What do you do if you find a person stealing at work?

Do you confront them and ask what's going on?
Do you report them to their supervisor?
Do you report them to the legal department or the corresponding department?
Do you do nothing? After all, it's not your concern.

The likelihood of overlooking theft is very low. In many countries, it is considered serious misconduct and means the immediate termination of the employment relationship. Regardless of the amount, it is an act that breaks trust and the person's credibility. It is highly unlikely that anyone would question the termination of an employee for theft.

The question is, what happens when you have a star performer in your organization who consistently delivers results and helps grow the organization's sales but at the expense of mistreating other people? What if this same person disrespects a colleague or abuses their authority to get things done?

What do we do with that person? When similar situations arise, people often categorize it as a gray area. Unfortunately, many times, nothing is done.

We usually justify results to allow behaviors we would not tolerate in others. Worse yet, these are often the people who are promoted or internally recognized without even evaluating their impact on the organization.

People and teamwork are your greatest competitive advantage. To understand your organization's culture, it is important to go deep and understand what each process in the company is telling employees about what is important.

One of my favorite definitions of culture is "the way things are done here." But understanding what creates culture cannot be better captured than in the quote by Gruenter and Whitaker:
"The culture of any organization is determined by the worst behavior the leader is willing to tolerate."

What are you doing to think strategically and create systems that allow you to manage people and teams to gain a competitive advantage?