Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Overview
Discuss the nature and evolution of business ethics
management
Codes of ethics
Current theory and practice regarding the management of
stakeholder relationships
The development of social, ethical, and environmental
accounting, auditing and reporting tools
Different ways of organising for the management of business
ethics, and critically assess the role of organization culture and
leadership
Extent to which developments discussed in this lecture
represent genuine commitment to business ethics or
sophisticated public relations
Codes of Ethics
Codes of ethics are voluntary statements that
commit organizations, industries, or
professions to specific beliefs, values, and
actions and/or set out appropriate ethical
behaviour for employees
4 main types of ethical codes
Challenge
Sparring partners
One-way support
Mutual support
Endorsement
Project dialogue
Strategy dialogue
Task force
Joint venture or alliance
Resource intensity
Culture clash
Schizophrenia
Uncontrollability
Co-optation
Accountability
Resistance
Areas of assessment
Ethical
Often a focus on internal management systems
Environmental
Impact on natural environment
Social
Broader remit, often including impact on stakeholders
Sustainability
Focus on triple bottom line
Stakeholder
dialogue
Determination
of audit scope
Publication
of report
Verification
Agreement of standards
and performance
indicators
Agreement of
objectives
Preparation of
accounts and
internal reports
Stakeholder
consultation
Stakeholder
surveys
Internal
audit
Inclusivity
Comparability
Completeness
Evolution
Management policies and systems
Disclosure
External verification
Continuous improvement
Reporting
The Global Reporting Initiative (GRI)
Reporting assurance
AA1000S Assurance Standard
Compliance orientation
Four ways of
organizing for
business ethics
management
Values orientation
External orientation
Protection orientation
Summary
Business ethics has varying approaches: e.g., in Europe
emphasizes an external, socially based orientation rather
than concentrating on ethical codes to ensure compliance
Question effectiveness of ethical codes
Danger of overstating the benefits of business ethics
management tools
Crucial role for the motivations of the use of these tools,
the process of their development, and the implementation
and follow-up