Assignment No.

2
Business Ethics and Corporate Governance
MBA Executive Semester IV
Jamia Millia Islamia

Submitted By Submitted To
Mohd Zuhaib Prof. Sunayana
18MBE031
Q2. Discuss how culture influences ethical decision -
making and how that creates problems for a global ethical
code of conduct?
Answer:

Ethics
Ethics is a code of behaviour that a society considers moral and
appropriate for guiding relationship with one another.
Ethics deals with things to be sought and things to be
avoided, with ways of life.
Ethics are standards of right and wrong, good and bad.
Ethics are concerned with what one ought to do to fulfil
one’s moral duty.
There are two aspects to ethics:
o Being able to determine what is right or wrong, good
or bad
o Commitment for doing what is right and good.

Business Ethics

It refers to a code of conduct that businesses are expected to follow

while doing business.
Business ethics compromises of values and principles and
helps in guiding the behaviour in the organizations.
Businesses should have a balance between the needs of the
stakeholders and their desire to make profits.
While maintaining these balances, many times businesses
require to do trade-offs. To combat such scenarios, rules
and principles are formed in the organization.
This ensures that businesses gain money without affecting
the individuals or society as a whole. The ethics involved in
the businesses reflect the philosophy of that organization.
 One of these policies determines the fundamentals of that
organization. As a result, businesses often have ethical
principles.

Culture

Culture is a set of common values, norms, beliefs, and ideas

shared by members of the same group.
Culture is often a social phenomenon. Because cultural items
obtained from individuals living in the same social
environment (Hofstede, 2010).
Culture is a collective programming of the society thought
system that distinguishes humans from other populations in
more general terms the same time period, is shared by a
group of people living in a particular geographic.
Ethical Decision-Making

Ethical decision making is a cognitive process that considers

various ethical principles, rules, and virtues or the maintenance of
relationships to guide or judge individual or group decisions or
intended actions.
So before reaching to a model an organisation needs to follow a
certain process which is described below
1. Take time to define the problem
Some initial analysis has to happen for leaders to truly
understand where they need to bring in ethical principles.
Leaders need to decide why an ethical decision needs to be
made and the outcomes that are desired for the decision.

2. Consult Resources and Seek Action

Leaders then need to work on developing a strategy using
the resources and people around them. Whether it be
qualified co-workers, HR professionals, or policies and
handbooks set long ago, leaders need to gain clarity from
other sources when creating a strategy to tackle the issue.

3. Think About The Lasting Effect

While identifying the problem and seeking viable
resources to help is the way to go, any advice for how to
handle an issue should be filtered through the lens of how
it will affect others. 

4. Consider Regulations in other industries

Regulations and standards that other companies have
 established can be a good starting point for developing
ethical strategies. 

5. Decide on a decision
After consulting others and doing a bit of extra research, it
is time for a final decision .

6. Implement and Evaluate

This is where talk meets action. It is easy for people to
research and create solutions to a problem, but when
dealing with morality and ethics, it can be challenging to
put it into action finally.

Influence of culture on ethical decision – making

Culture influences ethical decision making because each

culture is different. Since each culture is different, it is hard
to create a uniform standard for ethics across the world.
An example is bribing official of governments. In the United
States, this is illegal. However, in other countries, this is
considered a normal business practice. Thus, the banning of
bribing will not occur, as it still exists in the world today.
Cultures with their values affect us from birth onward and
are an important factor that determines how we will behave
in the future.
Due to different cultures in the world the habits and customs
that are established differ a lot, and generally there are also
different ways of thinking and prioritizing.
Ethics is supposed to be a general and uniform notion, but
even here there are some differences considering the variety
of cultures.
 Culture affects the behaviour of almost every company in the
country, since culture is used to establish certain standards
and principles, but there can be some exception.

Code of conduct

Code of Conduct is a set of organizational rules or standards

regarding organizational values, beliefs, and ethics, as well
as matters of legal compliance that govern the conduct of the
organization and its members. Organizational members are
responsible for adhering to the code of conduct and will be
held accountable for failure to do so. Most large businesses
will have a code of conduct, which are often developed in
response to legislation regulating business activities and
behaviour or some sort of ethical scandal.

Cultural influence creating a problem for a

global ethical code of conduct