Business Ethics

hiring, working with and firing of friends in a business

Introduction

It appears that in the 30 years that business ethics has been a discipline in its own right a model of business ethics has not been proffered. No one appears to have tried to explain the phenomenon known as 'business ethics' and the ways that we as a society interact with the concept, therefore, the authors have addressed this gap in the literature by proposing a model of business ethics that the authors hope will stimulate debate (Lissack, et al., 2003). The business ethics model consists of three principal components (i.e. expectations, perceptions and evaluations) that are interconnected by five sub-components (i.e. society expects; organizational values, norms and beliefs; outcomes; society evaluates; and reconnection).

The introduced model makes a contribution to the creation of a conceptual framework for business ethics. A few tentative conclusions may be drawn from the introduced model of business ethics. The model aspires to be highly dynamic. The ultimate outcome is dependent upon the evolution of time and contexts. It is also dependent upon and provides reference to the behaviours and perceptions of people. The model proposes business ethics to be a continuous and an iterative process. There is no actual end of the process, but a constant reconnection to the initiation of successive process iterations of the business ethics model. The principals and sub-components of the model construct the dynamics of this continuous process. They provide guidance on what and how to explore our common efforts to understand the phenomenon known as business ethics (Lissack, et al., 2003). The model provides opportunities for further research in the field of business ethics.

According to Lissack (2003), “ethics is concerned with moral obligation, responsibility, and social justice.” She goes on to say that “ethics reflects the character of the individual and more con temporarily per haps, the character of the business firm, which is a collection of individuals.” In “Accounting for Ethics,” Dennis (1996) de fines ethics as: “...that which is to do with a code of conduct which clarifies one's duty towards other human beings, even be - yond what is required by law. In other words, an ethical code de fines what is morally right or wrong in a particular field of human activity - in this case business affairs.” There is difficulty as well as simplicity in both of these definitions. In his re search on business ethics and corporate decision making, Mauro (1987), used definitions for ethics and business ethics that were developed by Walton (1977):

1. Ethics. A critical analysis of human acts to determine their right ness or wrong ness in terms of two major criteria: truth and justice.

2. Business ethics. A range of criteria whereby human actions are judged to include such things as societal expectations; fair competition; the aesthetics of advertising and the use of public relations; the meaning of social responsibilities; reconciling corporate behaviour at home with behaviour abroad; the ex tent of consumer sovereignty; the relevance of ...