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INTRODUCTION
Business ethics is a kind of applied ethics. It is the application of moral or ethical norms to business. The term ethics has its origin from the Greek word ethos, which means character or custom- the distinguishing character, sentiment, moral nature, or guiding beliefs of a person, group, or institution. Ethics is a set of principles or standards of human conduct that govern the behaviour of individuals or organization. Ethics can be defined as the discipline dealing with moral duties and obligation, and explanation what is good or not good for others and for us. Ethics is the study of moral decisions that are made by us in the course of performance of our duties. Ethics is the study of characteristics of morals and it also deals with the moral choices that are made in relationship with others. Business ethics comprises the principles and standards that guide behaviour in the conduct of business. Businesses must balance their desire to maximise profits against the needs of the stakeholders. Maintaining this balance often requires tradeoffs. To address these unique aspects of businesses, rules- articulated and implicit are developed to guide the businesses to earn profits without harming individuals or society as a whole. Ethics is concerned with truth and justice, concerning a variety of aspects like the expectations of society, fair competition, public relations, social responsibilities and corporate behaviour.
ETHICS PHILOSPHIES
The following are some of the ethical philosophies: DEONTOLOGICAL THEORY Deontological theory is an approach to ethics that focus on the rightness and wrongness of actions themselves as opposed to the rightness or wrongness of the circumstances of those actions. If a manger decides that it is duty to always be on time to meetings is running late for reasons not in his control, how is he supposed to drive to reach the meetings on time? Is he supposed to speed, breaking his duty to uphold the law or is he supposed to arrive at his meeting late, breaking his duty to be on time? TELEOLOGY Teleology is the philosophical study of design and purpose. ENLIGHTENED EGOISM This model takes into account harms, benefits and rights. Therefore, under this model an action is morally correct if it increases benefits for the individual in a way that does not intentionally hurt others, and if these benefits are believed to counterbalances any unintentional harm that ensue.
UTILITARINISM It is an idea that the moral worth of an action is solely determined by its contribution to overall utility, that is, its contribution to happiness or pleasure as summed among all persons. RELATIVISIM It is an idea that some elements or aspects of experience or culture are relative to other elements or aspects. VIRTUAL ETHICS THEORY It is a branch of moral philosophy that emphasizes character rather than rules or consequences as the key elements of ethical thinking. JUSTICE It is a concept of moral rightness in action or attitude. It is closely linked to fairness.
ETHICS IN PRODUCTION This area of business ethics deals with the duties of a company to ensure that products and production processes do not cause harm. Some of the more acute dilemmas in this area arise out of the fact that there is usually a degree of danger in any product or production process and it is difficult to define a degree of permissibility.
A code of ethics should reflect upper managers desire for compliance with the values, rules and policies that support an ethical climate. The developments of the code of ethics should involve the president, board of directors and chief executive offices who will be implementing the code. If the companies do not have a code of ethics, they must explain why they have not adopted one. A company may either file its code as an exhibit to the annual report post the code on the companys web site or eager to provide a copy of the code upon request and without the charge. A code of ethics outlines a set of fundamental principles. These principles can be used both as the basis of operational management. A code of ethics is based on a set of core principles or values and is not designated for convenience. Those subjects to the code are required to understand, internalize and apply in situations the code does not specifically address. Organizations except that the principles, once communicated and illustrated, will apply in every case and that failure to apply the principles can be a cause for disciplinary action.
Specific Professional requirements are: Ownership. Passion for winning. People development. Consumer focus. Teamwork Innovation. Integrity. Professional competitiveness. Respect existing laws. Professional review. Enhance quality of work. Deal with media tactfully. Be upright and avoid inducements. Observe corporate discipline. Good conduct. Accountable. Management of business risks. Protect companys properties.
CONCLUSION
Ethics is the first line of defence against corruption while law enforcement id remedial and reactive. Good corporate governance goes beyond rules and regulations that the government can put in place. It is also about ethics and the values which drive companies in the conduct of their business. It is therefore all about the trust that is established over time between companies and their different stakeholders. Good corporate governance practice cannot guarantee any corporate failure. But the absence of such governance standards will definitely lead to questionable practices and corporate failures which surface suddenly and massively. In making ethics work in an organization it is important that there is synergy between vision statements, mission statements, core values, general business principles and code of conduct confers a variety of benefits. An effective ethics programme requires continual reinforcement of strong values. Organizations are challenged with how to make its employees live and imbibe the
organization codes and values. To ensure the right ethical climate a right combination of spirit and structure is required.
BIBLOGRAPHY
1. Governance. 2. Principles, Policies and Practices. 3. 4. Concepts and Dimensions. 5. 6. 7. 8. P.V. Sharma and S. Rajani: Corporate Governance: Contemporary Issues and Chaellenges. John Caver: Board Leadership. Christine Mallin: The role of Institutional Investors in Corporate Governance. K.R. Sampath: Law of Corporate Governance: Principles and perspective. Inderjit Dube: Corporate Governance. Sanjiv Aggarwal: Corporate Governance: A.C. Fernando: Corporate Governance: ICSI and Taxmann Publication: Corporate