Ethical management - A look at the organized world, 2nd edition

The challenges facing the future of management are looming on the horizon of today’s cosmopolitan world, while organizational action continues to pose problems. What means do we have at our disposal to solve this problem, and what modern ideals do we advocate in our search for solutions: the rationalization of knowledge, or individual and social emancipation? Ethics, however, goes beyond instrumental reason and arguments based on efficiency; it broadens our view to include the human and collective perspectives of the organization.

Presenting ethics as a perspective on the organized world is a unique way to open our eyes to a plurality of organizations and a diversity of viewpoints. Each turns out to be a world of norms and principles to be discovered through a philosophical lens—thereby challenging the notion of the good and opening the door to criticism. Adopting a philosophical approach to ethics invites us to take time to reflect on the appropriateness of the organization’s standards of conduct. It also affirms that ethics is intrinsic to management through the standards being developed.

To understand how standards of action are developed, the decision-making process reveals the criteria for assessing their appropriateness, whether those criteria are consequences, intention, fairness, virtue, or discussion. Although some room for autonomy remains, various mechanisms embed ethics into the organization’s structure and management practices: statements of values, principles of corporate social responsibility, a commitment to sustainable development, governance, codes of ethics, and professional conduct. But it is impossible to assess the appropriateness of a standard of conduct without considering the direction of change it encourages, which raises questions about the meaning of work, moral development, and corporate culture.