Chairs:
Howard Whitton, IIPE, ethics@gil.com.au
Dr. Shabbir Cheema, UN DESA, cheema@un.org

Panellists:
Dr. Alan Lawton, The Open University Business School, United Kingdom, a.lawton@open.ac.uk
- Agreement in Evaluation
Peter Salway, Victoria Public Employment Commissioner, Australia, peter.salway@dpc.vic.gov.au
- Victoria Public Employment Commission
Paul S. Mackellar, Practice Leader, Asia-Pacific Region, Arthur Anderson, Australia,
paul.s.mackellar@au.andersen.com
- IntraSight
Kyung-Joon Jin, Prosecutor, Anti-corruption Committee, Republic of Korea, kjin@post.harvard.edu
- Korean Anti-corruption Legislation
Alex Mills, Royal Commission on Ambulance Services Privatisation, Australia, millsa@masrc.org
- Investigating Impropriety as an Ethics Audit Tool
Angela Gorta, Research Manager, NSW Independent Commission against Corruption, Australia, agorta@icac.nsw.gov.au
- Four NSW ICAC Tools for Measuring Corruption Resistance

Discussants:
Dr. Daryl Balia, Transparency International South Africa; Director of Ethics, Public Service Commission of South Africa
Dr. Key Chong Park, Director General for Foreign and Security Affairs, Office of the Prime Minister, Republic of Korea
Jane Ley, Deputy Director, Special Projects, Office of Government Ethics, USA

Main Themes Covered

1. Organisational and conceptual factors in instituting a program of ethics audit
2. Assessing the ethical health of an organisation involves monitoring policies and practices for good management practices rather than failure of compliance and organisational self-assessment against codified principles.
3. An organisation's ethical practices can be audited also in the private sector through targetted, multi-layered perception surveys involving employees and clients.
4. Web-based self-assessment surveys can encourage response rates and the validity of responses.
5. Public inquiries into ethical failures can be an effective vehicle for re-examining the legitimacy and public support for stated ethical values and standards.
6. The need to gather information and protect privacy need to be reconciled in carrying out ethics audits.
7. There is a need to distinguish between values, institutional requirements and actual practices in measuring the ethical climate of an organization.

Main Conclusions

1. Ethics can be audited, given the proper organizational environment and conceptual tools. The outcomes not only indicate the level of compliance to standards, but also can be used to improve management and employee understanding of ethical standards.
2. Tools range from measuring implementation of codes of conduct, organisational self-assessments, employee and client surveys, risk profiles, corruption resistance reviews, analysis of grievance and complaint reports, web-based tools, and public inquiries into ethical failures.
3. In employing these tools, it is important to balance the need for information and to protect privacy; to distinguish among values, institutional requirements and actual practices; to gauge the compliance with specific procedures and to promote overall ethical culture; and to ensure proper consultation among stakeholders including trade unions, employees, etc. to promote ownership.
4. The quality of ethics audits depends on the conceptual frameworks, variables being measured, quality of information available, and other broader factors such as the strategic objectives of the organization. In addition, conditions, the environment and the level of development of the country are also factors to be considered.