Code of Ethics Design and Implementation

Introduction

Business ethics has become increasingly important in recent years. American’s idea of business had become more negative due to the scandals in the early nineteen nineties. Due to the increasing public outcry, it is more important than ever to have an enforced code of ethics or CofE. Currently, the organization I work for, PBC, does not have a code of ethics. There are many important ideas that need to be implemented in a CofE for my organization to ensure ethical behavior by every employee. I will be developing an ethics plan to be adopted by my organization, and will provide evidence as to why that is in my code of ethics.

Organizational Structure

The management company I work for is the most decentralized organization out of all the organizations I have worked for in the past. In a decentralized organization the decisions are delegated all the way down to the bottom of the organization (Ferrell, Fraedrich, & Ferrell, 2011). In my company all decisions are left to me, since the only people above me are my owners. Since I work with a decentralized organization, and ethics program is even more important. One author linked the size of the organization to the risk of unethical behavior, and found that the smaller more flexible the company sees both extremes of high ethical behavior and low ethical behavior (Schminke, 2001). When I recently took over the community, the lack of an ethics program became a hurdle I had to overcome. The previous manager did quite a few things that were unethical. Since there is no one supervising my staff and I when it comes to ethical decisions, it is even more important to have a solid ethics program.

Within the management company I work for we have both formal and ...

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.... C., Fraedrich, J., & Ferrell, L. (2011). Business Ethics: Ethical decision making and cases 8th ed. Mason, OH: South-Western Cengage Learning.

McNamara, C. (n.d.). Complete Guide to Ethics Management: An Ethics Toolkit for Managers. Retrieved September 1, 2011, from Free Management Library: http://managementhelp.org/businessethics/ethics-guide.htm

North Carolina Department of Administration. (2005, July 1). Example of an Organizational Code of Conduct. Retrieved September 1, 2011, from North Carolina Department of Administration http://www.doa.nc.gov/cfw/documents/grants/2010/policy/OrganizationalCodeofConductExample.pdf

Schminke, M. (2001). Considering the Business in Business Ethics: An Exploratory Study of the Influence of Organizational Size and Structure on Individual Ethical Predispositions. JOURNAL OF BUSINESS ETHICS , 30 (4), 375-390.