More does not always mean better : do more comprehensive ethics management programmes result in better outcomes?

Abstract

Much research has gone into establishing the nature of ethics initiatives adopted by organisations in an attempt to enhance ethical behaviour. Less attention, however, has been given to the actual efficacy and impact of such initiatives. We address this gap directly, utilising cluster analysis to investigate the African Journal of Business and Economic Research (AJBER) • Indexed at: EBSCO, ProQuest, J-Gate and Sabinet • Accredited by IBSS Vol. 12, (Issues 2 & 3), Aug/Dec 2017 pp 149-176 Open Rubric More Does Not Always Mean Better … 150 combined effects of various ethics initiatives on levels of observed unethical behaviour and the propensity to report such behaviour. Significant differences were found to exist between clusters with respect to level and type of observed unethical conduct, and whether or not this behaviour was reported. Contrary to expectations, the findings reveal that the strength of an organisation"s ethics management programme does not ensure lower rates of observed unethical behaviour. It is argued that the quality, rather than the quantity, of ethics initiatives determines the overall impact of ethics management programmes. Particular emphasis is placed on highlighting the role of ethics training, over and above other initiatives such as ethical codes, ethics support and rewarding ethical behaviour.

How to effectively communicate your code of ethics: An empirical study using a cluster randomized control trial experiment

“…First, and from a methodological point of view, we show how to apply the RCT methodology to better analyze the impact of an ethics program on employees' understanding of a code of ethics. Although many papers have studied the effect of ethics programs on different outcomes (for example, Hauser, 2018; Ho, 2013; Kaptein, 2015; Kirsten et al, 2017; Valentine et al, 2018; Warren et al, 2014), to our knowledge, this is the first paper to apply the RCT methodology to investigate this impact.…”

“…All other countries have just one study each. A closer look reveals that only four papers examine the circumstances in developing countries, namely, Chile (Majluf & Navarrete, 2011), China (Lin et al, 2018), India (Verma et al, 2016), and South Africa (Kirsten et al, 2017). These papers exemplify our interest in studying a developing country as one of the contributions of this research.…”

“…Other papers analyze different ethics programs, such as ethical training or hotlines, confirming their impact on whistleblowing (Barnett et al, 1993); ethical or unethical behavior (Delaney & Sockell, 1992; Kaptein, 2015; Warren et al, 2014); bribery (Goel et al, 2015); corruption (Hauser, 2018); perceptions of unethical behavior (Kirsten et al, 2017); ethical decision making (Sims & Keon, 1999); perceptions of ethics code effectiveness (Singh, 2011); and several different outcomes of value consistency and the presence of ethical conflicts (Majluf & Navarrete, 2011).…”

Stepping down rather than up: the ethical option for business in our troubling times

“…These reveal mixed results (with a worrying trend in findings that those who enrol on business courses themselves start from a lower base of 'moral orientation' than humanities and science students). The relatively small amount of research that has been undertaken with actual working people (Clarke, 2011;Kirsten and Plessis, 2017) similarly reveals mixed results. It is important to note that most of these studies include self-report measures, thus offering questionable indications of what people actually do in the field.…”

The dark side of leadership: How ineffective training and poor ethics education trigger unethical behavior?

“…Moreover, previous investigations have proved that organizations with higher ethical commitment engage in less earnings management, have better organizational performance and a higher market valuation, and achieve higher corporate financial performance ( Ghazali, 2015 ). On the other hand, environments infiltrated with unethical behaviors have significant detrimental effects on the organization ( Kirsten et al, 2017 ). Unethical leadership behaviors have a deleterious effect on employees and the entire organization ( Brown et al, 2005 ; Erickson et al, 2007 ; O’Keefe et al, 2020 ).…”