Throughout my career, I’ve dedicated years to challenging the prevailing notion that integrity is too abstract to be measured. Ethics isn’t an activity—it’s an impact. And impact takes more than counting. This question — whether ethics can be measured — has been posed to me countless times. In a world fixated on metrics, dashboards, and KPIs, ethics and integrity are often dismissed as too ‘soft’ to quantify. However, I’ve come to believe that the real issue isn’t whether ethics can be measured—it’s whether we’re willing to reevaluate what truly drives culture. We measure what we prioritize. We only track what’s easy—incident counts, training completions, and hotline calls—reinforcing a compliance culture that’s reactive, rather than reflective. Ethics and integrity live in the spaces between those numbers. They are evident in how decisions are made, how authority is utilized, and how people are treated. They’re embedded in the questions we ask, the behaviors we reward, and the silence we tolerate. The challenge is that we’ve been trained to chase KPIs—Key Performance Indicators—because they’re tangible, trackable, and often tied to incentives. But KPIs alone don’t tell the whole story. They measure activity, not necessarily effectiveness. A policy may be implemented, a training may be completed, a report may be filed—but did it shift behavior? Did it build trust? Did it reinforce the values we claim to uphold?
In my own work, I’ve hit every KPI—well, more so the “K” and the “I.” The “P,” the performance piece, is where things get complicated. Because evaluating effectiveness takes more than counting—it takes context. This context is crucial in understanding the actual impact of our actions on culture. It takes courage. It takes a willingness to ask: Did this move the needle on culture? Did it change how people lead, how they listen, how they show up? Across the field, we see organizations that meet every compliance KPI yet still fall short in terms of integrity. Others may fall short on metrics but foster cultures rooted in ethical leadership—and it shows. The difference isn’t in the numbers alone. It’s in the mindset. Those who get it right aren’t just checking boxes—they’re examining the impact. They’re not just tracking activity—they’re monitoring alignment. They’re listening. They’re learning. They’re willing to assess the intangible by asking better questions and staying curious about the answers.
That’s where benchmarks and monitoring come in. Benchmarks ask: What does “good” look like in our context? What does ethical leadership sound like in our meetings, our hiring practices, our boardrooms? Monitoring asks: Are we paying attention to the right signals—not just the loud ones, but the quiet ones that whisper when something’s off? It’s about asking the right questions, not just the easy ones, to understand the true ethical climate of the organization.
As I wrote in the book Compliance Officers Are People, Too:
“We’ve built entire programs around what’s reportable, trackable, and auditable. But the real measure of integrity isn’t in the metrics—it’s in the moments. The moment someone speaks up. The moment a leader chooses transparency over convenience. The moment a policy is applied with empathy, not just precision. These moments don’t always show up on dashboards, but they define the ethical climate more than any spreadsheet ever could.”
Ethics isn’t a number. But it leaves a trail. It is evident in employee voices, leadership accountability, and whether people feel safe speaking up and being heard. It’s an alignment between what we say and what we do. Between our policies and our purpose. Between our metrics and our mission.
So yes, ethics is measurable. Not in the way we measure revenue or risk, but in the way we evaluate trust, culture, and courage. It requires us to move beyond KPIs as the sole source of truth and embrace benchmarks that reflect our values, alongside monitoring that captures the nuance of human behavior. It requires us to distinguish between measurement and effectiveness—and to lead with integrity that’s felt.
Where integrity leads, progress follows.
Signed with purpose, Desiree.