Coors Brewing Company Lives its Values
Raytheon
America Online
Coors Brewing Company Lives its Values
Needs
Coors recognized that instilling a culture of integrity required that all training and communication elements developed in support of the program must be consistent with the company's core values and be seen as a catalyst to achieve their business goals. At Coors, having a culture of integrity serves as the foundation for both an effective compliance program as well as meeting the control environment requirements now part of Sarbanes-Oxley.
Approach
Working Values developed a comprehensive learning and communication program that uniquely reflects Coors' culture. Working Values created an online portal called the Living Our Values Web site containing the company's communications around core values, decision-making, and learning. The interactive Code of Conduct was written to be consistent with the themes of the program while conveying key compliance information. Anchoring the ethics awareness and learning aspects of the program is the Ethics Expedition, Coors' own ethics awareness program that laid out how decisions are made at Coors.
Result
Coors has engaged employees in understanding their commitment to compliance by linking messaging to the company's culture and values. A more accountable workforce helps senior leadership and the General Auditor build a comprehensive foundation for the company's internal controls.
We have a set of core values that are vital to our business and to our culture. When we wanted to revise our Code of Conduct and place it online for our employees, Working Values helped us craft a relevant user-friendly online presentation geared to our specific needs. Additionally, they worked with us to create a value-based ethics Web site that helps Coors communicate and educate on issues and available resources within the company. It was essential that they understood our culture and help us deliver something that would be embraced by people throughout our business. Working Values took the time, and the care, to understand our vision and our people, and to deliver an excellent result. We have received many positive comments from employees who feel this program has made a difference at Coors by making the Code and our Values relevant to everyone.
Caroline Mc Michen
Ethics Coordinator & group manager
Coors Brewing Company
Needs
Raytheon recognized that it needed to complement its online compliance training with ethics training. In addition to awareness of company standards, Raytheon wanted to introduce the concept of gray areas, issues that impact the business but are not technical violations of the law. Raytheon wanted to formally link ethics and ethical decision making to core business goals and processes and empower their employees to “take action”.
Approach
Working Values developed a live one-hour training session, as an interactive game, where the goal was twofold: an introduction to the concept that every business decision has an ethical component that has an impact on the corporation and its stakeholders and an introduction to an integrated business decision-making model to help employees evaluate the alternatives and consequences of an ethical dilemma. Further, this program emphasized that when it comes to ethics, not taking action is not an option.
A decision making model (DMM) was introduced to add corporate criteria and a logical process to an intuitive reasoning approach with the following process steps:
A - Act Responsibly
C - Consider our Ethical Principles
T - Trust your Judgment
I - Identify Impact on Stakeholders
O - Obey the Rules
N - Notify Appropriate Persons
The Raytheon Code of Ethics was a critical part of the DMM. It formed the foundation for rational decision making based upon Raytheon’s values.
Result
| • | The first part of the game play was to uncover the ethical decision points and defend the assessment from a specific stakeholder viewpoint. This involved team-based discussion and required presentation of the team view to the entire group. This highlighted the differences between stakeholder views and increased awareness of their competing agendas. |
| • | The second part of the game play was to plan for ethical action. This required participants to use the Raytheon Code of Conduct as well as the Raytheon DMM. Each team analyzed their ethical approach from an inclusive point of view that considered all stakeholders. Each team determined alternate approaches for taking action and coming to consensus on their preferred approach. |
Taking action was the heart of the program and the real key to open and honest communication. The final training encouraged Raytheon employees to feel comfortable bringing issues forward for discussion and resolution.
Needs
AOL wanted to implement a new ethics initiative after finalizing a revised version of its “Standards of Business Conduct” (SBC). This learning initiative had to include SBC training for the topics and best practices for an audience of approximately 2000 managers. The managers also needed to be trained to facilitate the SBC sessions for their direct reports or others in the field.
This fast growing organization needed its message to be delivered across the organization and across the companies it acquired leading to a cultural consistency where the same behavior is expected of every employee within the organization, from top to bottom.
Approach
Working Values created a one hour employee ethics training program to be facilitated by local managers with a Web-based tool that supported the discussion of the relevant topics within the SBC. We developed an additional training session for the managers and provided them with a facilitator’s guide for their employee session. We also created a print based training for the AOL call center employees that reflected the appropriate messaging and the appropriate tone for that aspect of AOL.
A group of five characters in the materials created context around personal and professional accountability, as well as a sense of the individuals’ personalities. The cases were delivered via streaming video through the SBC web site.
A key component of the AOL SBC training conveyed the desire and expectation for employees to bring issues forward and reach out for help. This objective was accomplished by the Responsibilities and Resources outline for every case in the program. This message was reinforced with a separate handout – “The SBC In Action”.
Result:
All of the managers are on board and connected with the Standards of Business Conduct. All the employees were trained on the SBC topics and best practices and now have easy and consistent reference and referrals to the Standards of Business Conduct and their resources within AOL for reporting issues and asking questions.
Consistent messaging regarding ethics and compliance was delivered across the organization, both at HQ and subsidiaries across the country, achieving a consistent culture.
With the release of updated Standards of Business Conduct, we wanted to provide our managers and employees with a training program that would help them engage in a conversation on issues of integrity in the workplace. Working Values developed a flexible solution that not only met the needs of varied audiences, but added a creative energy that really engaged our employees and managers in the subjects covered .
Kimberly Strong
Assistant General Counsel
America Online