Kristina Buenrostro
Ethics and Law in Business and Society
Section 24
October 16, 2014
Hartman, E. (2006). Can We Teach Character? An Aristotelian Answer. Academy of Management Learning & Education, 5(1), 68-81
Introduction
My review of this article intends to determine whether the author proved if character can be thought or not. The article’s title which is upon assessment is “Can We Teach Character? An Aristotelian Answer” by Edwin M. Hartman from Rutgers University. In this article, Hartman narrates the process needed to determine if character can be taught to individuals. He defines ethics and values; utilizes Aristotle’s teachings and ideas to attest his point; and ties it in with business ethics. The article’s purpose is to establish how people’s characters form and decipher whether people’s moral fiber can be manipulated once it has been instituted. I have evaluated this article to have proven its point efficiently since it provides ample evidence and constantly includes Aristotle’s position on the issue. It was easy to comprehend and was also integrated with scholarly examples.
Background Information
The article comes from the research journal Academy of Management Learning and Education. Throughout the article, Edwin M. Hartman uses the Enron fiasco as evidence of individuals with bad character and immoral values. For this article to be included in this journal, it would have pertain to business and perhaps specifically to management; the piece indeed does
• Aristotle then says in his descriptions, “Thirdly, character must be true to life: for this is a distinct thing from goodness and propriety, as here described.”
Many students come to school without a solid moral and ethical foundation because it has not been a priority at home. The lack thereof must not be used as an excuse. Educators must assume the responsibility to be effective caregivers, moral models, and ethical mentors. Successful character education is an integral part of a school’s culture, most effective when the virtues are integrated into the academic curriculum (Dean, 2014).
Hartman, E. (2006). Can We Teach Character? An Aristotelian Answer. Academy of Management Learning & Education, 5(2006), 68-81.
Mentioning about business classes, students may think about finance, marketing, accounting, management and so on. However, ethics class is designed for all business students to understand about ethics and how to do moral business. The article Can We Teach Character? An Aristotelian Answer by Edwin M. Hartman explains the principle of ethics and how the schools can teach their business students good characters. The author emphasizes on the Aristotle’s principles of well-being and ethics and how to apply these principles to real life.
Luke, an ABC employee, is currently working on a land development project consisting of building an adult entertainment store in a neighborhood where Luke’s brother, Owen, lives. Luke knows that Owen has been considering selling his home but that he is putting it off expecting the real estate market to improve in a few years, yet Luke knows that the project will cause the opposite effect.
On the other hand, many argue that character should be taught in school in addition to academics, as it will result
Peter Crist is almost always correct. The reality is that if someone lies or covers stuff up, most of the time they will be found out eventually be it in two days or in 20 years. However, the reality is that some people do lie and cover stuff up in professional and personal situations and are never exposed. Sometimes this is because they're in a situation where dishonesty is prized, other times it's because the people around them turn a blind eye to what they see because they don't want to know the truth. Other times, it's because the person engaging in the dishonesty is so crafty and so quick that the trickery and subterfuge is almost inscrutable. However, the fact remains that Crist is correct. Often people are found out because those who are engaging in the trickery have so much hubris and so much arrogance that they engage in bolder and bolder moves, believing that they will never be caught. One example of that from the recent past is of Bernie Madoff. His crime was a simple Ponzi scheme which grew larger and larger in size and scale to the point where he couldn't help but be found out. In this case, the fact that Ms. Jones was found out was somewhat expected: she advanced to such a position of power within the institution that she was almost one of their public figures, which meant that her credentials would be under greater scrutiny.
The top managers operated in a corrupted fashion They did not even try to produce a positive symbolic management within the organization. Thus, the failure of the company was also the reflection of their moral failing. As a matter of fact, not only there was an aggressive and arrogant culture, but managers were mainly driven by corruption, and greed. They had no space for ethics; their main goal was trading for financial gains. Managers at Enron did not focus on long term goals. Moreover, they did not take care of their shareholders. Executives had neither an open relationship nor a shared vision with their employees. Instead, they were only interested in enriching themselves; according to their philosophy any situation could bring profits, even though this might involve crossing ethical lines. Indeed, the culture of pride, arrogance and greed at Enron made executives look for whichever solution in order to get more and more profits. Because executives wanted to benefit themselves first, all the decisions they took in the board room were made on the only account of how they could earn more. For all the above-mentioned reasons, operational and financial controls were inadequate,
Business ethics refers to the consideration of moral decisions and responsibilities in the process of operating a business. Business ethics, practiced throughout the deepest layers of a company, become the heart and soul of the company 's culture and can mean the difference between success and failure. Values drive behavior and therefore need to be consciously stated, but they also need to be affirmed by actions. Ethical business environments are created with foundations of integrity, accountability and commitment.
Upon applying utilitarianism theory to Tom’s current situation, Tom would maximise the greatest good and increase the happiness of more people and parties by exaggerating his work experience. The first party that would benefit from this is his parents. As was said in the case study (2014), Tom’s mother had lost her job a few years ago and has remained unemployed since. Tom’s father has also not been doing well financially, as his business has not been doing well as of lately, which would lead to less income for the family. Tom’s parents would be better off financially, as they will no longer need to support Tom if he were to be hired by the accounting firm.
Business ethics and corporate morals have been evolving over the years, and continue to do so. These guidelines are constantly molding and vary as businesses become more integrated. Costco Wholesale Corporation, is a very successful multinational business, but has had issues in following along with social responsibility trends that come with advancements in domestic and worldwide partnerships.
In conclusion, in our opinion, there are so many standards and criteria to judge whether a consultants’ behavior is ethical and permissible, and code of conduct can hardly be the only criterion since it is too general to cover every aspect in the real business world. Traditionally, code of conduct is an essential way to prevent unethical behaviors in consulting industry, and we can see in the aforementioned case that it did help the consultants to develop the sense of responsibilities and be aware of what they need to do in their work. However, based on some literature, we found out that although the adoption rate of code of conduct is overwhelming, the issue that whether or not code of conduct can significantly improve business ethics has
When we talk about business ethics, we think of the business as a whole, but in reality business ethics applies to the individuals working within the business. According to Investopedia, business ethics is the study of proper business policies and practices in regards to potentially controversial issues (Investopedia, 2016). Strong business ethics will help an organization become more successful by building customer loyalty, retaining good and talented employees, creating a positive work environment and avoiding legal problems (Hill, 2016).
Business ethics can be defined as the critical examination of how people and institutions should behave in the world of commerce. There are many subcategories that we may look into when speaking of business ethics, in this essay I will be writing about advertising ethics. Advertising is practically unavoidable in today 's world, we see it in the streets, shops, magazines, television, on the internet, hear it on the radio. In this essay I will describe two ethical issues in advertising, show why business leaders need to remember to launch ethical campaigns and also have and look into some examples from the business world.
I read five articles on character education. These articles helped me to better understand the importance of character education and useful techniques and methods to teach children values and morals.