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Business ethics is an area growing in importance for business managers. Research in the USA suggests that three‐quarters of major corporations have specific codes of ethics, and in the UK some 40 per cent (and increasing) of major organisations have codes of ethics. This article explains a survey on corporate ethics undertaken in the UK and points to some reasons why firms choose to have codes of ethics, and why some firms do not. It concludes by suggesting that further research is needed, especially on the perceived benefits of a corporate code of ethics to organisations.

Creating and maintaining a consistent ethics program is a challenge for multinational organizations and establishing a network of ethics ambassadors is one way to help meet this challenge. This paper aims to summarize the role of HR in encouraging an ethical culture; looks at how to recruit ambassadors and establish a network; and examines some of the challenges.

The report upon which this paper is based draws on the experience of one of the authors as an ethics practitioner in a large multinational company, and an Institute of Business Ethics (IBE) survey of large companies taken in 2010, compiled from 12 responses from companies across different sectors, of which six are headquartered in the UK, four are headquartered in continental Europe, one in the USA and one unknown.

An ethics ambassador network is a cost‐effective way of ensuring that ethical values are embedded throughout an organization. An effective network can help mitigate integrity risks and encourage a culture that is supportive of high ethical standards and legal requirements.

This paper provides HR practitioners within multinational organizations with an insight into how they can facilitate the use of ethics ambassadors. A more in‐depth examination of the subject is published in the IBE's good practice guide, Ethics Ambassadors, available from www.ibe.org.uk

Considering the highly publicised ethical crisis in public and private administration recently, the flurry of management‐oriented articles on ethics is an encouraging sign. But in their rush to recommend solutions, management theorists have gone off in many different directions. For example, while using the term business ethics, Owens has called for written codes of ethics enforced by appropriate sanctions. Boling, meanwhile, preferring the term management ethics, has suggested democratically developed codes of ethics to reduce emphasis on policing. Finally, Payne has deplored the lack of substantive behavioural research in the area he labels organisation ethics. This somewhat confusing array of terminology aside for a moment, an important remedial option has been ignored or overlook‐ed in these and related treatments. Namely, in the face of encouraging testimonial evidence that business ethics instruction works, the business management classroom affords an excellent opportunity to begin redressing the ethics crisis. Moreover, formal business ethics instruction can help reestablish the administrative importance of such ethically‐grounded values as idealism, compassion, and generosity that researchers have found to be seriously atrophied among business school seniors.

Research has so far not approached the contents of corporate code of ethics from a strategic classification point of view. Therefore, the objective of this paper is to introduce and describe a framework of classification and empirical illustration to provide insights into the strategic approaches of corporate code of ethics content within and across contextual business environments.

The paper summarizes the content analysis of code prescription and the intensity of codification in the contents of 78 corporate codes of ethics in Australia.

The paper finds that, generally, the studied corporate codes of ethics in Australia are of standardized and replicated strategic approaches. In particular, customized and individualized strategic approaches are far from penetrating the ethos of corporate codes of ethics content.

The research is limited to Australian codes of ethics. Suggestions for further research are provided in terms of the search for best practice of customized and individualized corporate codes of ethics content across countries.

The framework contributes to an identification of four strategic approaches of corporate codes of ethics content, namely standardized, replicated, individualized and customized.

The principal contribution of this paper is a generic framework to identify strategic approaches of corporate codes of ethics content. The framework is derived from two generic dimensions: the context of application and the application of content. The timing of application is also a crucial generic dimension to the success or failure of codes of ethics content. Empirical illustrations based upon corporate codes of ethics in Australia's top companies underpin the topic explored.

Why should PR professionals bind themselves to a code of ethics when even membership of a professional industry association is not mandatory? Is it not easier to be ethics‐free? The Public Relations Institute of New Zealand (PRINZ) is one of a number of public relations associations around the world that has recently reviewed its code of ethics. The new codes now focus on education first – to encourage understanding and minimise breaches – and discipline second. In a world rocked by corporate scandal, business leaders are rediscovering ethics and even British hip hop musicians are considering drafting an ethics code. The Spingate scandal showed that the ethics of all PR practitioners, be they members of professional PR institutes or not, are subject to public scrutiny and their actions and words may damage their own and the industry’s reputation. PR practitioners are seeking guidance on ethics, to have the confidence they are doing what is generally accepted to be right. Conformance with agreed and widely understood codes of ethics will improve PR practice and the industry’s reputation.

This study aims to investigate how sustainability and ethics are being addressed both by the literature and companies. Furthermore, it seeks to identify the specific strategies that these companies use to foster ethical behaviour and promote sustainability in their business operations.

The study entails a bibliometric analysis and a set of case studies from a sample of companies working in different industry sectors. Based on these tools, it analyses whether – and how – enterprises are placing an emphasis on sustainability and ethics as part of their businesses. In addition, the selected companies' unethical practices or socially irresponsible corporate activities were investigated and presented.

The findings suggest that using an ethics perspective can be a valuable tool in improving the accuracy and correctness of business decision-making. In addition, the paper has identified the fact that sustainability standards can be used to improve customer satisfaction as many important issues are addressed. Finally, the paper highlights the importance of ethical considerations when designing and implementing sustainability standards at enterprises and the need for regulatory guidance in this regard.

The paper addresses the need for studies on how sustainability and ethics are being discussed by both the literature and companies. The paper presents some elements that can be used as possible corporate indicators for a wider implementation of sustainability and ethics objectives in enterprises.

To build public trust in the accounting profession, previous research studies have stressed the need for ethics education. This present research aims to investigate the effects of teaching ethics using the ethics education toolkit (EET) developed by the International Accounting Education Standards Board on accounting students’ moral judgment.

An experimental design was used to determine the effects of teaching ethics using the EET on moral judgment. Data were obtained using the multidimensional ethics scale questionnaire and analysed with multiple linear regression. Factor analysis was performed to obtain the four moral philosophies defined in the literature.

The results confirm that use of the EET improves the moral judgment of accounting students. The influence of utilitarianism and relativism on moral judgment was reduced, while the students’ ability to recognise violating an unwritten contract as an unethical act was improved. Contrary to expectations, the influence of justice on moral judgment decreased.

The study may benefit academics by showing positive outcomes of EET use. The EET is a well-developed teaching tool, also suitable for educators insufficiently qualified to develop their own ethics courses or facing time constraints.

The EET was developed to support implementation of ethics education in programmes for professional accountants. By investigating the applicability and effects of the tool in higher education, this study aims to develop moral judgment in accounting students before they enter the accounting profession.

This research aims to study budgetary slack from a behavioural perspective, especially examining the effect of gender and code of ethics on budgetary slack ethical judgment.

This study adopts the experimental method of 2 × 3 between-subjects mixed factorial design with 102 participants to test the hypotheses. The participants are undergraduate and postgraduate accounting students at a major university in Indonesia.

The results show that gender affects budgetary slack ethical judgment, in which women judge budgetary slack as more unethical than men. Additionally, the results indicate that individuals consider budgetary slack more unethical when a code of ethics is present than when it is absent.

This study contributes to the management accounting literature and behavioural research by understanding budgetary slack from an ethical perspective. Additionally, this study contributes to ethics literature by identifying the effect of gender and code of ethics on budgetary slack righteous judgment.

Working with organizations is central to organizational ethnography. However, while research ethics relating to individual participants is widely discussed, research ethics relating to the organizations has been neglected. The purpose of this article is to address this shortcoming and introduce the concept and domain of “meso-ethics” in research ethics. Meso-ethics pertains to organizations as research participants and thus allows for the explicit inclusion of organizations in ethical considerations and practice. Meso-ethics complements the known domains of micro-ethics and macro-ethics in research ethics.

The concept of meso-ethics takes point of departure in the micro-ethical principles of “respect, and avoiding harm” and adjusts these to apply to organizations. The organizations are first defined as a distinct type of research participants, which differs from individual participants. The organizations are formally organized units that possess resources to assert power and stakeholders with a vested interest in the research. Second, the relationship between researchers and organizations is related to issues of power, allowing for a view of the power relations as flexible and relational. Moreover, this includes a potential vulnerability to harm on both sides.

The new concept and domain meso-ethics allows for explicit reflections and practice of research ethics in relations to organizations, a central participant in organizational ethnography. There is a discussion that meso-ethics should be combined with micro-ethics and macro-ethics in future practice to allow for comprehensive reflections and practice of research ethics.

The article contributes a new concept and domain of research ethics, meso-ethics, in organizational ethnography and related research to explore and practice research ethics in relation to organizations participating in our research. Meso-ethics complements the known domains of micro-ethics and macro-ethics in research ethics.

Environmental degradation in emerging economies has induced stakeholder pressures on diverse firms to ensure sustainable business performance. Consequently, firms are adopting environmentally ethical cultures and reinforcing green creativity to satisfy stakeholders' environmental needs while attaining green competitive advantage, sustainable production and higher financial performance. The purpose of this study is to investigate whether corporate environmental ethics and green creativity serve as antecedents to higher competitiveness, sustainable production and financial performance, and also examine if green competitive advantage and sustainable production mediate the relationships between corporate environmental ethics, green creativity and financial performance in the context of an emerging economy.

This study using a survey approach examined data from 290 manufacturing small and medium-sized enterprises. Data were analyzed and interpreted using SmartPLS 3.0 software, a variance-based structural equation modelling technique. This modelling technique was adopted due to its suitability for predictive research models.

The findings show that corporate environmental ethics and green creativity are critical antecedents to green competitive advantage, sustainable production and financial performance. The results connote that while corporate environmental ethics and green creativity directly and robustly influence green competitive advantage, sustainable production and financial performance, their effect on financial performance is strengthened via the indirect effects of green competitive advantage and sustainable production. Contrasting past findings, corporate environmental ethics negatively related to financial performance in this study context. The findings indicate that the integration of environmental ethics and green creativity can be a unique strategy for mitigating environmental negative risks while improving green competitive advantage, sustainable production and financial performance.

The study is among the few that draws insights from organizational ethics and the natural resource-based view (NRBV) to examine the interactions between corporate environmental ethics, green creativity, green competitive advantage, sustainable production and financial performance. Drawing insights from the findings, the study provides suggestions for managers, academicians, policymakers and governments as well as highlights implications and directions for future research.