Corporate Ethics Demystified

BY REAGAN NYADIMO

reagannyadimo@yahoo.com

In a world where employers are keen on behaviour, fear and panic always engulf many fresh recruits from campus and colleges on the way they should carry themselves in an office setting. They stumble out of the shelters of school life and into an impatient corporate world without much knowledge of how to conduct themselves in work environment. Confusion often reigns in the Way they should dress, communicate and carry themselves in during office hours. This gap in the education system has left thousands of students with no option but to gamble with their virtues with some being shown the door.

Elly Wamari, a renowned writer for Daily Nation and a columnist advices on the following soft skills to fresh graduates who want to shine in the job market: 

1.  Communication! Communication! Communication: Communication is a specialty with a critical role to any organization and it is ranked highly among the top skills that employers look for in a job candidates. According to Elly, it is a lifeline of relationships with colleagues and the employer. Work is all about understanding instructions and running them. Know how you map your ideas to your organization, consult colleagues and share information relevant to job description to build your career line.

2. Language: Guard against use of slung, sheng and unnecessary abbreviations since they are likely to portray you as lowlife, uncivilised and uncouth. It also opens avenues for judgement since not all may be familia with your encrypted words.

3. Competence: Be the source of your inspiration and the soul engineer of your capabilities backed by your knowledge and skills for quality output. 

4. Reliability: Be someone that people can count on. Stand by your timeline, beat deadline and submit your work in time with being supervised. 

5. Honesty: Honesty is the best policy. Telling the truth and standing firm for what is right is the best virtue you can have in an office environment. 

6. Integrity: Show exemplary consistent principles that demystify bribery and corruption to enable the company trust you with bigger projects. 

7. Dress-code: Should suit work environment. Cooperate world prefers suits and formal ware. Smart ware that fits jobs description make people take you seriously and earn you respect for that matter. For ladies, it should not be too revealing or too tight as this is likely to send mixed signals to your colleagues and the employer.

8. Office gossip: Shun away from behind door talks and mend ling into co-workers affairs. Avoid talking ill of your fellow workmates and your boss for that matter no matter how bad your relationship may be. 

9. Office policies: Detailed information that builds and shapes your organization should not be shared outside office environment as this is likely to give your competitors an upper hand at the same time poisoning your firm that you pledged your loyalty to. 

10. Office romance: If necessary it should be practiced outside office environment and should not come into conflict with job description. Both parties need to handle their relationships as mature consenting adults who handle themselves in dignity and courtesy.

The writer is the managing editor writers Guild Kenya