Honesty must be nurtured at Schools & Universities

If we analyse the reasons as to why Sri Lanka has become bankrupt- there can be many, but a core contributor is the dishonesty that has prevailed among policy makers and generally in the world of business.

Whilst we can pass this off as the ‘ way of the world” it’s time that business schools and universities focus on this attribute and train students and bring out this “latent” attribute to the surface than putting it under the carpet. A case in point is that if we see there is a deviant behaviour it must be addressed as a priority if we are to build a new society. If we do not do this, we are only doing lip service to this ethos of ‘ making a responsible citizen’. Let us do a deep dive to this concept.

What is Integrity

“Integrity” has become a concept and topic with more prominence in research in policy making. There are eight different views but the most common discussion points are on the areas of “ethics”, “corruption” and “good governance”. Meaning, if we teach students to be ethical, and be a person who will not get involved in corruption will mean that the person will be a responsible citizen in the future. A point to note is that this attribute must be nurtured and rewarded during the formative years and mainly at business school. If not, students want to go with the flow and adjust to the world order which is where the issue happens.

Governance

Governance is nowadays a popular concept that relates to power; authority; politics; policy and administration. Meaning, this is where the role of lecturers, and business school administrators have a role to play as they are the people make tomorrows “responsible citizens’. A best case in point from the recent happening is the Sri Lankan sports personality who is under interrogation on an offense in Australia. He was under a correction process of 2 years when authorities waived the penalty and allowed him to play cricket. If the authorities believed in up holding “Governance’ and respecting the views of the panel that handed him the past verdict, may be the cricketer would have avoided the current debacle that he is in.

It was a classic case where “things must NEVER be put under the carpet”. In fact it is the biggest injustice one can do by letting go of “minor offenses’ that we see in the day to day life at a business school/ university.

Morals

This leads to the discussion on the relationship between integrity and morals; in other words, what is right and wrong, good or bad. Some say that integrity is an open reflection on morals. Others say integrity is more an umbrella concept which combines values that are relevant for the person being judged. Among these is the more legal view that seems attractive because of the clarity of laws and rules on what matters. But the more practical view is that business/ universities must teach values and morals as a subject and may be in build a case study or assignment to be done so that there will be a permanent change in behaviour than just an academic discussion.

Next steps

It is sad to say this but, if we are in the business of making tomorrows business leaders and people of good governance then, we must be cognizant that unless we change the way of training youngsters we will not be able to make a change in society. Unless we pick the issues at the nursery level and correct it, we will not be able to inbuilt a new behaviour that will create a new Sri Lanka. So that challenge is on our hands. We can pay lip service or we can make the change.

The author is a sports enthusiast, speaker, business personality and an Alumni of Harvard University. He can be contacted on rohantha.Athukorala1@ gmail.com