By Karen Bennett, Employee Relations Manager

On occasion, staff members may find themselves in ethical dilemmas when making decisions about getting involved in activities that may create or appear to create a conflict with their work responsibilities and the interests of the Laboratory.

Outside activities are not precluded when you work at the Lab. Consulting for others and other moonlighting work can often be beneficial for the individual's growth and can add value for the Lab. Conflicts may occur though, when outside activities or in terests interfere with effective job performance or alter the judgement or ability of individuals to act in the best interests of the Lab.

In all business dealings, prudent judgment must be exercised to avoid situations where one's loyalties may be questioned, particularly in situations involving sensitive procurement, intellectual property, personnel decisions, or outside employment activit ies leveraged with one's association with the Lab. In all dealings, Lab staff must be mindful of the potential for conflict of interest and conform to established standards of professional conduct and integrity. Even activities that appear unrelated to the Lab's mission may present a conflict of interest question.

Conflict of interest could involve such things as accepting gifts, trips, or personal discounts. It also could include situations where the staff member has a business interest in an organization which does business with or is seeking to do business with the Laboratory, or which engages in similar work under contract to the DOE. In addition, it is prudent for individual staff members to refrain from using their positions at the Lab to endorse products and services, or represent personal opinions as thos e of the Laboratory.

Lab policy requires the disclosure of outside business activities ahead of time allowing any appearance of conflict to be resolved up front. If circumstances are unclear as to the propriety of the activity, talk with your supervisor, knowledgeable staff members such as our in-house legal staff, John Mullin (ext. 7543) and Rhonda Scales 9ext. 7384) or the Employee Relations Manager, Karen Bennett (ext. 7232). It opens up a line of communication for discussion of any ethical issues or impropriety that may arise in the course of the activity.

To initiate a request to engage in outside business activities, be it employment, consulting, or establishing a comparable business activity, submit a completed "Request to Engage in Outside Business Activities" form to your Division Associate Director fo r review and approval.

One of the values of the submittal is that it may help the Lab identify potential conflicts that are unknown to the person submitting the request. Requests for activities of a continuing nature must be resubmitted annually for review and approval. Once submitted, you will receive a reminder annually from Human Resources.

Some time ago the Director, Hermann Grunder, issued a memorandum to all employees that summarized some of the Lab's components of conflict of interest. As a reminder, they are as follows:

Competing and conflicting professional interests between the individual staff member and the Laboratory will be resolved in favor of the Laboratory.

Preferential treatment resulting or arising from employment must be avoided, therefore even when there is not a real conflict the appearance of one must also be avoided.

Any work done for SURA, the Lab or Department of Energy is the same, and no additional payments may be accepted for such work. Any outside work which does not conflict with the Lab must be done on the staff member's own time.

The Laboratory's resources such as equipment, machinery, computers, stationary, clerical support, may not be used for outside interests.

For more information on this topic, check with your supervisor, our Legal Services staff, the Employee Handbook (page 5-4), or Employee Relations.

maintained by webmaster@jlab.org