An ethics “culture” needs to permeate organizations! To help create an ethics culture, Citicorp developed a business ethics board game that is played by forty thousand employees in forty-five countries. Called :The Word Ethic,: this game asks players business ethics questions, such as how do you deal with a customer who offers you football tickets in exchange for a new, backdated IRA? Diana Robertson at the Wharton School of business believes the game is effective because it is interactive. Many organizations, such as Prime Computer and Kmart, have developed a code-of conduct manual outlining ethical expectations and giving examples of situations that commonly arise in their businesses. Harris Corporation’s managers and employees are warned that failing to report an ethics violation by others could bring discharge.
One reason strategists’ salaries are high compared to those of other individuals in an organization is that strategists must take the moral risks of the firm. Strategists are responsible for developing, communicating and enforcing the code of business ethics for their organizations. Although primary responsibility for ensuring ethical behavior rests with a firm’s strategists, and integral part of the responsibility of all managers is to provide ethics leadership by constant example and demonstration. Managers hold positions that enable them to influence and educate many people. This makes managers responsible for developing and implementing ethical decision making. Gellerman and Drucker respectively, offer some good advice for managers:
All managers risk giving to much because of what their companies demand from them. But the same superiors, who keep pressing you to do more, or to do it better, or faster, or less exp