Corporate Compliance & Ethics Week is a valuable opportunity to pause and refocus attention on culture and decision-making. But it doesn’t have to be complicated. The most effective approach is to give employees and managers tools they can actually use in the work they already do, and to create space for meaningful conversations.
Here are some practical ways to make the week matter. Best of all: you don’t need a big in-person event to create impact. While it’s great to host a road show or gather everyone together, you can start smaller by meeting people where they already are. Use a few everyday channels—like Slack, your intranet, or company newsletter—to build a mini campaign that sparks conversation, shares quick wins, and keeps ethics and compliance visible all week long.
1. Share a useful tool
One of the easiest ways to mark the week is by sharing a resource that employees can apply right away. This might be a quick checklist, a decision-making framework, or a short microlearning module.
To help you get started, we’ve prepared a free microlearning module you can download and use during Compliance & Ethics Week. It doesn’t have to sit in your LMS—you can kick off an all-hands meeting with it, share it in a team huddle, or send it through your internal newsletter. You can even use it as an opportunity to test out not-so-usual delivery channels—and multiple at once!—to see where your message best reaches your audience.
2. Turn it into a game
Make it fun—and purposeful. Create a virtual scavenger hunt that sends employees digging through your Code of Conduct or key policies to find the right answers. Each clue can link back to an important standard or real-life scenario, reinforcing what “doing the right thing” looks like day-to-day. Offer small prizes or company swag for participants who complete the challenge to keep engagement high and learning lighthearted.
3. Highlight everyday culture in action
Culture isn’t only shaped by the “tone at the top.” It lives in the everyday choices employees make. Use this week as a moment to recognize those who model the organization’s values in their work. That might mean a team that raised a concern early, a manager who navigated a gray area thoughtfully, or a frontline employee who made a decision that put values before convenience.
Recognition shows that culture isn’t abstract, it’s lived out in the actions of your people.
4. Invite real dilemmas
Employees often believe misconduct only happens somewhere else, or that it’s always the work of “bad actors.” The reality is that anyone can face difficult choices under pressure.
Create space for employees to discuss gray areas together. Share sanitized, anonymous examples drawn from past investigations, hotline cases, or audit findings.
For example:
- A manager who approved an invoice without checking for conflicts.
- A sales rep who offered a gift that accidentally crossed a threshold.
- An employee who bypassed a control to meet a deadline.
If you’d like to generate new scenarios, here’s a simple GenAI prompt you can adapt:
“Help me write a gray area scenario in the second person.
Here are some background details that do not need to be included in the scenario:
My company is a [INDUSTRY] company that provides [PRODUCT OR SERVICE] for [CUSTOMERS], based in [LOCATION] but does much of its business in the [REGION]. Please consider the cultural norms and customs when you write the scenario.
Use this information to build the scenario:
Brainstorm a scenario where [TYPE OF EMPLOYEES] encounter a potential issue related to [ACTIVITY/RISK] in [LOCATION]. The [TYPE OF EMPLOYEES] will be [DESCRIBE RISKY ACTIVITY].
Describe the real-life scenario related to the risk. Be specific about the ethics and compliance issue, including cultural influences, in this scenario. This scenario will be workshopped with the [TYPE OF EMPLOYEES]. We need to ask them questions to start the discussion. Include these questions or something similar: How should the situation be resolved to ensure compliance with our policies and values? What changes should be made going forward?”
Want more ways to use behavioral data and AI to make compliance practical? Catch the on-demand webinar: From Hindsight to Insight: Using Behavioral Data to Drive Compliance Program Effectiveness.
5. Equip managers with practical tools
Managers are often the first place employees turn with questions. Support them by embedding culture and risk-awareness directly into their tools and processes.
This might mean preparing different resources for different audiences:
- For high-risk roles: a quick-reference guide for reviewing third-party invoices, a checklist for gifts and hospitality approvals, or a “when to escalate” decision tree.
- For wider audiences: a short civility-at-work microlearning, prompts for team discussions, or a one-page guide to handling conflicts respectfully.
The more practical and role-relevant the resource, the more likely managers are to use it.
6. Listen with openness
The most powerful step leaders can take this week is to listen. Create spaces—through surveys, roundtables, or team discussions—where employees can share what feels clear, what feels confusing, and where they want more support.
The key is to listen without defensiveness. This isn’t about justifying what has or hasn’t been done. It’s about hearing perspectives and using them to strengthen the process going forward. When employees feel heard, they’re more likely to engage honestly and consistently.
7. Connect culture to the business
Finally, remind employees that culture isn’t a soft add-on—it’s essential to performance and resilience. Use examples from your industry, or anonymized stories from your own company, to show how decisions affected outcomes: protecting reputation, preventing loss, or building customer trust.
When employees see that values-driven decisions aren’t just the “right” thing to do but also protect the organization, it reframes compliance and ethics as business-critical.
Make it about your people
At its best, Corporate Compliance & Ethics Week isn’t about campaigns or checklists. It’s about giving employees the tools, recognition, and space they need to make better decisions in the moments that matter.
Because the heart of culture doesn’t live in a policy manual, it lives in the everyday actions of your people.
Download your free microlearning module here.
Harper Wells is a governance, risk, and compliance leader with over 20 years of experience developing enterprise-wide ethics and compliance programs. As Chief Compliance Officer at Learning Pool, she leverages data-driven insights and innovative training strategies to foster ethical, high-performing workplace cultures.