What businesses need to know about ethical procurement

Every once in a while, there’s a segment on the news detailing how officials received kickbacks or asked for bribes to favor private contractors.

There’s the backlash that lasts for a few months along with legal proceedings before the matter goes silent. Jobs are lost, officials are humiliated and perhaps punished, and public trust in the government slides even further. Unethical procurement strikes again.

Your business can avoid similar thorny situations by creating and abiding by a set of guiding principles related to the ethics of procurement. So-called ethical procurement standards go far beyond maximizing profits by asserting how your organization will do what’s right for your employees, suppliers, society, and the environment even when it might cost a bit more.

As more evidence surfaces of how unethical business deals hurt the lives of the poor and middle class and siphon off billions in value, while destroying the environment, choosing to do the right thing will help you:

• Secure your brand reputation
• Mitigate financial and legal risks associated with shady procurement tactics, and
• Drive revenue from a market that is increasingly interested in ethically sourced products

Why ethical procurement?

Ethical procurement helps foster both a personal and corporate ethos focused on doing your bit to make the world a better place that is not only about your financial prospects. It may seem unintuitive to some, but this mindset will also help you do better in business.

Secures your brand reputation

Mossack Fonseca’s Panama Papers leak. Nestle groundwater controversies. BP and the Deepwater Horizon oil spill. WeWork. Facebook and Cambridge Analytica. Juicero. Fyre Festival. Theranos. And so on.

All of those brands ...