The William G. McGowan Charitable Fund and SHRM joined forces three years ago to create the first-ever “Ethical Leader of the Year Award.” The award was presented to a Fortune 1000 CEO who had demonstrated, in the most convincing terms, genuine ethics and sustained ethical leadership in their organization.
The McGowan Fund has sought to faithfully uphold the six guiding “Principles of Ethical Leadership,” based on the leadership of former CEO of MCI Communication Bill McGowan. McGowan led MCI in creating a massive disruption in the telecommunications industry – a disruptive force which led to today’s hundreds of choices in telecommunications. Bill was a high-visibility, highly engaged CEO who was often at the cutting edge of change. Therefore, he was controversial – but he always held himself personally accountable to those principles. He continuously reinforced that ethics and ethical leadership were not just “the right thing to do” but also “the right business thing to do.”
SHRM represents more than 325,000 members from across the globe, elevating the human resources (HR) industry, whose professionals are often the ones who create, nurture, and maintain organizational culture. A too-often unsung role, HR is also a central factor in why people come, stay, and are enthusiastic about being part of an organization.
Our colleagues at Korn Ferry, the nation’s largest search firm, the National Association of Corporate Directors, and McKinsey, in their most recent report on the top 10 characteristics required of CEOs today, have all come to the same conclusion as Bill McGowan and SHRM: Successful businesses in this era must have a visible and sustained commitment to ethics and ethical leadership, even in the most difficult of times. Most recently, we saw firsthand how the pandemic forced company leaders to make extraordinarily difficult ethical and leadership decisions yielding very real consequences – many people were hurt through massive layoffs and a great number of small and medium organizations closed[BA1] . Yet, the integrity and transparency of those who stuck to their principles of ethics and ethical leadership gained the respect, and often loyalty, of employees, customers, shareholders, and other stakeholders.
The Ethical Leader of the Year Award was presented in 2022 to Charles Lowrey, the Chairman and CEO of Prudential Financial, reflecting his ability to make those difficult decisions and the extraordinary success of Prudential because of Lowrey’s and the company’s commitments to ethics and ethical leadership.
This year, at SHRM’s 75th Anniversary National Conference, with more than 20,000 people in attendance, the McGowan Fund presented the second Ethical Leader of the Year Award to Ed Bastian, the CEO of Delta Airlines. In an industry devastated by the pandemic, Ed demonstrated to his employees, shareholders, and customers that the company had deep moorings to ethics and ethical leadership and applied them in the most difficult moment in aviation history.
Both of these CEOs have repeatedly illustrated what Bill McGowan always believed: Ethical leadership is extremely good business and one of the keys to the successes of the businesses they lead.
Fourteen years ago, the McGowan Fund emphasized their commitment to underlining the importance of training future business leaders on ethics and ethical leadership when they created the “McGowan Fellows Program.” The Fund partners with 10 major universities to demonstrate the effectiveness of a true immersion experience in preparing students to be ethical business leaders as part of their MBA program. The Fellows overwhelmingly report feeling well-schooled in ethical decision making and prepared to bring what they learned to bear in the enterprises in which they participate.
Perhaps one of the most telling examples of the interest of the next generation of business leaders comes from our friends at Colorado State University’s business school, which offered a course on ethics and ethical leadership to all students enrolled at the university. With no promotion, no visibility, nor any advertising, over 1,000 students signed up to take the course in addition to their regular course load. The list goes on, but the message is clear – the importance of ethical leadership cannot be overstated.
MBA and other business programs across the country should take careful note of the expectations of corporate search committees and other recruiters in today’s workforce. They are looking for the next generation of business leaders to be fully prepared to take on leadership roles, having been trained in ethical decision-making and the principles of ethics and ethical leadership by the time they graduate from their business program of choice.
Together, the William G. McGowan Charitable Fund and SHRM are committed to recognizing leaders who have truly “walked the walk” through the Ethical Leader of the Year Award. It is our privilege to honor these outstanding individuals as we work to instill an ethical leadership culture in our individual organizations and create better workplaces for a better world.
