dilemmas but to use appropriate critical thinking skills to help resolve those dilemmas in a way that results in an ethical outcome”(http://www.commpred.org/report/2006_Report_of_the_Commission_on_Public_Relations_Education.pdf, p. 22). Public relations professionals need both experience managing ethical issues and academic study of ethics. Studying ethics helps practitioners to advance professionally and to make defensible judgments in the eyes of publics. Not preparing young practitioners to deal with ethics disadvantages them in their career aspirations and harms the reputation of the public relations profession itself.
In the IABC study, participants reported little on-the-job ethics training, professional seminars, or continuing education workshops. 65% received no ethics training from an employer, although our data showed that when practitioners report to senior or top level vice presidents they received more additional ethics training than when reporting to others. Of the 35% reporting some ethics training, the data from this study also reveals that a proportionally greater number of men (43%) received training once hired than did their female counterparts (32%). In summary, 50% of the IABC sample maintained that they regularly counsel management on ethical decisions, yet about 70% of the sample have never studied ethics and about 65% have no on-the-job ethics training.
The deficit in communication professionals who are thoroughly versed in ethics may pose potential problems. Filling a necessary demand based on professional experience alone leaves the communication professional open to failures to reasoning or oversights in analysis which could be guarded against through formal ethics training or study. Those who do not have training in ethical decision making may be unfamiliar with alternate modes of analyses that could yield valuable input into the strategic decision-making process. A lack of credibility results both for individual communication professionals and for the public relations practice itself. Errors of omission in the analysis of an ethical dilemma result from a lack of training rather than a lack of ethical intention on the part of public relation counsel. Logical and consistent analyses allow a defensible argument to be made and the media or publics can understand the decision-making process of the organization. Rational decisions are easier to explain and defend to publics, and although they may not agree they can usually understand. Therefore, attention to astute and rigorous ethical analysis is essential not only for individual practitioners or the public relations profession but also for organizational effectiveness in achieving long-term financial success.
Pushing the Frontiers in Public Relations Ethics
To answer the demand for ethics training from the professional front, training in ethical decision making is being offered by some employers, universities, and professional associations. Only recently have public relations scholars incorporated a substantial amount of moral philosophy into the body of knowledge we know as communication. The inclusion of this scholarly literature in our own field can powerfully extend the ethical reasoning capabilities of public relations professionals. These approaches, which are reviewed below, offer substantive ethical guidelines for analyzing dilemmas.
Dialogical Ethics versus Advocacy Ethics
Dialogue as a philosophy began in ancient Greece, with the classical argumentation of philosophers such as Aristotle, Plato, and Socrates. Dialogue is a natural inclusion in any discussion of ethics because some scholars (J. E. Grunig, 2001; Habermas, 1984) argue that dialogue is inherently ethical. They see dialogue as ethical because it engages in a give and take discussion of public relations issues with the chance for all interested parties to have input. The discussion is ultimately supposed to arrive at truth or to reveal the underlying truth to which the parties can agree. Ideas are evaluated on merit alone rather than on a positional basis. It should be noted that this distinction is a fine one that separates advocacy from dialogue – true dialogue argues based on merits until truth is reached. Advocacy argues positionally, meaning according to the arguments from the side of the client or employer, rather than from any or all sides. The advocate’s position may or may not be aligned with truth, but it starts with a bias in the discussion and thus fails the test of being truly ethical. A dialogue can potentially reach a truth that could be negative to an employer or client simply based on meritorious arguments, and is seen as ethical since it does not favor any one party over the views of others.
Public relations scholars such as Heath (2006) see dialogue as the way in which a good organization engages in open communication with its publics. The virtue or good character of the organization is maintained through its efforts to communicate with publics, discussing issues in a dialogue of give and take. This “wrangle in the marketplace” (Heath, 2001) results in the best ideas rising to the top, regardless of their origin. Heath (2006) explained, “What was needed. . .was not more articulate advocates, but advocates who had achieved higher standards of corporate responsibility” (p. 72). This higher standard is to engage in dialogue for the sake of achieving an understanding of the truth, and truth can arise from any perspective. One note to keep in mind is that dialogue must be entered into with good intentions; Kent and Taylor (2002) wisely noted that “If one partner subverts the dialogic process through manipulation, disconfirmation, or exclusion, then the end result will not be dialogic” (p. 24).
Pearson (1989a) explored the concept of dialogue as an ethical basis for public relations. He thought that public relations was best defined as “the management of interpersonal dialectic” (Pearson, 1989b, p. 177) emphasizing the personal relationship maintenance and building functions of public relations with members of publics. An entire strain of research (Ledingham & Bruning, 2001, 2000) has found that relationship building functions are the most crucial aspect of public relations, and Pearson’s link to the usefulness of dialogue in doing that makes perfect sense. Dialogue is best seen as an ongoing process of seeking understanding and relationship, with the potential to resolve ethical dilemmas through a mutual creation of truth. Kent and Taylor (2002) offer an extensive list of factors to consider in engaging in the process of dialogue, and it is an invaluable resource for public relations professionals seeking to build that process into the communication of their organization.
Most people who think of public relations as advocacy would not agree with the dialogical position because they believe that the organization can best define facts related to an issue and persuade publics to understand or agree with those interpretations (Pfau & Wan, 2006). These scholars (Fitzpatrick & Bronstein, 2006; Miller, 1989; Peters, 1987) agree that the advocate role of public relations is similar to that of an attorney, in which Pfau and Wan pointed out that “persuasion plays an integral role” (p. 102). However, this approach lacks authenticity because it emphasizes one-sided persuasion and does not allow for the validity of contrary facts emerging outside the organization or from other publics.
Advocacy can sometimes be difficult because it can confuse loyalty to the client or employer with loyalty to the truth. For instance, a long-term ethical approach might be to help the client change or improve operations to ensure future viability, but this perspective can be overlooked in favor of short-term success or loyalty to management’s interpretation of issues. Although some advocates maintain that an ethically responsible approach is enough (Fitzpatrick & Bronstein, 2006) many executive-level practitioners explain that they need more powerful means of analyses in terms of ethical issue resolution (Bowen, 2002b, 2006). Alternate views see public relations as the organization’s objective or balanced advisory voice in strategic management, as discussed below.
