Executives Bergstrom, Pedersen, Updike to Speak at Oct. 6 Fox Valley Ethics in Business Summit
Interactive #FoxValley #EthicsSummit aims to improve mental health

Executives Tim Bergstrom of Bergstrom Automotive, Bob Pedersen of Goodwill of North Central Wisconsin and Vicki Updike of Silver Star Brands will discuss ethics as executive panelists at Samaritan’s first annual Fox Valley Ethics in Business Summit on Tues., Oct. 6.

“The Fox Valley Ethics in Business Summit will gather key leaders for a conversation on ethics meant to provide a dose of community-wide preventive mental health care,” says Rosangela Berbert, Samaritan’s executive director. “With strong ethical leadership, employees, families and communities are mentally healthier.”

Keynote speaker Clancy Martin will play an integral role as moderator and coach throughout the summit. Martin is a professor of business ethics and philosophy at the University of Missouri-Kansas City. Prior to his work in academia, he spent seven years in the luxury jewelry business, where he experienced firsthand the connection between ethics and mental health.

Robin Schroeder, senior corporate attorney with the Bemis Company and summit steering committee member, says the event promises to be collaborative, interactive and unlike any other event in the area.

“The program will include smartphone-based polling on real-world dilemmas that businesses and their employees face,” Schroeder says. “This will be an opportunity to do realistic goal setting in an energizing environment.”

The summit also will align leaders throughout the Fox Valley on this important topic.

Gary Cebulski, president of Samaritan’s board of directors and chair of the Fox Valley Ethics in Business Summit steering committee, says those who participate in the summit will help set a high standard for ethics across the region.

“The summit is meant to stimulate conversation,” Cebulski says. “The idea is to energize leaders to set the ethical tone from the top in their organizations.”

Partners already  invested in the event include Community First Credit Union, the J. J. Keller Foundation, the Boldt Company, Rotary Clubs of the Fox Valley, Bergstrom Corp., Goodwill, Heartland Business Systems, United Way of the Fox Cities, U.S. Bank National Association, the Bemis Company Foundation and Schenck, among others.

The Ethics Resource Center’s recently released 2013 National Business Ethics Survey of the U.S. Workforce found that forty-one percent of employees have observed ethical misconduct on the job. That figure has decreased from 52 percent in 2005.

Ethics training seems to be a factor in the decrease. During the same window of time – from 2005 to 2013 – the percentage of employers providing ethics training increased from 62 percent to 81 percent.

In addition to advancing the conversation on ethics, the Fox Valley Ethics in Business Summit will raise funds to improve access to mental health care – one of our region’s biggest challenges, according to the 2014 Living Well in Outagamie County report and 2014-2019 Community Health Improvement Plan.

“There is a shortage of mental health providers in the region,” Berbert says. “Funds raised through the Fox Valley Ethics in Business Summit will help ensure that Samaritan can remain part of the solution to that shortage.”

To learn more about the summit:

• Visit https://samaritan-counseling.com/eib
• Contact development director Lisa Strandberg at (920) 886-9319 ext. 116 or [email protected]
• Search LinkedIn for Fox Valley Ethics in Business Summit.

Follow the summit: #FoxValley #EthicsSummit