“Only about half (53%) of employees trust their organization’s senior leaders – the people who set the tone for organizational culture and need to inspire high-performance and commitment. In contrast, three in four (75%) of employees trust their immediate managers” (BlessingWhite, 2008, p. 2). Senior leaders have the difficult task of aligning organizational culture and ethics and it has been determined that it is impossible to demonstrate trustworthiness without a personal relationship. This finding is consistent among all generations in the workplace, throughout the different business lines, and at every level. Employee engagement is dependent on the manager-employee relationship. This is important as BlessingWhite (2008) stated that bad managers are the third most common reason for leaving, behind lack of career growth and actually disliking the job (p. 2). Contributing employee are employees who trust their managers. For leaders to be effective, they need to know what engagement means, they have to experience engagement, and they need to lead engagement. “They need to be able to help their team members believe in the value of full engagement and inspire them to pursue it on a personal level” (BlessingWhite, 2008, p. 21).
Corporate Responsibility
Corporate culture is important to maintaining organizational controls. Through corporate culture, a company can promote values, beliefs, and ethics. Everyone has their own individual values, beliefs, and ethics, but as an organization, it must enforce ethics through its senior leaders, codes of conducts, and compliance programs. Just as companies can have negative impact on individuals, it can also have a positive effect on its workers. “Self-regulation of corpo...
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...d rules that are managed and reinforced can make a difference in the organization. Senior leaders must be aware of the influential impact that immediate leaders play in the daily duties of the workplace. Then the immediate leaders can emphasize and support the ethical character of their workers. Civility demands that a person must be self-disciplined for the sake of others. “By putting ethics into practice in our day-to-day encounters, civility is that moral glue without which our society would come apart” (Brannigan, 2008, para. 13). It is more important than ever for companies to act responsibly, as customers are buying products and services from the companies that they trust. Ethical values can be incorporated into an organization’s culture. Ethics plays an important role in the company and can have beneficial and profitable results on the corporation.
The ethical code of an organization illustrates the importance of being honest, acting with integrity, and showing fairness in decision making (Bethel, 2015). Ultimately, “laws regulating business conduct are passed because some stakeholders believe they cannot be trusted to do what is right” (Ferrell, Fraedrich, & Ferrell, 2015, p. 95). In the last couple of years, culture has become the initiator for compliance, which means from the top down there has to be a commitment to act in a way that represents the company’s core values (Verschoor, 2015).
In business, creating a culture of ethical behavior and productivity are two of the most important elements in daily operations. There are deferring opinions on how to establish those standards. One standard is universal in which human rights are general and should apply to every human being or having a one-size fits all standard of practice (Hugh, M.C., 2002). For example, an organization could great a set of ethical standards that universal and standard to apply to its members. However, the opposing view is cultural relativism, where the view that all values are meaningful only within specific cultures (Hugh, M.C., 2002). In other words, each culture defines what is right and what is wrong. Applying this to business, an organization can create ethical standards that are specific to their service line and provide specificity to members about their services, behavior, and social
Ethics or rather morals entail mechanisms that defend, systematize as well as recommend conceptions of right or wrong. Many organizations develop ethical codes to ensure employees and employers understand the difference in doing good or bad. In that respect, ethics are an essential aspect of successfully running of any organization or government. Ethics ensure employee’s productivity levels are up to the required standards. It also assists them to know their rights and responsibilities. Additionally, employers, as well as any persons in management, are guided by them to ensure they provide transparent leadership. Ethics also defines how customers should be handled. Ethical codes govern the relationship between customers and an
When I think of corporation culture I think of vision, beliefs, values having a united front and activities of member within the company that affect society and the environment. A company’s leadership provides the vision and support needed for ethical conduct, in order to be successful. As well as to maintain a good relationship with society companies needs plans and structure for addressing ethical concerns. (Ferrell et al, 2013 p.219)
Establishing and implementing a strategic approach to improving organizational ethics is based on establishing, communicating, and monitoring ethical values and legal requirements that characterize the firm's history, culture, and operating environment” (p. 129). Ethics programs ensure satisfactory relationships with all stakeholders by aligning with all of their demands and needs, and determine conduct with customers and relationships with regulators, shareholders, suppliers, and employees (Ferrell, 2004). Values are a core set of beliefs and principles, one or many. A number of factors contribute to the development of values. These include membership in a community or culture, attitudes, beliefs, and behaviors.
For a company to be successful ethically, it must go beyond the notion of simple legal compliance and adopt a values-based organizational culture. A corporate code of ethics can be a very valuable and integral part of a company’s culture but I believe that it is not strong enough to stand alone. Thought and care must go into constructing the code of ethics and the implementation of it. Companies need to infuse ethics and integrity throughout their corporate culture as well as into their definition of success. To be successfully ethical, companies must go beyond the notion of simple legal compliance and adopt a values-based organizational culture.
I discovered how sticking to one’s morals should be the topmost priority for everyone involved in business, whether personal or professional. Regardless of what the consequences may be, the intensity of the problem, and the complexities it may bring, sacrificing one’s integrity should never be an option, as integrity goes hand-in-hand with the morals of an individual (Duggan & Woodhouse, 2011). They further go on to say that having individuals take part in building a code of ethics that supports employee integrity, they will act ethically. Also, I believe that companies should place more emphasis on the moral behavior of their employees, and clear-cut policies should be set regarding such ethical situations. Furthermore, I realized how serving justice while making decisions really helps in the long run, and that opting to go for the ideal rather than they deserved is not always the best option, and could hurt a company in more than one
In recent years, companies are becoming socially responsible and now stakeholders almost expect a company to have CSR policies. Therefore, in twentieth century, corporate social responsibility (CSR) became an important development in public life (Barnett, ND).Corporate social responsibility is defined as “the ways in which an organisation exceeds the minimum obligations to stakeholders specified through regulation and corporate governance” (Johnson, Schools and Whittington, N.D cited in March, 2012). Stakeholders can be defined as “those individuals or groups who depend on the organisation to fulfil their own goals and on whom, in turn, the organisation depends” (Johnson, Schools and Whittington, N.D cited in March, 2012). There are many purposes for this essay, the first purpose is to descried the key principles of corporate social responsibility and explain their importance for stakeholders. Secondly, is to show how far this company follows those principles in order to be accountable to at least three of its stakeholders. In this essay, three stakeholders, environment, customers and employees will be evaluated respectively and the key principles of the stakeholders will be examined.
A person could seek employment at a corporation because of position or for more money. A person does not apply for a job at a business that has a bad reputation or ill working environment for the employees. A person seeks happiness and contentment in a place of employment that helps provide a tolerable or happy environment. Corporate culture can have an effect on how this working environment is molded and produced. The textbook definition or corporate culture is “shared and deeply held beliefs that determine how a company’s employees interact with each other. In essence, the personality of the organization.” (Goldberg, 2014). Not only is corporate culture is developed by beliefs among employees but most important on how the organization is presented.
Ethics are inclined to be a formal system or a set of rules that are adopted by an individual, group, or organization. Morals are a social component to values and tend to have a very distinctive acceptance. Laws establish clear boundaries of what is acceptable (Moral Leadership, 2015, p.1). Ethical leaders play an important role in communicating an organization's ethics, morals and laws (McCann and Holt, 2013, pg. 635). Consequently, employees will rely on their leaders for guidance when they face ethical questions or problems. As a result, leaders will need to consider how to communicate what they value and inspire employees in ways to accomplish rewards for fulfillment. Ethical leadership behaviors differ amongst various industry segments
Ethics is the responsibility of each individual person, but starts with the CEO and the Board of Directors, setting the right tone at the top and moves down through the organization, including setting the tone in the middle. A company’s culture and ethic standards start at the top, not from the bottom. Employees will almost always behave in the manner that they think management expects them, and it is foolish for management to pretend otherwise (Scudder). One of the CEO’s most important jobs is to create, foster, and communicate the culture of the organization. Wrongdoings or improper behavior rarely occurs in a void, leaders typically know when someone is compromising the company
Business organizations regularly run into demands from various stakeholders groups when conducting day-to-day business. These demands are generated from employees, customers, suppliers, community groups, governments, and shareholders. Thus, according to Goodpaster, any person or group of people that can shape or can be shaped by attainment of the objectives by an organization is considered a stakeholder. Most business organizations recognize and understand their responsibilities to these groups and endeavor to honor and fulfill them. These responsibilities are often communicated to the public by a statement of principles or beliefs. For many business organizations, corporate social responsibility (CSR) has become an essential and integral part of their business. Thus, this paper discusses the two CSR views: the classical view and the stakeholder view. Furthermore, I believe that the stakeholder view has brought ethical concerns to the forefront of businesses, and an argument shall be made that businesses would improve both socially and economically if CSR, guided by God’s love, was integrated into their strategic planning.
Business ethics are a set of moral rules that govern how a business operates, how people should be treated within an organization, and how business decisions are made. They are a crucial part of employment and in managing a sustainable business, mainly because of the serious consequences that can result from decisions made with a lack of regard to ethics. Even if you don’t believe that good ethics don’t contribute to profit levels, you should realize those poor ethics have a negative effect on your bottom line in the long-run. Every business in every industry has certain guidelines to which its employees must stick to, and regularly outline such aspects in employee handbooks.
Ethics and values are very important in guiding employees and management in an organisation. It encourages employees to be accountable and transparent and also in make ethical decisions. In an organisation that ethics are practiced there are less conflicts and there is consistency at all times even when an organisation undergoes difficult times. A code of ethics is established in an organisation to solve problems when the do arise and explains how employees should respond when faced with different situations. Values and ethics are important for employees to get along. Our values tell us what we think is important and that helps us in making right decisions. For example a person who values justice will not be coursing conflicts and will adhere to ...
Ethical behaviour is what all career people should aim to have. Not just the ethical attribute but exceptional behaviour with this regard.this is because in order to build a career, one must be governed by the rules of ethics to safeguard oneself and others. Ethics are essential in the workplace because a tough ethical code provides a non-threatening environment with high employee morale. The corporate social responsibility is important to everyone,therefore it should not be neglected by the employees and the organization. Ethics purely center on personal conduct. It involves personal choices that can make or break a person in the workplace or business. The major importance of having good conduct is to maintain a high level of respect not just for people but for the proffession. Most people who begin their working career have aspirations of excelling at their jobs and reaching the pinnacle of their profession while maintaining a sense of values; however employees often become blind with ambition and put aside their sense of ethics in order to obtain financial security and recognition for their efforts. There are many things that one can gain from having good behavioural ethics in the workplace. It will develop a discipline which will propel the work practices to a higher level and will help set a high standard. It will promote teamwork among the workersand will also buil...