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Principles of a Model Business Ethics Program:
Course, Curriculum, and Community
To outline a model business ethics
program, this report employs a framework based on three
interconnected dimensions: Course, Curriculum, and
Community. The framework starts with suggested principles
for the individual ethics foundational course, set within
the full business school curriculum, comprised of all
courses of various disciplines, and nested in the context of
the overall academic community.
It is important to consider not only
the effect of a single course, but also the combination of
courses and how ethics is integrated throughout to form a
curriculum. The stand-alone course is critical, but if
ethics is not integrated into other courses, then it is much
less effective. Additionally, it is essential to analyze the
culture of the school or of the department. Stakeholders
need to think in terms of the particular course within the
context of the entire curriculum and embedded within that
entire community or culture. All three components are
necessary and work together to support a model business
ethics program.
Course
An ethics course should be:
1.
Grounded in the leading thinking and practice about ethics
and moral philosophy from academia, business, and other
organizations;
2.
Connected deeply to all other disciplines of business,
including management, leadership, strategy, finance,
business law and organizational behavior, based on a belief
that business ethics is inherently interdisciplinary;
3.
Required as a foundational course placed early in the
curriculum, taught by ethics-trained faculty or a
multi-discipline faculty team including ethics-trained
faculty;
4.
Designed to promote highly-engaged student participation
through a variety of teaching tools and techniques such as
small class size, outside speakers, experiential components,
case studies, etc.;
5.
Aimed at preparing students for understanding their roles as
ethical leaders, managers, and followers.
Curriculum
As an integral part of the curriculum:
1.
Ethics should be a core and fundamental business discipline;
2.
Ethics content should be integrated into all other business
disciplines, and other business content should be integrated
into the ethics discipline;
3.
Ethics content should be equally weighted and valued with
other disciplines through early semester introduction,
required, graded content, the offering of ethics electives,
etc.
Community
The entire academic community (students, faculty,
administration, and business partners) should:
1.
Demonstrate commitment to ethical practices;
2.
Support ethics programs through an active research process
that produces leading-edge field research, practice aids,
published works, and teaching materials;
3.
Collaborate on issues such as recruiting, role models, and
relevant research.
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The Business Roundtable Institute for Corporate
Ethics (www.corporate-ethics.org)
is an independent entity established in
partnership with Business Roundtable—an
association of chief executive officers of
leading corporations with a combined workforce
of more than 10 million employees and $4.5
trillion in annual revenues—and leading
academics from America’s best business schools.
The Institute, which is housed at the University
of Virginia's Darden Graduate School of Business
Administration, brings together leaders from
business and academia to fulfill its mission to
renew and enhance the link between ethical
behavior and business practice through executive
education programs, practitioner-focused
research and outreach.
Thank you for your interest in the Business
Roundtable Institute for Corporate Ethics.
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