Integrity Ombuds for Organisations: the advantages of creating an independent safe space for stakeholders to voice concerns

In recent years, the importance for organisations and their stakeholders – employees, customers, investors and suppliers – of creating a culture where every individual has means to efficiently and effectively communicate is a topic which has been extensively researched and commented upon.

For employees of organisations, the CIPD’s view is that: “Employee voice is the way people communicate their views to their employer and influence matters that affect them at work. For employers, effective voice contributes to building trust with employees, innovation, productivity and organisational improvement. For employees, self-expression in voice often results in feeling valued, increased job satisfaction, greater influence and better opportunities for development. Employee voice is important in creating inclusive working environments too.”

Encourage stakeholder voice

In an ideal world, all organisations would strive to encourage all stakeholders, including employees, to speak out – and many do. But encouraging stakeholder voice can be met by a myriad of barriers even for the most enlightened of businesses.

In a traditional commercial environment, some well recognised and documented obstacles can create those barriers. For example:

• Lack of Psychological Safety: stakeholders, especially employees, may fear speaking out because a culture of blame or a closed door culture exists.
• Job Security Concerns: stakeholders may fear that by speaking out, valued relationships or job security could be put at risk.
• Perceived power imbalances: senior groups may dominate conversations making it hard for more junior members to make themselves heard or influence their desire to speak out.
• Pressure to Perform: weight of work, unrealistic time frames, high pressure environments, and unrealistic expectations may all contribute to an individual’s capacity to voice concerns.

However, an organisation does not have to have a culture of blame or negative hierarchical structures for stakeholders to fear speaking up, an individual’s cultural belief, self-confidence, education, and negative perceptions of self, organisation and leadership are all highly individual and emotional reasons which may drive a need in people to remain silent even in an environment where psychological safety is encouraged. A study carried out by the Journal of Healthcare Leadership in 2023 into what was causing the failure of individuals to report healthcare issues found that the failure of individuals to speak up was not only influenced by a psychologically safe environment but may, even where psychological safety was inherent, “be impacted by personal perceptions that stem from deep-seated personal values”. This, the study concludes, “exposes a crucial need to explore cultural and diversity aspects of … reporting and how to individualise interventions to reduce fear …”

Leadership involvement

Even at a leadership level, barriers to making individual or collective voices heard exist, not necessarily because of psychological insecurity, but more often driven by fear of maintaining organisational financial or reputational goals. Indeed, in recent years, at their extreme, such failures at leadership level have led to tragic consequences. Examples include:

Grenfell Tower Fire

Where intense pressure to keep costs under control and meet housing targets, caused decision makers to ignore fire safety and keep quiet, resulting in the loss of 72 lives in the subsequent fire in 2017.

Post Office Horizon Scandal

Where pressure on senior managers to uphold the reputation of the Post Office led to failures to speak out about the Horizon system with a devastating and life changing effect on over 700 sub-postmasters wrongly accused of theft and false accounting (and the death of at least 4 by suicide).

Harrods Cover Up

The alleged cover up by senior members of Harrods of the sexual abuse of young female members of staff between 1985 and 2010 by the store’s owner, Mohammed Al Fayed, in order to protect the reputation of this globally recognised institution.

Whistleblowing

Integrity’s Ombuds for Organisations is a service designed to ensure that organisations can demonstrate they take the complaints and concerns of its stakeholders seriously. It is not a whistleblowing hotline; it is service that offers individuals independent professional support to address their everyday concerns and uncertainties. However, in some cases the service might act as an early warning system for potential whistleblowing and allow organisations to understand and control potential internal risks quickly.  In the UK, laws exist that are designed to protect whistleblowers both in public and in private organisations. However, whistleblowing still comes at a personal cost for those who expose the wrongdoing of an organisation. Whilst protected by law, the personal and professional consequences of speaking up can be dire for the individuals and the reputational damage to the organisation can be extensive. Ensuring that an environment exists where leaders, employees and all other stakeholders are encouraged to vocalise themselves confidently without fear of repercussion, not only gives individuals the care they need but allows organisations to control potential concerns before those concerns end up controlling the organisations. Our Ombuds for Organisations can provide that confidential service. 

How can Integrity help?

An easy, early and effective way for organisations to encourage stakeholders, including leaders and employees, to speak up, and to really evidence a commitment to their well-being,is to give them access to an independent third party who will offer a non-judgmental safe space for individuals to voice concerns, however small, and the support to address them within an organisation before they get out of hand. Imagine the difference such a service might have made if it had been available to the victims in the scenarios above.

For this reason, Integrity now offers an Ombuds service to organisations wishing to support their stakeholders, empower a collective voice and help individuals tackle issues before they get out of hand.

Organisational Ombuds, an emerging service in the UK, exist to support employees who have concerns about policies, processes or conflicts, or customers who have complaints about the goods or services they receive. As the title suggests, these Organisational Ombuds are not appointed by government but by the organisations themselves. The role of the Organisational Ombuds is to be independent, provide guidance and support to individuals, and resolve conflicts and complaints quickly and informally.

Integrity Ombuds is staffed by professionals and experts who will be able to address the individual circumstances of each case with care and compassion and provide specialist bespoke support in whatever way is required. Get in touch to discuss or find out more about Integrity Ombuds for Organisations here.