Values, ethics and professional etiquette

1Why this matters

Home Science leads to many careers: chef, baker, hotel receptionist, tailor, fashion designer, nutrition assistant, interior decorator, or the owner of a small restaurant or salon. In every one of them, skills get you the job, but behaviour keeps it. A tailor who sews beautifully but never finishes on the day promised soon loses customers to the tailor next door.

This lesson explains values and ethics, and the professional etiquette expected at school and at work.

2Values

Values are the beliefs a person holds about what is important and right. They guide the choices you make, especially when nobody is watching. Common personal values include honesty, respect, responsibility, kindness, hard work, fairness, self-discipline and punctuality.

Rwandan civic education promotes values from Rwanda's own culture, among them:

• Ubunyangamugayo: integrity, being honest and trustworthy so that no one can fairly blame you;
• Ubupfura: good character, behaving with dignity and self-respect;
• Agaciro: dignity and self-worth, for yourself and for the nation;
• Kwigira: self-reliance, solving problems with your own effort;
• Ubumwe: unity, working together as one people.

3Ethics

Ethics are the principles people use to decide what is right and wrong behaviour. Professional ethics are the standards of behaviour expected of people in a job. Professional codes usually include honesty, trustworthiness, accountability (accepting responsibility for your work and your mistakes), confidentiality (keeping private information about clients private), fairness, respect and obeying the law.

Rwanda has a policy of zero tolerance for corruption: asking for or offering a bribe is a crime, not just bad manners.

4Professional etiquette

• Punctuality: arrive a few minutes early and meet deadlines. If you will be late, tell the person in advance.
• Dress and grooming: dress for the job. In a kitchen that means a clean uniform, hair covered, short clean nails and no jewellery; in an office, neat clothes.
• Greeting and addressing people: greet colleagues and customers, and use titles until invited to use first names.
• Phone use: personal calls and social media wait for your break.
• Customer care: listen, stay calm, apologise when you are wrong, and solve the problem or find someone who can.
• Teamwork and respect: share work fairly, accept correction politely, and treat everyone equally whatever their gender, religion, disability or background.
• Tidiness: leave your workplace clean and your tools in their places.

The same rules are your personal etiquette at school and at home: be on time, keep promises, return what you borrow, knock before entering, queue patiently, and respect other people's property and privacy.

Worked example: solving an ethical problem in three steps

Mutesi works at weekends in a restaurant in Musanze. A tourist pays a 7,000 Frw bill with a 10,000 Frw note and leaves in a hurry without waiting for change. Her colleague says, "He's gone. We can split the 3,000."

Step 1: name the values at stake. Honesty, ubunyangamugayo (integrity), and her employer's and customer's trust.

Step 2: list the options and their results.

• Split the money: dishonest; if the customer comes back or the manager finds out, both workers could lose their jobs, and the restaurant's reputation suffers.
• Keep it quietly for herself: the same problems, and she also deceives her colleague.
• Run after the customer, or give the change to the manager with a note of the table and time: honest; the customer can collect it and the restaurant is protected.

Step 3: choose and act. She tries to catch the customer; if she cannot, she hands the 3,000 Frw to the manager. She has acted with integrity even though no one was watching.

Practice

Solution. A value is a personal belief about what is important and right, such as honesty. Professional ethics are the agreed standards of behaviour for everyone doing a particular job, such as a nurse's duty of confidentiality.

Solution. Any three of: arrive on time; wear a clean uniform with hair covered and no jewellery; keep the phone away during work; greet colleagues and use titles; accept correction politely; keep the work area clean.

Solution. Copying is not honest (the teacher would think it is the friend's own work); it is not fair to classmates who did the work, or to the friend, who will not learn; and Habimana would not be happy for the teacher to see it. He should refuse politely and offer to explain the work instead.

Solution. Confidentiality. Clients who hear her gossip will expect her to gossip about them too, so they lose trust and may go to another salon.