Target audience: Business students, managers and professionals alike.

Learning Outcomes:

1. Gain knowledge of ethical approaches to organisations;
2. Consider business advantages of ethical approaches;
3. Understand the relationships between organisational strategy and the ethical dimension.

Duration: 1 week (10 hours)

Module Chair: Dr Pascale Hardy, HES-SO, Switzerland

Contents

1 Introduction

 1.1 Spaces & Meetings

 1.2 Assignment

2 Module Activities

3 Assignment Submission & Peer Assessment

4 References

5 Acknowledgements

1 Introduction

This module considers what an "ethical approach" to organisations might look like, the business advantages of such an approach, and the relationships between organisational strategy and the ethical dimension.

1.1 Spaces & Meetings  

A. Forum for general communication:  Module 6

B. IRC Chats over Freenode on Channel: #openED (Dates to be announced at the forum and also at the timetable!)

C. Live sessions at UStream (Dates to be announced at the forum)

1.2 Assignment

Choose a study from Activity 5 (below) and reflect on what you would might have done differently from an ethical perspective, and why.

You will upload the Assignment to the Assignment Directory.

Assignments will be "peer assessed", so make sure that you present your results in a clear and logic way that is understandable for others! Criteria for assessing assignments is is given in the Assignment Submission & Peer Assessment section below.

Please note: This module will show as completed in your "Self-Print Certificate" only when you have submitted your Assignment.

2 Module Activities

This module is divided into 5 activities and an assignment over the duration of one week, taking in total 10 hours to complete. You will need to allow 2 hours to complete the assignment. You may also want to allow additional time for IRC chats or other live interactions, depending on how many there are.

What is an ethical approach?

Activity 1: Social capital and stakeholder relationships (90 minutes)

1. Read the Introduction and Section 1 of OpenLearn module B824_1 "Creating an ethical organisation". This introduces the concept of "social capital" and discusses the relationships between an organisation and its stakeholders. There is also an opportunity for you to rate your organisation in terms of its relationships.
2. How did your organisation fare in the questionnaire? How might it improve?
3. In your view, does the questionnaire adequately capture all that an organisation needs to be ethical? Share your views of the questionnaire in the Module 6 forum. Perhaps you can agree on how to improve the questionnaire.

Why pursue an ethical approach?

Activity 2: Two views of the "business sense" of an ethical approach (90 minutes)

1. Read Section 2 of OpenLearn module B824_1, which identifies two contrasting approaches to justifying an ethical approach.
2. Watch this video Business Ethics with Anita Roddick.
3. Try to summarise the different arguments for an ethical approach. Are there counter-arguments? Share your views in the Module 6 forum.

Activity 3: Case Study (2 hours)

1. Read the papers relating to the case study of Migros, one of the biggest retailer in Switzerland.
2. What are your thoughts on Migros' ethical approach and corporate social responsibility? Share your views in the Module 6 forum.



Ethical dilemmas for business

Activity 4: Accounts of ethical dilemmas (90 minutes)

1. Compile one or two examples of ethical dilemmas that you have encountered in recent years and post them into the Module 6 forum. It does not need to have been you or your organisation that faced these dilemmas. Feel free to anonymise the accounts. Would you have handled things any differently?
2. Read other people’s ethical dilemmas that have been posted in the forum and discuss them. Do you have any advice, based on your experience?

Studies of business ethics

A number of open access journals contain studies of business ethics. For example:

1. The Electronic Journal of Business Ethics and Organizational Studies
2. Journal of Academic and Business Ethics
3. The Journal of Business Systems, Governance and Ethics
4. Philosophy for Business
5. Rationality, Markets and Morals

Activity 5: Discussing business ethics (90 minutes)

1. Browse these journals, and similar journals to which you have access, and identify two or three accounts of business ethics studies that you think might be relevant to your situation or interests, or to the accounts of ethical dilemmas in Activity 4.
2. In the Module 6 forum, share briefly what each study was about, what you have learned from it and any criticisms you would like to make.
3. Read others’ descriptions of studies. Vote for the study that you think raises the most serious ethical questions.
4. For the study that gets the most votes, discuss in the forum what alternative approach might have been more ethical.

Congratulations! You have now finished this week. Please complete the learning reflection form for this week.

3 Assignment Submission and Peer Assessment

1. Write your Assignment, as explained in the Assignment section above.

Assignments will be "peer assessed", so make sure that you present your results in a clear and logic way that is understandable for others!

2. Upload your Assignment to the Assignment Directory.

Please note: This module will show as completed in your "Self-Print Certificate" only when you have submitted your Assignment.

3. Assess others' assignments by giving marks for each of the parts of the task (below).

For each part of the task, high marks should be awarded to answers that are accurate, comprehensive, convincing, insightful and scholarly.

Being "scholarly" means using logical arguments; avoiding non sequiturs; substantiating claims; and using accurate spelling, grammar and referencing.

Furthermore, each part of the task also has a specific success criterion for achieving the highest marks:

4. References

1. Eberle A. (2001) Corporate Sustainability in the Case of Migros, lecture at the Oikos, virtual campus
2. Hamprecht J. and Corsten D. (2006) Supply Chain Strategy and Sustainability: The Migros Palm Oil Case, oikos Sustainability Case Writing Competition
3. Migros Sustainability Report 2007
4. Schweizer A. K. (2005) Why have Migros not gone public yet, Research Paper Zaeslin Scholarship, October 2005

5. Acknowledgements

The module links extensively to The Open University's OpenLearn module B824_1 "Creating an ethical organisation", which has been made available within the Creative Commons framework under the CC Attribution – Non-commercial licence. These materials are available under the same licence.

The first draft of this module was created in July 2010 by James Aczel, following an outline created by Pascale Hardy. Additional activities and the case study were added by Pascale Hardy in September 2010.