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CASHED: I should do what’s right, even if that’s the only reward.

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FIVE QUESTIONS FOR MAKING TOUGH ETHICAL DECISIONS

Thanks to the recent corporate accounting scandals, government bribery scandals, and headline-grabbing celebrity affairs, ethics are playing an increasingly high-profile role in professional life. So how do you make sure you always make the right ethical decision? And will the right ethical decision always be clear, or is it sometimes as blurry as it seems?

To help you make tough ethical decisions, I’ve put together five questions that can provide guidance when you most need it. Answering these five questions will help you see that ethical choices aren’t often as fuzzy as they sometimes appear.

1. Which outcome to the decision will allow you to sleep most peacefully one year from today?

2. Will anyone be hurt based on your decision, and does that person know he could be affected by your decision?

3. If your decision made newspaper headlines, would you be jeered or cheered?

4. Do you have to creatively justify your decision as ethical, and would strangers immediately agree with you?

5. If your mom and dad knew about your decision, would they be proud?

If you answer these five questions and are still unsure about what to do, it’s time to get advice from those who care about you. Call your mentor and tag team for advice. Call your best friend. Call your religious leader. Call your mom. All these people know you, want what’s best for you, and have survived their own ethical dilemmas. With their input, you’ll be able to make the right ethical decision when it matters most.

WHAT ABOUT LITTLE WHITE LIES?

Calling for help may seem like an obvious choice when you’re facing huge ethical dilemmas, but what if the decision doesn’t feel important enough to deserve much thought? Maybe it’s a tiny white lie explaining why you’re late. Perhaps it’s telling the electric company the check is in the mail when you know it isn’t. If nobody gets hurt, are tiny unethical decisions bad?

In my experience, even the smallest white lie can take on a monstrous life of its own. You can find yourself lying on top of your previous lies just to stop the original lie from surfacing. Keeping a story of lies straight can be a real chore—and a needless one at that. If you’d just been honest in the first place, the other person probably would’ve forgotten about the whole thing. Instead, you’re now on the hook big time.

Natt knows what it’s like to turn a little white lie into a monstrous fake story. He decided to take a semester off from college but didn’t want to tell his parents. They were paying for him to be there, and he knew they would stop sending money if he stopped going to class. So, he played along as if college were going great. Then he got comfortable not going to class, but he kept telling his parents college was going just fine. This went on for three years. At the end of it, he had to fake his own graduation—which included a fake diploma and transcript—and his parents threw him a graduation party! They didn’t find out until a year later that his entire college career was a big fat lie.

Remember, everyone makes mistakes. When you make a mistake, apologize sincerely and move on. Telling a small lie only gives a tiny mistake the opportunity to become a big regret. People are willing to forgive you for being human, but they have long memories when it comes to liars, cheaters, thieves, and frauds.

FRIEND OR FAUX?

Maybe you have never fudged information on your résumé, lied to stay out of trouble, made a false insurance claim, shoplifted at the mall, or committed credit-card fraud. But you probably know someone who has. If you were both implicated in an ethical dilemma—say someone’s Rolex turned up missing and you two were the only ones with keys to the apartment—do you think she would sell you out to save her own neck or would take the high road?

In trying to live an ethical existence, beware of your so-called friends