Managers, examples for ethical behaviour?

According to a study, many leaders believe that if employees know the ethical goals, they will practice them in their daily activities. But it seems that this is not enough. Employees forget the ethical goals, which leads to huge scandals.

If people didn’t learn about ethics from their parents, it is the task of the executives to learn it. Although the company has a vision statement, we find that employees don’t apply to it. Employees and executives never had an ethical discussion at work that dealt with day-to-day problems.  The biggest problem seems that employees see unethical behaviour of their own bosses. For example: while a good client had been overbilled, the manager suggested not to tell it.

How can managers solve this problem? First they have to give good ethical advices. They have to make clear that profit is not the most important purpose, on the contrary ethical goals of the company are crucial.  

Sources:  

http://edition.cnn.com/2010/BUSINESS/10/22/opinion.samuelson.ethics/index.html

http://www.google.be/imgres?imgurl=http://jeremylatham.com/images/toastmasters-meeting-chair.jpg&imgrefurl=http://siglaptoastmasters.wordpress.com/2008/04/12/where-to-look-for-speech-topics/&usg=__KSnV6Dt6U2f_samzxWD318bX1UI=&h=299&w=450&sz=25&hl=nl&start=0&zoom=1&tbnid=_pCWDFvqQBByZM:&tbnh=142&tbnw=198&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dethical%2Bstarts%2Bat%2Bthe%2Btop%26um%3D1%26hl%3Dnl%26sa%3DN%26biw%3D1680%26bih%3D889%26tbs%3Disch:1&um=1&itbs=1&iact=hc&vpx=1202&vpy=564&dur=408&hovh=182&hovw=275&tx=115&ty=105&ei=_ITpTNzLDsTKjAfCjMWFAw&oei=_ITpTNzLDsTKjAfCjMWFAw&esq=1&page=1&ndsp=41&ved=1t:429,r:31,s:0

Cornette Guillaume

What is ethical investing?

Is investment all about capitalism run wild? Or can the words ethical and investment be used together in one sentence?[1]

First of all, I’d like to state that this article is a way to build further on a previous post (by Jonas Van Liedekerke, Ed.).  I think that in the future more and more investors will think twice or even more about a plan or project to invest their money into. Projects that could harm the environment, cause pollution, exploit people and/or children’s rights will no longer have a surviving chance in the market field.

"Most people aren't interested in what happens to their money once they put in their bank or pension," he says. "What we need to do is to show them that ethical finance is all about making money and at the same time doing some social and environmental good."[2]

This statement shows that people don’t care about what bankers do with their money. They are concerned about the protection and interest rates the banks are willing to offer, but that’s it. In present times, bankers and relations managers should make their clients aware about the projects that are invested with their money. That will improve the relation and thrust between the client and the bank.

"It is important to remember that one person's ethics are not necessarily the same as another's," says the ASX. "A decision to invest in socially responsible investment funds will depend on your own values as well as your overall portfolio and financial planning goals."[3]

In my opinion, investors will have to keep this statement in the back of their heads. No one is the same. Every person’s character is based on different values and can’t easily be predicted. I think the best solution for this problem is to perform surveys to get to know the different views of the consumers.

To conclude, I believe that ethical investments are possible in the nearby future. The results of green energy being produced by wind mill parks, solar energy plants or bio mass are a way to prove this.

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[1] 

[2] 

[3] 

Mathias Aper

Even a bank can be ethical

Concerning ethical behavior and financial performance, the following topics: fair trade, financial fraud, corporate social responsibilities, ethical investments and ethical consumerism have been explained, illustrated and discussed. Another topic within this movement towards social responsibility is ethical banking.

An ethical bank takes interest in the welfare of the community, serves the disadvantaged, and supports progress in the sustainability of the society. It also tries to avoid doing business with corporate entities who act unethically and immoral. Furthermore, there is not only a commitment to internal ethics, but also to the wider external ethics. This is what separates ethical banks from conventional banks. External ethics means that the bank is concerned with the environmental and social impact of its business practices such as the loans they provide or who they invest in, whereas internal ethics has to do with codes of conduct within the company such as customer satisfaction, wages, the well-being of employees,…Some of the wide range of ethical banks are Triodos Bank ( The Netherlands ), Reliance Bank ( United kingdom ) and Cultura bank ( USA ).

The most effective way for an ethical bank to fulfill its social goals is to adopt the ‘carrot-and-stick’ approach. This approach is based on interest differentiation: companies who cause more environmental and social damage have to pay higher interest rates in order to borrow capital than ethical responsible corporations. Another way is to develop ethical investment funds. The social banks can also encourage its borrowers to reduce emissions and save energy.

As banks play a major role in our economy, I believe ethical banking is the most effective way to implement financial ethics in our society, only on condition that practically all banks follow the socially accepted rules. This could be achieved by more governmental regulation.

Kenn Crombé

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ethical_banking

Jeucken, M. "Banking and sustainability—slow Starters are Gaining Pace." Ethical Corporation Magazine 11 (2002): 44–48.

http://www.ethicalinvestment.co.uk/Ethical_banking.htm

Sustainability, let’s get some reputation

Not every company acts sustainable, but companies do realize that being sustainable can improve their reputation. But what does sustainability means? In general, sustainability tries to solve the social, economic and environmental issues as good as possible. But each company has a different activity with different views. Therefore, it could be that only one particular aspect of sustainability is important for businesses.

Improving reputation and trust are the main reasons why companies would act sustainable. Many companies have good intentions about being sustainable, but never act sustainable. This is a big problem, and also a reason why sustainability should be bound to every business strategy. Also, a lot of companies don’t mention the negative externalities of their sustainable initiatives. Some products aren’t recyclable, which could be very negative for the environment and the health of other people. That’s why companies should meet the cradle to cradle standard and make most of their products recyclable.

My opinion is that companies only deserve a good reputation if they really act sustainable. The only way to know this, is to check and control them. Sustainability and accountability are two words that suit each other. A tip for those businesses with sustainable intentions: less talking, more action.

Source: Business Ethics

Van Liedekerke Jonas

Ethical consumerism, I have my doubts …

Comment on Guillaume Cornette’s opinion:

I disagree when Guillaume says that if Nike pays more respect to the human rights and produces ethically, people would be willing to pay a little bit more for Nike’s products.
First of all, Nike has made a pretty bad name during the past few years. And the well-known rule that negative information concerning trade practices has a greater impact on consumers than positive information, makes it even more difficult for Nike. Making the public realize Nike has developed itself into a more ethical brand, takes many years.
In many surveys of consumers' attitude, it is mostly proven that people claim they would reward companies for their positive ethical actions, but I think that in reality less people would in fact do so. Personally, I think that surveys don’t reflect actual behavior correctly.
Furthermore, in this case the media plays a major role. If the media had not criticized Nike for its unacceptable behavior, Nike would not have been facing so many social implications of business ethics and less consumers would have chosen to shop more ethically.   
In addition you could ask yourself how many people are able to pay a bit more. 
Finally, we must not forget the individual differences between consumers.

How many people really search for an ethical-proven symbol at the back of a product?
Isn't it mainly the price that makes people choose what they shall buy?
In a nutshell, I figure that the degree a company’s ethical commitment does not have a direct positive impact on consumers’ perception.

This does not mean I believe Nike should not pay respect to human rights and act ethically. On the contrary, I think child labour and other corporate discriminations must be punished severely. There should be more laws to prevent unethical conditions and more international commitment is necessary.

Kenn Crombé

Child labour in India

Child labour does not only happen in India, but it is a human rights issue that affects many places in the world. In India, many children under the age of fourteen are employed in carpet making factories, glass blowing units and making fireworks with their bare little hands.

Seema, who is only nine years old, works in the fields of a cotton seed farm. Every day, she has to get up early to get to work. To make a decent profit, the farmers attract cheap labourers. That means they have to employ kids like Seema.  Every year, more than 400 thousand labourers under age are being forced to work in cotton seed farms across India. They need to provide a small income for their starving families that live on the edge of absolute poverty.

In Northern India, situations like this are common. The exploitation of little children for labor is generally accepted to make poverty easier to be endured. Carpet weaving industries pay very low wages to child labourers and force them to work in bad conditions.

 

These children are held back from getting proper education and will later on suffer the same conditions their parents are currently living in. It ends up in a vicious circle of everlasting poverty. As a reaction on Guillaume’s (Cornette, Ed.) article on child labour, I would like to state that organizations that ban child labour already have a label that represents their ethical code of conduct. I think this is the only solution to make a distinction between the companies that strive for corporate governance and the ones that violate the ethical way of entrepreneurial activity.

 

List of sources:

http://www.merinews.com/article/child-labour-in-india/135987.shtml

http://www.childlabor.in/index.htm 

Mathias Aper 

 

Child labour

First of all I will react on the previous blog. Like Jonas said, Starbucks has changed the lives of many farmers. But  there are still some factories, which employ children and pay low wages.

Perhaps you wear a jeans, without knowing it was made by a seven-year old child from China, where children work 12 hours a day. Up until 1820, child labor was very common. Enterprises would do anything to reduce costs.

Before the industrial revolution child labor was not a big problem. But since 1700, children were forced to work in mines, factories, etc. In 1788, more than 60 % of workers were children, because there

were no laws. Since 1830, the government of the U.S. made laws to reduce child labor. Although there were laws, the laws were ignored. Eventually the National Child Labor Committee was founded, which inspected companies. More and more companies have drawn their own code.

I think that laws help to prevent child labor, but in many countries companies violate these laws. Therefore I suggest to give the companies, which pay respect to human rights, a label.  So everyone, who buys a product, can see if their product is produced ethically.

http://www.buzzle.com/articles/history-of-child-labor.html

Cornette Guillaume