Business Ethics
Business Ethics
With all the high-profile major corporate scandals of the past few years you might think that business ethics is more of an oxymoron than anything, but some companies and individuals are taking business ethics seriously and making an effort to conduct themselves in an ethical manner in a number of areas. Business ethics is a broad topic encompassing many facets of business life. Business ethics concerns corporate behavior in general. And business ethics can be further divided down to a company’s behavior toward its shareholders, its employees, its customers, its competitors, citizens in general, the government it deals with, intellectual property rights, and the environment.
It was once thought the business ethics meant that the company owed allegiance only to its shareholders and so was ethically bound to return shareholder value any way it could. So as long as it did that it was behaving ethically. But this narrow self-serving definition no longer suffices in this day and age. Business ethics now encompasses every facet of business life. And for business to behaving ethically, it must be mindful of its conduct in every area. Business ethics now demands that a business not only do what is right for the shareholders, but also for its customers and employees as well.
Business ethics requires that a company treats its customers ethically in its advertising, pricing and production. Business ethics now defines the company’s responsibility to advertise its product in a non deceptive way. Business ethics now outlines the company’s responsibility to price its product fairly and not to rip off the customer. And business ethics now governs the company’s manufacturing processes so that they produce their products in a way that does not do damage to the environment. And business ethics further demands that for a company to be considered ethical, it must be producing a product that is not directly harmful to its consumers either by its very nature, use or through the use of potentially dangerous materials in its manufacture.
Now that so many companies are multinational corporations, the area of business ethics is touching on a corporation’s conduct concerning its dealings with foreign governments. Bribery and kickbacks have been a regular business practice for so many companies for so long, but the hidden cost to countries of companies fostering corruption who had criminal behavior in their government officials is just beginning to be known. And business ethics is now concerning itself with this area.
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