• Use the video option when possible
• Don’t wear your pajamas
• Stage your video area
• Lighting is also very important and typically, more light is better
• Try to look into the camera
• Do your own tech support before you start
• Stay on mute if you’re not talking
• Don’t eat during the meeting
• Don’t do other private things while on a meeting
• Stay focused
• Limit your meetings to only those who really need to attend
• Finally, just like an in-person meeting, the host should be the last to leave 

Episode Timeline

Today’s special guest is Dr. Steven Mintz, author, speaker and “Ethics Sage.” SAFFIRE LEGAL PC’s founder and principal attorney Teresa McQueen talks with Dr. Mintz about the impact of ethics in the workplace and focusing on creating a more productive and civil working environment.  A wonderful episode that highlights the practical steps employees and employers can take to create a more ethics-minded workplace. 

“If you want to make a difference, master their way before you s“You have to be pro-active with ethics – not reactive – to get the positive result.”

– Dr, Steven Mintz

Highlights From This Week’s Workplace Perspective:

• Organizations can learn ethics, but it takes having an open-minded leadership that wants to learn, evaluate their own systems, and be open to change.

• To promote a culture of ethics, organizational leadership needs to “act the way you are asking your employees to act.” 

• “Employees tend to act in the way that they think will be rewarded.” 

• Common dangers zones for unethical behavior flow from messages sent from the top; a lack of “stakeholder capitalism;” and rationalizing unethical behavior.

• Ethics as an awareness issue and the evolution of the ‘ethics culture.’

Dr. Mintz’ Ethical Tips for Employers and Employees:

• To achieve positive results you need to be pro-active with ethics, not reactive. 

• Think before you act and live by the mantra of “do no harm.”

• Consider the consequences of your actions before you act. “It takes a long time to build a reputation for trust, but not very long to destroy it.”

• Go ahead and draft that angry tweet or email, but send it to yourself before sending it to its intended recipient or out onto the internet.   

• Find a mentor or adviser – someone whose opinion you respect – to go to for advise or to run ideas by before making a report or taking action.

In today’s episode I’ll be talking about a recent (April 2018) CA Supreme Court decision on an important case known as Dynamex Systems v. LA Superior Court. The Dynamex ruling with its new ABC test for determining when an independent contractor is truly independent has a lot of businesses and IC across the state scrambling.  We’ll walk through some of the more significant aspects of Dynamex and talk briefly about some initial consideration to keep in mind whether you’re a business or an IC. Today’s episode ends, as always, with an etiquette segment. Today’s focus: Dining Etiquette!