In the corridors of academic institutions, amidst the hum of centrifuges and the scribbling of hypotheses on whiteboards, lies a responsibility that often goes unspoken and is sadly sometimes not valued as it should be by our most admired science heroes: ethical leadership.
Take for example the recent resignation of Stanford’s president Marc Tessier-Lavigne over sub-par “standards of scientific rigor and process” in his laboratory.
Tessier-Lavigne is retracting several Cell Nature Science publications as a result. While he has resigned his position as university president, he continues to be a tenured faculty member at Stanford. Paper retractions are due to inappropriate data manipulation or quality of research reagents. Stanford’s report states that Tessier-Lavigne “was unaware of those problems at the time.”
As team leaders over here, we can relate to a degree–it’s impossible to be 100% in the loop on what goes on in the lab at all times while also staying on top of all your other responsibilities. But at the same time, it is your responsibility to ensure rigor and ethical research conduct!
So one aspect of ethical leadership is that you (unlike Tessier-Lavigne) take control of and responsibility for the stuff happening on your watch!
How to do that when you can’t and shouldn’t look over each team member’s shoulder 24/7 is one important part of our upcoming leadership training Research Leadership Mastery.
In this 6-months program, we touch on many different aspects of leadership. Among them is how to take charge of your team culture (integrity and ethical conduct must be one aspect of it), what to do when folks don’t meet standards, and how do up your performance standards without risking folks feeling so much pressure that they lose drive or abandon their values (people will do that if it meets their need for safety or significance).
If you are interested, you can find a little more information here and can get your questions answered in a 30min Zoom call with Stefanie who will also help you to assess your leadership strengths/weaknesses and team opportunities and risks. You can book a strategy session here.
As a research team leader and mentor, you are not just a custodian of research projects, but also the moral compass guiding your team while they and you navigate or sometimes struggle through the maze of research and an academic career.
Tessier-Lavigne’s dilemma was between pursuing other opportunities and his responsibilities to his research program. At the minimum he needed a culture and systems that ensured high quality, ethical research. He did not live up to this leadership challenge.
Ethical leadership isn’t just about following a set of rules.
It’s about cultivating a mindset, a culture of ethical curiosity. Just as we ponder the mysteries of cell biology or the nuances of molecular interactions, we need to encourage our teams to be curious about the ethical dimensions of their work.
This might mean organizing team discussions around ethical case studies, bringing in experts for seminars on research ethics, or simply creating spaces where team members can share their own ethical dilemmas and seek guidance.
It’s about fostering a culture where team members feel safe to report negative results, where anomalies are seen as opportunities for learning rather than errors to be hidden.
That’s easier said than done. I, Stefanie, once had an undergraduate student who falsified a compliance training certificate. I was stunned.
To me it just seemed such a stupid thing to get in trouble over.
After having a conversation with the student, I took this as an opportunity to look at our systems and culture to figure out why they felt they had to abandon their academic integrity. Because at the time, we had a lot of undergraduate students in the lab, we had created processes and deadlines for them to complete the trainings. This student struggled because English wasn’t their first language and, to be fair, these trainings with their tons of acronyms are sometimes challenging to wrap your head around. The student couldn’t pass the quizzes and instead of talking to us about it, they felt their only option to meet our deadlines was to produce a falsified training certificate.
Obviously, the nature of this student’s resourcefulness needed some upgrading. But also our culture needed an upgrade because they didn’t feel like they could simply let us know about their challenges.
Academic research is rife with potential ethical dilemmas such as this one or the one Tessier-Lavigne navigated.
Here is another one that all of us encounter:
Do you put your own career first or the career of your trainees?
Take the #mentorFirst movement initiated by Jen Heemstra. Does that mean choosing your trainees over yourself? Fundamentally, #mentorFirst is a great message that most of us likely agree with. After all, we largely don’t work with a professional workforce. We work with trainees, graduate students and postdocs, who signed up for low salaries and high demands on their time and intellect to be mentored and trained by us!
The problem is, that this isn’t rewarded in our current “merit” system. Being a team player or a great mentor does very little for you when you show up for your annual faculty evaluations or before your promotion and tenure committee.
Don’t get me wrong, it’s not that we don’t quantify this. Stefanie just recently filled out the 90 question form that her department likes to use as a basis for their evaluations. Questions about mentoring were part of it. But think about it, if you don’t publish and/or don’t bring in grant funding, you won’t make it in this career. It doesn’t matter if you mentored 95 people. Mentoring 95 people also does reflect very little on the quality of the mentoring.
Back to the point: #MentorFirst sounds great. But what do you do when your mentee turns out to be unaligned with your agenda? Or when their lack of productivity threatens your very career? Or when your small team doesn’t generate the consistent output of publications and grant proposals that is expected of you?
That’s another of those ethical dilemmas: Are you a mentor first? Are you a small business owner first?
If your priority on being a great mentor sinks your research program, have you served your community to the degree you have the potential to? And at the same time, is research output a justification for not putting people first?
In Research Leadership Mastery you will learn how to work this particular dilemma. Hint: Putting people first and running your lab is a productive way is of course not mutually exclusive. But sometimes you have to make difficult business and people decisions.
The Ethical Dimensions of Team Dynamics
The essence of leadership is not just about navigating the minefield of ethical challenges but doing so with empathy, understanding, and a tailored approach.
Our teams are microcosms of the broader academic community. The way we treat our team members, the culture we foster, and the values we uphold are as much a part of ethical leadership as ensuring appropriate research conduct.
Drawing from our extensive discussions on feedback, motivation, and team dynamics, it’s clear that ethical leadership also encompasses creating an environment of respect, understanding, and mutual growth. It’s about recognizing the inherent value of each team member, ensuring their well-being, and providing them with opportunities for personal and professional growth.
This doesn’t mean that you or your team members are comfortable at all times. Sometimes it means you have to have difficult conversations. And sometimes this means that you have to let a team member go, so they can pursue a path that is more in alignment for them. Making this decision is never easy and it needs to be carried out in an ethical fashion (which may not necessarily overlap 100% with the HR-preferred way).
Importantly, ethical behavior is less about your values (although those build a foundation of course) and more about navigating challenging situations with skill. That’s what good leadership is all about!
Stay curious, stay ethical.
Warmly,
Stefanie & Robert
PS: If you want to build your skill, so that you are an ethical leader not only during those sunny times when funding is plentiful, people are happy, and publications are lining up but also when waters are stormy, money is scarce, you are stressed, and there is people drama, consider Research Leadership Mastery. The program will help you navigate challenges, up your skills, and also be fun and supportive. More in a lowkey strategy session with Stefanie.