One of ECI’s greatest resources is its members. A pillar of our organization, we are proud to have E&C practitioners from industries across the globe in our community. Our new Member Spotlights are an opportunity to highlight just a few of our many great members, showcase their achievements and show our appreciation for their support of the incredible ECI community. This month, meet ECI Academic Fellow Christopher Wong Michaelson!
How long have you been an ECI Academic Fellow?
Before I answer that question directly, I want to say nostalgically that I first encountered ECI in 1997 when I was a graduate student networking my way around the E&C profession, and I saw the Ethics Resource Center’s (as it was then called) executive director speak at a conference. Later, at another conference, I met the founders of the Ethics Officer Association (as it was originally called), and I began my post-graduate career helping to launch an ethics advisory practice with a Big Four professional services firm. I even kept a foot there for many years after returning to become a full-time academic. After leaving Big Four consulting permanently I became an ECI Academic Fellow in 2016, thanks in part to my former colleague, Bobby Kipp. That was poignant for me since ECI and its predecessors had been a part of my professional life for so long.
What is your most-used benefit of ECI membership?
The greatest benefit to me is the relationships with both ECI practitioners and other academic fellows. Part of the reason that I kept a foot in practice long after I became a professor was that I am a better teacher and researcher when I understand what’s going on in the real world. ECI literally keeps me grounded as a philosopher prone to losing my head in the clouds.
How has ECI participation impacted your perspective on Ethics & Compliance more broadly?
Since I teach students aspiring to advance in the E&C profession in the Organizational Ethics and Compliance Program at the University of St. Thomas, ECI helps me understand their potential career paths and motivations. I’ve been around the profession long enough to have had at least glimpses of three generations of E&C professionals: the originals, who more or less “fell into” jobs that did not previously exist; the professionals, who brought law and audit and other professional skills to bear upon the ethics and compliance office; and the “purposefuls,” who are seeking meaning and purpose at work and have new educational programs and specialties in communications and analytics and technology to shape the future of work and their profession.
What research/academic focus do you specialize in?
My research explores what makes work worth doing in a life worth living. My coauthor Jen Tosti-Kharas and I have a book coming out in May 2024 called Is Your Work Worth It? – which we think is a question that occurs to just about anyone who works when they are seeking, changing, or reflecting upon a career. As E&C professionals know, one of the experiences that can make work feel worthy is helping other people – and one of the things that can make work feel worthless is when we are asked to act in a way that violates our ethical values.
If you could have lunch with any business leader, current or historical, who would it be and why?
I’ve long been an admirer of Indra Nooyi’s efforts to enact “Performance with Purpose” at PepsiCo, even though it wasn’t always easy for her to transition to a healthier product portfolio while satisfying financial performance expectations.
What is your proudest achievement outside of your career?
Of course there’s nothing that I can say that tops raising three creative, intelligent, and generous children. More specifically, though, as an adult I reclaimed my tennis career, which I had quit as a near-great junior player with a bad temper who got burned out. I am proud to have coached my sons to enjoy themselves and to excel as college tennis players and to have supported my daughter’s choice to dance on her terms.
Who has had the largest impact on you and your career and how have they influenced you?
Both substantively and sentimentally, my wife and my mother. When I was a Ph.D. student in Philosophy who discovered that philosophers were more occupied with studying the meaning of words than the meaning of life, my wife, Beth Slater Winnick, gave me the confidence that a philosopher could make a difference in the real world of work. After a few years in consulting, when I received an offer to teach business ethics at Wharton, my mother, Margaret Wong – a Chinese language teacher – was my inspiration to become an educator.
Please contact membership@ethics.org if you are interested in submitting your own member spotlight contribution.
