Introduction
The article “Ethics Training and Businesspersons’ Perceptions of Organizational Ethics” by Sean Valentine and Gary Fleischman is an investigation into the influences of corporate culture, ethical codes of conduct and ethics training into the level of job satisfaction, performance and ethical practices that employees bring to the workplace (Valentine & Fleischman, 2004).
Through a combination of extensive academic research and the use of a questionnaire in order to evaluate the opinions of a select group of employees who are often faced with ethical decisions on a daily basis, the researchers were able to present the importance of ethics training as a means of encouraging and facilitating proper ethical practices within the workplace.
Furthermore, they indicated that ethics training allows a workforce to be more aware of the ethical codes of conduct that a company abides by and as a result enables them to be far more likely to conduct themselves in a manner that is in line with the highest standards of moral and ethical behavior (Valentine & Fleischman, 2004).
The study also happens to place a considerable emphasis on the influences of organizational culture and how even organizations with the best ethical codes in the world often all prey to instances of unethical conduct within its ranks.
In order resolve such issues Valentine and Fleischman recommend the use of ethical training sessions as a means of building up on the framework of actions initially established by the ethical codes of conduct emphasized by the company.
They state that ethical codes are not enough to dissuade unethical actions, it is often necessary to create an even greater emphasis on ethics in order for employees to feel the correlation between ethical action and the company culture that they are a part of.
Theoretical issues identified in the article
The main theoretical underpinnings of the study is the concept of ethical training and existing ethics codes being the best way in order to ensure ethical actions among the employees of a company.
Such a theory has been backed by various studies such as those by Craft (2010) which explain that by creating an environment where employees are constantly exposed to ethically progressive ideas, notions and behaviors, eventually they will be influenced in the same fashion (Craft, 2010).
This theory addresses the “social notion” behind working within an organization by creating the impression that since everyone within the company is following and advocating the use of ethical behaviors then as an employee of the company a person should also implement such aspects into the work that he/she does.
One problem with this way of thinking is that authors such as Brenkert (2010 ) emphasize that this particular way of thinking is far too naĂŻve in that there are other factors that influence the way in which an employee becomes ethical or not (Brenkert, 2010).
This can come in the form of job satisfaction, salary, career growth, belief in the mission statement of the organization as well as other such factors which influence the behaviors of an employee.
No matter how much ethical training a person receives or no matter how exacting a company’s code of conduct are, such factors can only be considered as secondary contributors to enabling a person to develop ethical ideas but in no way does it influence an individual into avoiding all unethical behaviors.
The theory presented by Valentine and Fleischman also happens to correlate the concepts of job satisfaction with ethics wherein through ethical training and learning that the company you work for has an ethical code of conduct this would in turn increase an individual’s overall level of job satisfaction.
The inherent problem with this type of theoretical basis is that that job satisfaction has very rarely been correlated with ethics, rather, it has been shown time and time again that having an employee become satisfied with their job often involves developing interest, creating role variability and ensuring that they are paid adequately.
While there have been some theorists who have stated that job satisfaction is often connected to the ethical structure behind the job itself, they are mostly in the minority and as such calls into question the validity of the theoretical basis of the article.
Analyze the article in the light of your learning
Based on what I have learned about business ethics I have to say that the authors of the article do have a valid point when it comes to ethical codes of conduct and ethical training being influential factors in helping employees become more ethical.
The fact is that ethical behaviors from employees are influenced by business culture and the corporate environment that they are exposed to. The more ethically oriented the business culture and corporate environment is, the more likely employees are to display ethical behaviors.
The reverse is also true wherein the more unethical the environment the greater the potential for employees to show unethical behaviors. Another aspect of the article that necessitates a considerable degree of examination is the assumption of the researchers that a well structured ethical code of conduction and ethical training will result in ethical actions by the company as a whole.
While it may be true that such assumptions have been backed up by a considerable degree of research that they presented, modern day examples of unethical practices by companies show an entirely different story altogether. High ranking employees of Wal-Mart and GE have been embroiled in the news as of late due to a series of considerably unethical actions which have captured the attention of the media.
In the case of Wal-Mart this involves a series of bribes to Mexican officials in order to expedite the expansion of the company in Mexico. The GE employees on the other hand were part of an apparent insider trading scheme. It is this and several other examples of companies that pride themselves on their code of ethics and their ethical training that makes the assumptions of Valentine and Fleischman increasingly questionable.
Such actions though can be regarded as merely being isolated to a small percentage of the employees within that company and is actually not endemic within their organizational structure.
Unfortunately, when examining the use of the bailout money given to such companies in 2009 in order to help facilitate further growth within the U.S. economy, these companies merely utilized the funds in order shift their manufacturing operations to other countries such as India and China.
While it is technically legal, it is both ethically and morally irreprehensible since it was the intent of the government that such funds be utilized in order to create more jobs within the local economy instead of facilitating actions that would hamper recovery efforts even more.
Thus from this particular perspective it can be seen that even if ethical codes of conduct and ethical training sessions are implemented to create ethical employees, this does not mean that the end result will create an ethical company. The problem with the article is that it relies too much on ethical codes of conduct being a sufficient structure to influence a business culture within a company.
From the perspective of Cuillla (2011), even the most ethical of employees with the best code of ethics and ethical training possible can fall prey to unethical actions within a business culture when it concerns either the performance of the company or the necessity of implementing measures connected to competitive survival (Cuillla, 2011),.
This was seen in the case of the outsourcing industry wherein many companies outsourced various aspects of their operations to other countries such as India and China.
On the surface such companies stated that they stuck to the strict environmental rules and regulations established by the EPA within the U.S., however, since such regulations do not apply to outsourced operations in other countries these companies can in effect flagrantly degrade the environment through their operations while still stating that they were not the ones directly responsible for the incidences, rather, it is all the fault of one of their suppliers.
This is just one of the numerous examples of corporate double standards that exist in organizations that supposedly have high ethical codes of standards and undergo ethical training sessions. Another problem I had with the article was that it stated that company leaders should place greater emphasis on employee job attitudes as one of the method of managing the issue of ethics within an organization.
Identify the gaps
When it comes to employee retention and performance, job satisfaction is the deciding factor behind such principles of corporate human resource development and as such should be examined from a multilevel perspective in order to ensure employees continue to perform adequately and stay longer with the company.
In the case of the article, it is shown that the researchers correlated job satisfaction with a greater understanding of the company’s ethical underpinning and being able to better relate to the ethical codes of the company.
The authors state that by realizing the company that they work for has distinct ethical standards, this in turn results in a far more likely result of employees acting in a moral and ethical fashion while at the same time having a greater degree of job satisfaction.
The inherent problem with such a concept is that researchers such as Cuillla (2011) explain that while there are many ways in which job satisfaction can be accomplished ranging from new orientation methods, mentoring, continuous job training developments and other such factors it is normally the case that ethical codes and ethical codes of conduct do not act as a means of creating greater degrees of job satisfaction among a company’s employees (Cuillla, 2011).
The main reason behind is due to the fact that job satisfaction is often linked to the amount of interest derived from doing a particular task. The greater the degree of interest the more likely it is that people will like their job. Evidence of this can be seen in the case of employees who dislike their careers despite having large salaries since they have lost all interests in doing their job.
Ethical considerations can be considered a secondary contributing factor to job satisfaction, in no way though can it be attributed as being one of the main reasons behind a person enjoying their job. It must also be noted that while the study was able to get the opinions of various employees via questionnaires, it neglected to sufficiently indicate how corporate culture also plays a distinctive factor in influencing ethical behavior.
While such a factor was mentioned, it was only done briefly and as such is indicative of a gap in the literature which is rather important as seen in the case of this evaluation which showed just how much corporate culture and business environments influence the ethical function of a company as a whole and not just through its individual employees.
Assess the conceptual differences and similarities when applied to the context
There is an old saying that states that “the left hand doesn’t know what the right hand is doing”, in the case of corporations this takes on a more significant meaning due to the proliferation of various departments, operational sites and standards of doing business in particular areas.
Not all departments actually know what other departments are doing and as such this leaves a great deal of ambiguity as to what sort of ethical practices particular departments are or are not engaging in.
As such, this presents the necessity of establishing a standard set of ethical practices and procedures across all departments due to the need to ensure that when represented by a particular department in a certain business venture their ethical practices do not reflect badly on the rest of the company, what must be understood is that when a particular operation, department or employee engages in a distinctly unethical practice this makes consumers think of the company as a whole as being unethical despite the action being isolated to that particular instance.
It is based on this particular example that there needs to be a certain code of ethics in order to ensure a generalized form of ethical accountability across all departments in order to prevent any action that might jeopardize the company’s image.
From a certain perspective though, it can be stated that ethical codes and ethics training does help to facilitate better ethical behavior, however, as Valentine (2009) explains while such actions help to ensure that individual employees think ethically this does not outright prevent unethical actions from the company itself (Valentine, 2009).
Valentine (2009) elaborates on this by stating that the best way of preventing the company from conducting unethical actions is to implement proper methods of ethical evaluation and overseeing the actions of the company itself.
At times this involves the creation of a separate department within the company whose main purpose is to evaluate the ethical actions of the company and propose suggestions which are in line with widely accepted ethical procedures and practices.
Summary
Overall, the article was able to present an insightful outlook over the correlation between improving employee ethics through ethical codes of conduct and ethical training.
It was severely lacking though in sufficient information regarding how corporations as a whole become unethical despite having considerable ethics training and ethical codes of conduct. The authors should have delved more into to this particular issue since it has become increasingly relevant today.
Reference List
Brenkert, G. G. (2010). The Limits and Prospects of Business Ethics. Business Ethics Quarterly, 20(4), 703-709. Retrieved from www.EBSCOhost.com
Craft, J. L. (2010). Making the case for ongoing and interactive organizational ethics training. Human Resource Development International, 13(5), 599-606. Retrieved from www.EBSCOhost.com
Cuillla, J. B. (2011). Is Business Ethics Getting Better? A Historical Perspective. Business Ethics Quarterly, 21(2), 335-343. Retrieved from www.EBSCOhost.com
Valentine, S., & Fleischman, G. (2004). Ethics training and businesspersons’ perceptions of organizational ethics. Journal of Business Ethics, 52, 381-390. Retrieved from www.EBSCOhost.com
Valentine, S. (2009). Ethics training, ethical context, and sales and marketing professionals’ satisfaction with supervisors and coworkers. Journal Of Personal Selling & Sales Management, 29(3), 227- 242. Retrieved from www.EBSCOhost.com