CHAPTER 1: Why Ethics Matter

Learning Objectives

After completing this chapter students should be able to:

• Describe the role of ethics in a business environment
• Explain what it means to be a professional of integrity
• Distinguish between ethical and legal responsibilities
• Describe three approaches for examining the ethical nature of a decision
• Differentiate between short-term and long-term perspectives
• Differentiate between stockholder and stakeholder
• Discuss the relationship among ethical behavior, goodwill, and profit
• Explain the concept of corporate social responsibility
• Analyze ethical norms and values as they relate to business standards
• Explain the doctrine of ethical relativism and why it is problematic
• Evaluate the claim that having a single ethical standard makes behaving consistently easier

CHAPTER 2: Ethics from Antiquity to the Present

Learning Objectives

After completing this chapter students should be able to:

• Identify the role of ethics in ancient Athens
• Explain how Aristotelian virtue ethics affected business practices
• Identify the key features of Confucian virtue ethics
• Explain how Confucian virtue ethics can be applied to contemporary business
• Compare the origins and goals of virtue ethics in the East and the West
• Describe how these systems each aimed to establish a social order for family and business
• Identify potential elements of a universally applied business ethic
• Identify the principle elements of Jeremy Bentham’s utilitarianism
• Distinguish John Stuart Mill’s modification of utilitarianism from Bentham’s original formulation of it
• Evaluate the role of utilitarianism in contemporary business
• Explain Immanuel Kant’s concept of duty and the categorical imperative
• Differentiate between utilitarianism and deontology
• Apply a model of Kantian business ethics
• Evaluate John Rawls’s answer to utilitarianism
• Analyze the problem of redistribution
• Apply justice theory in a business context

CHAPTER 3: Defining and Prioritizing Stakeholders

Learning Objectives

After completing this chapter students should be able to:

• Identify key types of business-stakeholder relationships
• Explain why laws do not dictate every ethical responsibility a company may owe key stakeholders
• Discuss why stakeholders’ welfare must be at the heart of ethical business decisions
• Explain why stakeholders’ claims vary in importance
• Categorize stakeholders to better understand their claims
• Identify the factors that affect stakeholder prioritization
• Explain why priorities will vary based upon the interest and power of the stakeholder
• Describe how to prioritize stakeholder claims, particularly when they conflict
• Define corporate social responsibility and the triple bottom line approach
• Compare the sincere application of CSR and its use as merely a public relations tool
• Explain why CSR ultimately benefits both companies and their stakeholders

CHAPTER 4: Three Special Stakeholders: Society, the Environment, and Government

Learning Objectives

After completing this chapter students should be able to:

• Explain how investors and owners benefit from doing business as a corporate entity
• Define the concept of shareholder primacy
• Discuss the conflict between shareholder primacy and corporate social responsibility
• Explain the concept of earth jurisprudence
• Evaluate the claim that sustainability benefits both business and the environment
• Identify and describe initiatives that attempt to regulate pollution or encourage businesses to adopt clean energy sources
• Identify three public health issues that might warrant government regulation
• Explain what is meant by “revolving door” in a political context
• Compare constitutional arguments for and against government regulation of industry

CHAPTER 5: The Impact of Culture and Time on Business Ethics

Learning Objectives

After completing this chapter students should be able to:

• Describe the processes of acculturation and enculturation
• Explain the interaction of business and culture from an ethical perspective
• Analyze how consumerism and the global marketplace might challenge the belief system of an organization
• Describe the ways ethical standards change over time
• Identify major shifts in technology and ethical thinking over the last five hundred years
• Explain the impact of government and self-imposed regulation on ethical standards and practices in the United States
• Describe the impact of geography on global relationships and business ethics
• Explain how religion informs ethical business practice around the world
• Explain the difference between relative and absolute ethical values
• Discuss the degree to which compliance is linked with organizational responsibility and personal values
• Identify the criteria for a system of normative business ethics
• Evaluate the humanistic business model

CHAPTER 6: What Employers Owe Employees

Learning Objectives

After completing this chapter students should be able to:

• Identify specific ethical duties managers owe employees
• Describe the provisions of the Occupational Safety and Health Act
• Identify Equal Employment Opportunity Commission protections, including those against sexual harassment at work
• Describe how employees’ expectations of work have changed
• Explain why compensation is a controversial issue in the United States
• Discuss statistics about the gender pay gap
• Identify possible ways to achieve equal pay for equal work
• Discuss the ethics of some innovative compensation methods
• Discuss trends in U.S. labor union membership
• Define codetermination
• Compare labor union membership in the United States with that in other nations
• Explain the relationship between labor productivity gains and the pay ratio in the United States
• Explain what constitutes a reasonable right to privacy on the job
• Identify management’s responsibilities when monitoring employee behavior at work

CHAPTER 7: What Employees Owe Employers

Learning Objectives

After completing this chapter students should be able to:

• Define employees’ responsibilities to the company for which they work
• Describe a non-compete agreement
• Explain how confidentiality applies to trade secrets, intellectual property, and customer data
• Describe how employees help build and sustain a brand
• Discuss how employees’ customer service can help or hurt a business
• Explain employees’ responsibility to treat their peers with respect
• Describe employees’ duty to follow company policy and the code of conduct
• Discuss types of workplace violence
• Describe an employee’s responsibilities to the employer in financial matters
• Define insider trading
• Discuss bribery and its legal and ethical consequences
• Outline the rules and laws that govern employees’ criticism of the employer
• Identify situations in which an employee becomes a whistleblower

CHAPTER 8: Recognizing and Respecting the Rights of All

Learning Objectives

After completing this chapter students should be able to:

• Explain the benefits of employee diversity in the workplace
• Discuss the challenges presented by workplace diversity
• Identify workplace accommodations often provided for persons with differing abilities
• Describe workplace accommodations made for religious reasons
• Explain how sexual identification and orientation are protected by law
• Discuss the ethical issues raised in the workplace by differences in sexual identification and orientation
• Explain why income inequality is a problem for the United States and the world
• Analyze the effects of income inequality on the middle class
• Describe possible solutions to the problem of income inequality
• Explain rising concerns about corporate treatment of animals
• Explain the concept of agribusiness ethics
• Describe the financial implications of animal ethics for business

CHAPTER 9: Professions under the Microscope

Learning Objectives

After completing this chapter students should be able to:

• Identify ethical challenges relating to entrepreneurial start-ups
• Describe positive and negative effects of growth in a start-up
• Discuss the role of the founder in instilling an ethical culture
• Discuss how social media has altered the advertising landscape
• Explain the influence of advertising on consumers
• Analyze the potential for subliminal advertising
• Discuss whether the underlying business model of the insurance industry is an ethical one
• Identify the reasons why the government offers certain kinds of insurance
• Discuss the ethical issues in insurers’ decisions whether to offer disaster insurance
• Explain the concept of redlining
• Identify ethical problems related to the availability and cost of health care in the United States and elsewhere
• Discuss recent developments in insuring or otherwise providing for health care in the United States

CHAPTER 10: Changing Work Environments and Future Trends

Learning Objectives

After completing this chapter students should be able to:

• Identify the benefits of permitting employees to work from home
• Explain the drawbacks of telecommuting for the business and for employees
• Discuss the ethical dilemmas related to telecommuting and some of the solutions
• Compare the workplaces of yesterday, today, and the future
• Describe the benefits and potential drawbacks of workplace campuses
• Identify ethical challenges in the development of workplace campuses
• Explain the benefits, drawbacks, and ethical issues of job sharing and flextime
• Describe the business models that have emerged in the new millennium
• Discuss the ethical challenges businesses face in the gig economy
• Discuss the application of robotics and the workplace changes it will bring
• Identify artificial intelligence applications in the workplace
• Explain the ethical challenges presented by the use of artificial intelligence