Hosmer's fourth edition of The Ethics of Management provides business students (future managers) with a very specific analytical process for understanding and resolving moral problems in management. A manager needs insight and understanding in a global economy to convince everyone involved, given his or her varied religious, cultural, economic and social backgrounds, to accept a proposed moral solution. Acceptance of managerial moral solutions, over time, brings trust, commitment and effort, and those three, also over time, are essential for organizational success.

A model is developed which identifies and describes various factors which affect ethical and unethical behavior in organizations, including a decision-maker's social, government and legal, work, professional and personal environments. The effect of individual decision maker attributes on the decision process is also discussed. The model links these influences with ethical and unethical behavior via the mediating structure of the individual's decision-making process.

Managing ethical behavior is a one of the most pervasive and complex problems facing business organizations today. Employees' decisions to behave ethically or unethically are influenced by a myriad of individual and situational factors. Background, personality, decision history, managerial philosophy, and reinforcement are but a few of the factors which have been identified by researchers as determinants of employees' behavior when faced with ethical dilemmas. The literature related to ethical behavior is reviewed in this article, and a model for understanding (...) ethical behavior in business organizations is proposed. It is concluded that managing ethics in business organizations requires that managers engage in a concentrated effort which involves espousing ethics, behaving ethically, developing screening mechanisms, providing ethical training, creating ethics units and reinforcing ethical behavior. (shrink)

The majority of North American corporations awakened to the need for their own ethical guidelines during the late 1970s and early 1980s, even though modern corporations are subject to a surprising multiplicity of external codes of ethics or conduct. This paper provides an understanding of both internal and external codes through a discussion of the factors behind the development of the codes, an analysis of internal codes and an identification of problems with them.

Individuals who would blow the whistle by making public disclosure of impropriety in their own organizations face choices of public v private good. These dilemmas, along with institutional and professional standards that might ease the way of whistleblowers, are explored.

Based on analysis of interviews with managers about the ethical questions they face in their work, a typology of morally questionable managerial acts is developed. The typology distinguishes acts committed against-the-firm (non-role and role-failure acts) from those committed on-behalf-of-the-firm (role-distortion and role-as-sertion acts) and draws attention to the different nature of the four types of acts. The argument is made that senior management attention is typically focused on the types of acts which are least problematical for most managers, and that (...) the most troublesome types are relatively ignored. (shrink)

This article outlines an approach for implementing business ethics. A company should both organize for ethical business policies and execute them. The organizational dimension refers to structural components including codes of ethics, conferences and training programs and an ethical audit. The corporate culture must support these structural elements with top management playing a central role in implementing ethics. The execution of ethical business policies includes implementation responsibilities and tasks. These responsibilities are leadership in ethics, delegation, communication and motivation of the (...) company's ethical position to employees. Execution tasks are delineated for the marketing function. Although many company examples are provided, a program in place at McDonnell Douglas is highlighted as a model of ethics implementation. (shrink)

Concern over business ethics and ethical dilemmas has grown tremendously during the past decade, causing managers to rethink decisions which can affect both their careers and legal liabilities. Strategic Intervention in Organizations considers many of the issues confronting managers and consumers alike, stressing the importance of careful decision-making. The author analyses the content of 202 codes of ethics written by the highest level officials in major corporations and employs quantitative methods to assess the impact of these codes on corporate behaviour.

In recent years, the business ethics literature has exploded in both volume and importance. Because of the sheer volume and diversity of this literature, a review article was deemed necessary to provide focus and clarity to the area. The present paper reviews the literature on business ethics with a special focus in marketing ethics. The literature is divided into normative and empirical sections, with more emphasis given to the latter. Even though the majority of the articles deal with the American (...) reality, most of the knowledge gained is easily transferable to other nations. (shrink)

This paper presents the responses of 118 executives to a mail survey which examined their views of business ethics and various business practices. In addition to identifying various sources of ethical conflict, current business practices are also examined with respect to how ethical or unethical each is believed to be. Results are also presented which outline executive responses to four ethical business situations. Overall conclusions to the study are outlined, as well as future research needs.

This study investigated several issues with 1498 managers nationwide regarding, for example, how ethical they felt their organizations were and whether their personal principles must be compromised for the organization's sake. In addition their decision criteria for two scenarios involving ethical implications were articulated.

Business ethics, which grew out of religion's interest in ethics in business and management education's concern with social issues, has become an interdisciplinary academic field. Thus far it has centered on teaching undergraduates. The easy work has now been done and the field has reached a plateau. To develop further it requires development on the MBA level, high quality research on new questions, positive models, better interdisciplinary integration, and attention to international business. Ultimately the field will stand or fall on (...) the quality of research those in it produce. (shrink)

What should, or can, businesses do about‘prisoners of conscience’? Sir Geoffrey Chandler CBE is Chairman of the recently founded Business Group of the British Section of Amnesty International.

A study of 513 executives researched decisions involving ethics, relationships and results. Analyzing personal values, organization role and level, career stage, gender and sex role with decisions in ten scenarios produced conclusions about both the role of gender, subjective values, and the other study variables and about situational relativity, gender stereotypes, career stages, and future research opportunities.

The astute manger should be aware that, in organizations, the deck is frequently ‘stacked’ against higher levels of ethical behavior. This deck stacking occurs because of socialization processes, environmental influences, and the organization hierarchy. As a result of bosses using hierarchical leverage to take the ethical dimension of decision-making away from subordinates, the stage is set for a they-made-me-do-it defense of their moral integrity by these subordinates if and when violations of ethical norms come to light. There is also at (...) work, however, an I-made-them-do-it situation in which professionals who prefer to ‘nest’ in the more technical aspects of their work ‘delegate’ — upward — to their bosses ethical decision-making. Understanding these dynamics is crucial in an age which is especially sensitized to the ethical facet of organizational behavior. (shrink)

It is obvious that people experience ethical conflicts, and that many of these conflicts occur at work. We do not yet know empirically whether or how these experiences affect productivity. A person experiencing an ethical conflict will, at a minimum, be distracted. It seems likely that the incident will have a negative impact on his or her job performance.The kinds or degree of impact ethical conflicts have on productivity have not yet been determined scientifically. The purpose of this paper is (...) to encourage empirical investigation of the phenomena of the experience of ethical conflict at work and the impact these kinds of incidents have on job performance. (shrink)