A summary of Part 1 is that we have a massive power imbalance. We have a large and complicated organisation with its own dynamics, often facing a lone voice with no power, and with little understanding of the dynamics involved.

In such an unequal fight, the only way is to either give more power to one side, or to reduce the power of the other side.

In looking at the lone voice, there are undoubtedly measures that could give them more power. Things like better access to legal help, perhaps for free or at low cost, would help, for example. The problem is, I can see no measure on that side of the equation which will change the game.

The other side to look at is the one that holds all the cards, and that is the organisation. We need, though, to factor in a very important complication into our dynamics mix. This is something which is often done, but which doesn’t always have the desired impact. It is when organisations might consider particular areas to be everyone’s responsibility. They may well do this to show that something is so important it cannot rest on just one person. It simply must be a responsibility for everyone. The problem is the dynamics don’t work well. I have seen several times where people take this as a signal that someone else will take care, or look after something. After all, they think everyone else is responsible for something, so they don’t need to do anything. It is the same type of mechanics when you have a project that is a multi agency effort. Have you ever noticed that when all goes well, every contributing group takes credit, but when it all goes pear-shaped …………. I guess you know how it works.

We end up with situations where we make out that something is important by making everyone responsible. We know, though, that if something really is important, there is someone in charge of it.

Who’s in charge of it?

Have you ever been in an organisation where everybody is in charge of HR, or of finance? Me neither. There is someone in charge of those areas, and other ones, because they are important. So when Alan Bates, or anyone else, is shouting out loud about an enormous problem, who is responsible then? Who has to listen?

It is here that we can now see a way to cut through those troublesome dynamics, and find a way forward. Alan bates, and others, are challenging the ethical conduct of the organisation. The way to solve this problem is to take the responsibility away from the many, and give it to just one person.

We need to appoint a person who is responsible for the ethical conduct of the organisation. Someone whose job it is to fully understand what is going on, and who has the duty, and the seniority, to do something about it.

Who could take on that role?

We need to identify someone who must actively listen to people who raise concerns and who will be held responsible for investigating them, as well as taking any necessary subsequent action. It sounds easy enough, so we could just appoint someone, couldn’t we? Yes, we could, but we have two options.

The first way of tackling this is the same as for another other vacancy. You recruit someone. For such a role, the successful candidate would have to have many qualities, not least of all their own ethical conduct and professionalism, along with the ability to do the right thing, and to remain impartial. After a selection process, we could find somebody with these qualities. They will be able to conduct themselves appropriately, certainly at the beginning. The problem is what about after a couple of years? What then?

This is because there are two issues with doing this, beyond just identifying a suitable candidate. First, our ethical lead will be answerable to, but somehow holding to account, the leader of the organisation? Just how will that work? Then, this same leader oversees the future career path and opportunities for the same ethical lead that is holding them to account? How does that work, either?

The second point is that the inevitable consequence of appointing someone to do this role is that they will, at some point, go from being an outsider to being an insider. They will form friendships with others who they interact with, perhaps, daily, and some of these might be strong ones.

Both these issues offer a potential payback problem for the ethical lead to consider and are bound to affect how they work. That is how life works.

They might be good people, but they are still people, just human beings.

I have met very few people in my life who I believe could have carried out such a role effectively, and for any length of time, whilst being an insider.

The problem is not the role, that makes sense, it’s on what basis they do the job. How do we stop an outsider becoming an insider, with the complications that can bring?

People become involved in an organisation and transition from outsider to insider. This may happen quickly, or may happen over time, however, this morphing from one to the other always happens. Well, almost always, that is. The one exception to this is when the person is just visiting, when they have been assigned somewhere for a period of time, and they know their stay is only temporary.

In such a role, it’s not enough to appoint someone to do the job, you need to change the dynamics to remove those stumbling blocks. The way you do this is to appoint someone from another part of the public sector to do that role on a two-year basis before returning to their own sector. If you do this, you can see how all the dynamics start favourably aligning.

How might this work?

To see how this might work, allow me to use a little creativity, because it will work best with someone at a particular point in their career. We’ll say that the ethical lead is from the Prison Service (HMPS), as an example, and that the post is in a hospital. You wouldn’t want a governor to take on this role, or a deputy governor, either. The former is a key part of HMPS and it would be disruptive to remove such a person temporarily. Similarly, a deputy governor will soon move into a big role, and they need to hone their skills and keep their knowledge up to date, ready for when that day comes. The person who is best suited to take on this is the person who sits beneath a deputy governor. As part of their career path, they would be required to take on that role in another part of the public sector, in our example, a hospital, before returning to HMPS.

So, the person is appointed for a two-year period.

In HMPS, they will have already made a substantial investment of time and effort into their career already, and the big goal, a governorship, is just coming into view. This is quite a motivating force to ensure they do things properly.

To carry out this role, they will have to operate to a brief, a role description, of course. They will also require some training, and this is not just an introduction as to how that hospital works, either. The need for data gathering and interpretation is vital. I note in the book that if this area had been given the attention it deserves, many scandals could have picked up much earlier.

Another important area is record keeping, the thorough recording of events and creating paper trails. If the organisation and its decision-making processes were made more transparent, it would help in this, so work is needed here, too. The who knew what, when they knew, and what they did about it, matters a great deal in the aftermath of a scandal. When problems have occurred, the size and complexity of these organisations works against understanding what has happened. It also hinders any search for accountability. Some of those scandals were very big, but how many people had to leave their profession because of their conduct? Even when hundreds of people had died, how many people were convicted? To outsiders, this lack of accountability seems wrong, but I believe it is more likely to be complexity that is causing the problem, not conspiracy. Transparency in the workplace, and being able to see who did what and when, reduces the chances for these scandals to happen at all.

The ethical lead must also have support and help in place. This is needed because they are likely to encounter something they need help with. This might be due to be a simple lack of understanding, or they need someone with better knowledge, experience or, perhaps, a specialist of some sort. There also needs to be a mechanism where they can flag up issues that warrant immediate intervention. This could be, for example, if they feel they are being obstructed in their duties, or when they suspect that there is a danger to life.

If anyone is uncomfortable, believing that having such an ethical lead implanted into an organisation is, in effect, a spy. That is not the case. I can see no other way of getting round the powerful dynamics involved that I have described, except by having such a role, and in such a way. Rather than considering them a spy, let’s consider another, more accurate way of explaining their impact. Having an ethical lead in place will correct some misconduct and, for no other reason than there is a person there, doing that job. We behave differently when we are being observed, or believe we might be. The Hawthorne effect is what it’s called by scientists, when people modify their behaviour when aware that they are being watched. An alternative way to see this in action is to take your car out onto a motorway. As you drive along, you’ll encounter a situation where everyone is driving at exactly 70 miles per hour, and you know precisely what is happening. There is a police car within sight. This is astonishing. There is no laboratory in the world that could create such a piece of technology that automatically restricts a car’s speed, within sight of a police car, but humans need no other instruction as to what to do when they see one.

To have an ethical lead, as I have outlined, would work. They bring sufficient seniority and experience of managing people and problems in the workplace. Every single stumbling block of being an insider, that we saw earlier, disappears. The only incentive of any kind for the ethical lead, is to do the job properly. Their future career depends on it, and they will still be around in ten years’ time, if anything surfaces that they knew about, or suspected, but didn’t deal with appropriately. Additionally, the training and oversight will allow early intervention, if problems are building. An example of this intervention compares what might be possible, compared to what has sometimes happened before. This is when people are told, or fobbed off, with excuses of something being an isolated incident, a one off. Many people reading will guess that I am referring to the investigations into the sub-postmasters. Multiple sources have reported that those who were facing cash shortfalls and trying to work out what had been happening were told that they were the only ones. That everyone else was fine. I wasn’t, though, referring to the Post Office scandal. Guess what some relatives caught up in the Mid Staffs hospital scandal were told? ¹

Only by using a person on an attachment does this work so favourably. The ethical lead’s future career, and options, depends on them doing the right thing. They are not dependent on the leadership team in the organisation for their prospects. They don’t have to keep the boss happy, they just have to do the right thing.

Every incentive they have, and all the dynamics involved now work positively, and help the organisation, and its patients, or customers.

1. Ward to Whitehall p154