Unit 1

• Business Ethics


  Definitions and distinctions
• Business


  Organisations/Individuals that provide goods/services in exchange for payment
• Types of business organisations/activities

  • Private
  • Public
  • Individual
• Economic Ethics


  • Wider socio political framework, on national and international levels: political decisions, laws and regulations, norms and conventions
• Corporate responsibility


  • Social responsibility within societies in which they operate
• Organisational Ethics


  • Own structures, systems and standards to directly and control business activities
• Stakeholders


  • Internal (Employees, Media)
  • External (Competitors, Suppliers, Customers)
• 3 central concepts included in Ethics Definition

  • Good
  • Other
  • Self
• Business Ethics


  Ethical values and standards (Good), Stakeholders (Other), Business (Self)
• Ethical dilemma


  Decision is blurred, difficulty to choose between two good options or between two or more options that are all to some extent wrong
• Ethical and legal


  • Company publishes accurate statements of its income
  • Exceeding speed limit: to get a seriously injured college in time to hospital
• Ethical and illegal


  • Bribing government officials
• Unethical and legal


  • Lions are raised to be killed: Hunting canned lions in South Africa where the law allows it
• Values


  Stable convictions about what is desirable
• Types of values in business

  • Strategic values
  • Work values
  • Ethical values
• Values should mutually support one another, but different values can compete with one another
• Integrity


  Moral character of a person or organization, constantly adhering to a set of ethical standards
• Apples and Barrels metaphor


  Good apple, bad apple, good barrel, bad barrel
• Individuals (apples)


  Organisations (barrels)
• Organisations (barrels)


  Society (warehouse)