Compliance &Ethics - Society of Corporate Compliance and Ethics

For the past 35 years, my experience andtraining have empowered me to pay attentionto symptoms of organizational dysfunction.My training has also equipped me to analyzeand interpret the data by using a specific set oftools, and those tools have served me well. ButI do not have a monopoly on that ability. Everysuccessful manager I know has their ownapproach for how they apply their own skillsand knowledge to the organizational dysfunctionsthey face. But skills, knowledge, andconceptual models can only take us so far insolving the organizational problems we face.Above all, we need to recognize the fundamentaldifference between a problem, with itsidentifiable causes, and a symptom. Symptomsare indirect indicators of a problem. They areguideposts and mile markers. But we cannotsolve symptoms. We can only solve problems.And we can only solve the problems we facewhen we have accurately identified the causesbehind the symptoms.For years I have been crediting the medicalprofession with “turning me on” to diagnosis,as a first step in any ethics initiative, whetherit is a start-up or an ongoing, successful effort.It comes from an old adage in the profession,“Prescription without diagnosis is malpractice.”And medicine is a universal experience. Wehave all been ill or injured and sought medicalattention, so it is a phrase we all can relate to.But, in reality, I learned that lesson yearsearlier in my garage. Not everyone has spent acouple of months tearing down a “sick” motorand rebuilding it. Most have not invested thetime and resources to “fix” burnt valves, only torealize that the real problem was the oil pump.Back in 1959, had I done a proper diagnosis,I would have still had to do the valve jobas well as spend the extra $20–$30 for a newoil pump. But the outcome would have been areliable (and very cool) first car. As it turnedout, the lesson I learned has proven to be evenmore valuable. That failure became the basis ofa foundational insight that informed my overallapproach to my life’s work.Not being able to climb a hill was a symptomof burnt valves. Burnt valves were asymptom of a more significant “cause.” You don’tsolve problems by attacking symptoms. Yousearch for and address the underlying problems.The underlying problem in my ’53 Dodge wasa lack of oil reaching moving parts that eventuallyburned. A faulty oil pump caused that lack.The solution to the problem was to replace theoil pump. I missed that and spent the rest of mytime in high school using Mom’s very “uncool”car when I could have been “cruising the strip”in a Dodge convertible with a Hemi under thehood. Systems Theory may sound “geeky”but if I had been a bit more of a geek, I mighthave been “cool”! Solving problems instead ofmasking symptoms is cool. ✵Frank J. Navran (frank@navran.com) is the Founder and PrincipalConsultant of Navran Associates in Palm Coast, FL.1. Ethics Resource Center: The National Business Ethics Survey ® ofFortune 500 ® Employees: An Investigation into the State of Ethicsat America’s Most Powerful Companies. July 24, 2012. Available athttp://www.ethics.org/nbes2. Nadler/Tushman/Hatvany: Managing Organizations: Readings andCases. 1982, Little, Brown and Co.3. WikipediaCompliance & Ethics Professional May/June 2013+1 952 933 4977 or 888 277 4977 www.corporatecompliance.org 65