Ethical Values in Nonprofit Organization

Introduction
The goal of nonprofit organizations vary as it depends on its specific objective, mission and focus. The objective of an NGO can cover from improving human rights to providing education on environmental issues in a geographical area. It can also cover issues related to improving a given state, country or region. All NGOs worldwide share the desire to further their mission and vision. Most individuals that form NGOs usually tend to have passion for what they believe in. Most of them usually come from places that care for the future and human race as well. The main goal of NGOs is, therefore, to improve human experience by lending their efforts to a specialized and specific cause.
What Ethical Values are Important for Nonprofit Organizations and Their Leaders? Why?
Ethical values refers to the set of principles established to govern conduct of behavior. To assist in assuring a Nonprofit Organization maintains the best reputation, nonprofit organization leaders must create and promote a set of ethical values suitable for members of staff within the organization. Some of the examples of what ethical values that are important for nonprofit organizations and their leaders are discussed below (Groves & LaRocca, 2011).
Public Mindedness, Responsibility, and Service
Justice, progress and peace that is sustainable need organizations to contribute to the common good. Therefore, a nonprofit organization must ensure balancing of public and individual concerns, integration of service and self-development to other people and focusing on broader, more and higher public levels of service. This ethical value ensures that a nonprofit organization exhibits a caring and responsible attitude toward its environment. It also ensures recognition of activities and conduct that might have an impact on the perception of the public. It also encourages NGOs to conduct their activities for the sake of the public. It also ensures public money is not misused for purposes that are selfish and all assets belonging to the public must be treated with seriousness to enhance public trust (Groves & LaRocca, 2011).
Cooperation
Fostering of important activities towards the well-being of the globe and peace can be done through intercultural, interracial, and inter-religious works. It can also be done across artificial barriers such as ethnicity and politics that usually tend to separate individuals and their organizations. Nonprofit organizations should maintain cooperative and ethical relationships with other organizations (Groves & LaRocca, 2011). They should as well form partnership for the good of the public. Nonprofit organizations should always be willing to work beyond barriers such as ethnicity, politics, race, culture and religion. However, it should be done with individuals and organizations that share common objectives and values; within the limits of the organizing documents
Dignity and Human Rights
Each and every human being is born equal and free in rights and dignity which are endowed with conscience and reason. Humans should, however, acts towards each other in brotherhood spirit. An NGO is expected not to violate any individual’s fundamental rights. It should also have recognition that every person is born equal in dignity and free (Groves & LaRocca, 2011). Nonprofit organizations should, however, be sensitive to the culture, moral values, traditions, customs and religion of those they serve. An NGO should also respect family integrity and give support to family-based life.
Accountability and Transparency
Nonprofit organizations should strive for honesty and openness both toward donors and internally. Periodic accountings must be made. An NGO must be transparent in all its dealings with the beneficiaries, government, donors, public, partners and other parties that might be interested. This is applicable to all scenarios expect for information on proprietary and personal matters (Mihelic, Lipicnik & Tekavcic, 2010). The listing of officers and partnerships, basic financial information, activities and governance structure of NGOs must be accessible and open to the public. It should also provide information to the public about its work and use of its resources. An NGO must always be accountable for its decisions and actions. However, this should not only be to the government and its funding agencies, but also to its staff members, the general public, partner organizations and the individuals they serve.
What Actions Reinforce Important Ethical Values in The Organizations? How do these Examples Help Lead the Organization?
The below discussed actions that reinforce the important ethical values in organizations helps create a culture that is more ethical. These actions give an easy and straightforward suggestions on how to maximize ethical behaviors within organizations. Unethical behavior in an organization has been there from the first time man built an office (Jones, 1991). However, an organization’s policies, goals, and ethical climate can all have an impact on the behavior of employees.
Rewards
This employs that if you catch an employee doing something right, their ethical behavior should be rewarded. For instance, implementation of a system where people submit anonymous tips by telling about their colleagues’ behaviors in an honest manner. Gratitude should always be shown whenever someone acts against practices that can harm stakeholders and customers. Ethical standards must be incorporated into employee performance reviews. Encouraging an ethical behavior is usually easier than confronting a behavior that is unethical (Jones, 1991).
Expectations
NGOs must state its values in every employee’s handbook and that all those values should always be talked about and implemented in day-to-day business matters in a supervisory capacity. There are recommendations that an organizations should adopt a number of values that might lead to ethical business climate (Jones, 1991). These ethical values include; integrity, wisdom, self-control, kindness, transcendence and justice. For example, self-control value can lead to behavior of always doing what is right regardless of personal motivations.
Training
Training can enable the teaching of employees on how to behave in ethical manners. Ethically questionable situations and how to respond to them should be discussed. Ramifications of failing to behave ethically in both professional and personal ways should also be discussed. Emphasis should be put on benefits of ethical behavior and a point out be done on how employees expect to be treated in honest and fair manner. Training is effective when it comes to role playing being part of the instruction (Bansal, 2003).
Policies
Policy implementation towards preventing unethical behavior is usually the best option. For instance, if an employee regularly steals supplies from a storeroom or uses a copy machine to make personal copies, a code for the copier can be needed and the secretary asked to distribute office supplies are requested (Bansal, 2003). Implementation of such policies can make an employee to not having to put their integrity to test. Incorporation of ethical behavior into an organization’s policy should be considered. For example, confidentiality is expected from healthcare workers and breaching would result into termination.
Focus on Problem Solving and Skill Building
Organizations can focus their attention on development of problem solving and ethical skills techniques. Instead of just stating what kind of behavior are expected from them, organizations should help with step-by-step guidelines for development of an effective behavior and ethical decision making strategies and skills for resolving ethical issues. Some of the ways in which organizations can assist to train staff and students are through use of reference materials, workshops, readily available consultations from mentors and peers (Bansal, 2003).. This can help staff use tools available to them for participation in better ethical decision making.
What Particularly Challenging or Thorny Issue(s) they may face?
Lack of Funds
There are several NGOs that find it hard to gather continuous and sufficient funds for their projects and programs. One of the major component of this challenge is gaining access to appropriate donors. NGOs might have limited skills of resource mobilization. They might, therefore, wait for international donor to come and approach them. Some donors might withdraw funding or even shift priorities. The NGO might suffer from lack of a project’s financial and organizational sustainability (Assefa, 2004).
Lack of Strategic Planning
Several NGOs suffer from lack of strategic plan that is cohesive and would facilitate success in their mission and activities. This might render them ineffective when it comes to raising and capitalizing financial support (Assefa, 2004). An NGO should be able to predict what they will be doing in one or two months. A single event should never be enough to change an attitude towards any issue. However, this might happen when activists diversify their activities by organizing different kinds of events in different regions so they do not drown themselves in monotony. Civic activists should begin learning how they can do a long-term planning and even develop their strategy.
Poor Networking and Governance
Many NGOs lack effective governance. They have a deficit of understanding the importance of having a Board and how one can be set up. An NGO’s founder might be too focused on the running of the organization for their own good and purpose. However, governance is usually a foundation to transparency (Assefa, 2004). Disorganized or poor networking is a common challenge that causes efforts that are duplicated, inability to learn from experience, strategies that are conflicting, and time inefficiencies. The more NGOs communicate with each other, especially with International NGOs and the community as well, the more effective they can be. However, most NGOs perceive INGOs as a threat to their missions and goals. Several NGOs never maximize the use of current technologies which facilitates better networking and communication. Use of technology in a more effective way can help NGOs in addressing important global, national, and regional concerns.
Limited Capacity
NGOs that lack organizational and technical capacity for implementation and fulfillment of their mission should be more willing to invest in capacity building training. A weak capacity can affect technical, governance, fundraising ability, and leadership areas.
Poor Cooperation with Media
Many NGOs rely on mass media when organizing an event as they are expected to cover everything about the event (Assefa, 2004). Whenever nobody shows up for their event, they usually accuse journalists of declaring crisis and conspiracy in mass media and do nothing when it comes to spreading word about their events. Each and every NGO should have its own manager. The target audience which gets to know about the event through media such as posters, newspapers and social networks for youth is usually bigger than the audience of the event. No matter how sleepy, tired or hungry an activist can be, a press release about the event. Generally, if NGOs event is mentioned in media, one might comment that there was no work done. Cooperation with mass media should be part of NGOs long-term strategy.
Lack of Commitment
NGOs die because their staff members were not persistent enough in what they were doing in their field of work. The experience of working in NGOs can be a good beginning of future carrier. NGOs should always keep in mind the staff turnover and ensure they are not held single person (Assefa, 2004).
Lack of Feedback
Society is that is slightly involved in community life lacks feedback. Heterogeneity is another reason why people get engaged in NGOs. However, despite their motivation, individuals who cannot get sense of belonging to their society and lack appreciation of their contribution. They might even up and quit NGOs (Assefa, 2004). It is sad that most people are never given support by their families. The issues is not too much in line with negligence of authorities. The real issue is as a result of indifferences of populations. Almost everyone talks about the necessity of controlling authorities but nobody is interested in spending time and money to take care of it.
How Those Challenges Can be Met & What Can be learned from these Issues in Terms of Ethics?
Grant Funding
An NGO must do the following in order to receive grant funding;
Locate Opportunities. Opportunities can be located by finding an appropriate funder and grant for their mission and focus (Roloff, 2008).
First Round Application or Solid Concept Note. NGOs should provide information a funder or donor might require and answer all criteria. Immediate disqualification can result by not following the required guidelines.
Proposal. After an NGO passes the first application state, a request for proposal should be made. The requested proposal must be free from error and written well. It must also contain the needed elements to show funders or donors that the NGO has strategy and team members of high quality.
Capacity Building
Challenges such as poor governance, poor networking, and lack of strategic planning can be addressed through capacity building (Roloff, 2008). Capacity training and building can assist in providing new skills. NGOs can train their staff and cultivate the necessary skills within the NGO to address challenges that need to move forward.
On-Demand Advice from Experts.
The ability to reach out for the required guidance and advice whenever needed during a project and optimize NGO operations is valuable (Roloff, 2008). Confidence in donors becomes inspired whenever there is access to qualified experts who contribute to the success of the project. Naturally, NGOs will always become effective, streamlined and efficient.
Communication, Technology, and Information
NGOs should be using a minimum of email, relevant social media platforms, basic website and internet.
Income Generation
NGOs with assets can use the surplus to assist in income generation. Some of the examples are; trading on the name of the organization, renting out buildings, selling and creating products, providing consultancy and offering training (Roloff, 2008).
What Expectations & Standards does the Non-Profit Board Hold?
Board members are the individuals within an organization that work who guide an organization’s activities towards a sustainable future by adopting legal, ethical and sound governance. They also ensure financial management of policies and making sure the NGO has adequate resources for advancement of its mission. One of the responsibilities of non-profit boards is to hire and set the compensation of the executive director for the daily running of the management activities of the organization (Doherty, Patterson & Van Bussel, 2004).
Where staffs are paid and there is management of daily operations, board members would provide oversight, foresight and insight. The role of board members is to involve fundraising. However, at the National Council of Nonprofits, there is promotion of the role of the board of advocating for the nonprofit’s mission. Duty of Care involves taking care of the nonprofit by ensuring use of all the assets including good will, people and facility. Duty of loyalty ensures that the transactions and activities of the organization advances its mission. It also ensures recognition and disclosure of conflicts of interest, decision making in the best interest of the organization not only of the individual board member but also any other person. Duty of obedience ensures that the organization obeys regulations and laws. It also ensures the organization adheres to its stated mission and purpose (Doherty, Patterson & Van Bussel, 2004).
Board of directors does not exist only to serve as a trustee of an organization’s assets and fulfill legal duties. They also play a role in guiding organizations to contribute to an organization’s strategic focus, financial sustainability, serving as advocates and ambassadors, culture, and effectiveness. Besides fulfilling legal duties, it also offers resources for organizations (Doherty, Patterson & Van Bussel, 2004).
The nonprofit board determines purpose and mission through creating and reviewing of statements of purpose and mission. This can articulate the organization’s means, primary constituents served and goals. It also select the chief executive by reaching the consensus on the responsibilities of the executive and also undertake a search to find a qualified individual for the position (Doherty, Patterson & Van Bussel, 2004). Evaluation and support of the chief executive is done by the non-profit board to ensure there is professional and moral support required to further the organization’s goals. It also ensures effective planning by the board actively participating in the planning process and assisting in the monitoring and implementation of the goals.
Strengthening and monitoring of services and programs is the board’s responsibility through determination where programs are consistent with the mission of the organization. Monitoring of their effectiveness is also done. It also ensures financial resources that are adequate by securing the resources for the fulfillment of the organization’s mission. Provision of proper financial oversight and protection of assets is also done by the non-profit board through ensuring proper financial controls and development of budget annually. The board also ensures it is built competently by comprehensively evaluating each and every individual’s performance. It also ensures ethical and legal integrity through adherence of norms and legal standards. The board also ensures enhancement of the public standing of an organization (Doherty, Patterson & Van Bussel, 2004). This is done when the board clearly articulates the goals, accomplishments, and mission of the organization to the public. It also provides support through advocacy from the community.
What Expectations & Standards do Other Constituents Hold?
Some of the characteristics to consider in determining standards and considerations for other constituents include; the ability to creatively and clearly think, listen and analyze and work well with individuals and groups. Another characteristic is the willingness to prepare and attend committee and board meeting, take responsibility on given assignments, contribute financial and personal resources generously, open doors in the society, advocating for the organization and evaluating oneself (Musteen, Datta & Kemmerer, 2010). Interest in developing unpossessed skills such as recruiting board members and volunteers, soliciting and cultivating funds, and learning about the organization’s program area. Another feature is possessing tolerance, honesty and sensitivity to community-building skills, differing views, sense of values, concern for the organization’s development and personal integrity.
The other constituents have got work to do with setting up and incorporating bylaws. The bylaws usually involve work-in-progress where one of the topics involves creating confidentiality policy (Musteen, Datta & Kemmerer, 2010). There is usually no given attention to writing confidentiality policy which puts scrambling situation manageable without following of the roadmap. Such events also trigger reactions on part of the board for formation of new confidentiality policy quickly. Maintenance of confidentiality is one of the most important responsibilities that each and every board member must have. It would be easier for members of an organization to fulfill this responsibility when they possess written and formal policy they can rely on.
Confidentiality is an important responsibility during development of standards and expectations. Board members must always act in honest ways and put their best when it comes to interests of the organization (Musteen, Datta & Kemmerer, 2010). It also indicates that avoidance or acknowledgement of conflicts of interest and abstaining from voting when there is existence of conflicts should be done. Board members have limits when it comes to how they share information and with those they might share it with.


References
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Bansal, P. (2003). From issues to actions: The importance of individual concerns and organizational values in responding to natural environmental issues. Organization Science, 14(5), 510-527.
Doherty, A., Patterson, M., & Van Bussel, M. (2004). What do we expect? An examination of perceived committee norms in non-profit sport organisations. Sport Management Review, 7(2), 109-132.
Groves, K. S., & LaRocca, M. A. (2011). An empirical study of leader ethical values, transformational and transactional leadership, and follower attitudes toward corporate social responsibility. Journal of Business Ethics, 103(4), 511-528.
Jones, T. M. (1991). Ethical decision making by individuals in organizations: An issue-contingent model. Academy of management review, 16(2), 366-395.
Mihelic, K. K., Lipicnik, B., & Tekavcic, M. (2010). Ethical leadership. International Journal of Management & Information Systems (Online), 14(5).
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Roloff, J. (2008). Learning from multi-stakeholder networks: Issue-focussed stakeholder management. Journal of business ethics, 82(1), 233-250.