BUSINESS ETHICS AND SPIRITUALITY

1
BUSINESS ETHICSandSPIRITUALITY

• Sandeep Singh
• Reader
• School of Management Sciences, Varanasi
• e-mailspiritualcentre_at_smsvaranasi.com

2
What is Business Ethics
3

• Business ethics is rules, standards, codes, or
  principles which provide guidelines for morally
  right behavior and truthfulness in specific
  situations. (Lewis)
• Business ethics is the study of business
  situation, activities, and decisions where issues
  of right and wrong are addressed. (Crane and
  Matten)
• Business ethics refers to clear standards and
  norms that help employees to distinguish right
  from wrong behaviour at work. ( The Ethics
  Resource Centre)

4

• Business ethics has to do with the extent to
  which a persons behaviour measures up to such
  standards as the law, organizational policies,
  professional and trade association codes,
  popular expectations regarding fairness and
  what is right, plus ones own internalized moral
  standards. ( William Sauser)
• Business ethics is disciplined normative
  reflection on the nature, meaning and context of
  business activity. As such it deals with
  comprehensive questions about the justice of the
  economic context in which business operates and
  about the nature, function, structure and scope
  of business in that context, as well as with more
  specific issues raised by the relationship of
  business to government, the consumer, its
  employees, and society at large. ( Hoffman
  and Moore)

5

• Business ethics is a study of moral standards
  and how these apply to the systems and
  organizations through which modern societies
  produce and distribute goods and services, and to
  the people who work within these organizations.
  Business ethics, in other words, is a form of
  applied ethics. It includes not only the analysis
  of moral norms and moral values, but also
  attempts to apply the conclusions of this
  analysis to that assortment of institutions,
  technologies, transactions, activities, and
  pursuits that we call business. (Manuel
  Velasquez)

6
The concept of business ethics actually contains
four interconnected elements Four Interconnected
elements of business ethics

• Framework- Set of rules, standards, codes,
  principles, philosophy etc. to be followed for
  ethical decision making in business.
• Internal development of ethical
  traits-Development of virtues, values, morality
  and inner conscience.
• Situation- Business situations demanding ethical
  judgements.
• Behaviour- Ethical behaviour from the legal,
  stakeholder and humanity point of view.

7
Nature of Business Ethics

• Complex

Dynamic
Interdependent
Subjective
8

• Complex because of no common consensus
• Dynamic because of dynamic nature of business
  decision making
• Interdependent because ethical decision making is
  dependent on many factors and ones decision
  affect others.
• Subjective because the frameworks referred for
  ethical decision making are usually normative and
  are varied in nature. These frameworks differ
  from people to people and organization to
  organization.

9

• There may be
  varied arguments regarding business ethics but
  one commonly accepted
• fact is that intensity of ethics in business
• will always be limited to the extent
• of ethical behaviour shown by those
• who are involved in business.
• So the human factor is the key.

10
Significant Developments in Business Credited to
Business Ethics

• Profit is no more considered as the sole
  objective of business.
• Instead of maximization of shareholders wealth
  now the focus of business organizations is on
  stakeholder approach.
• Many large business organizations are involved in
  socially responsible activities.
• Environmental issues are now openly discussed by
  business world.
• Framework of Corporate Governance has improved
  considerably.

11

• Many business organizations have already framed
  their ethical code of conduct and are strictly
  following it.
• Business ethics is no more considered as an
  undesirable transgression into the functioning of
  business organizations. Instead organizations
  themselves are taking it seriously and now
  consider it as good for business.

12
Perceptions Regarding Business Ethics
13
Objectives of Business Ethics
14
Arguments against the Business Ethics

• Milton Friedman, a Nobel laureate had suggested
  that there is no need for business people to
  bring ethical factors into their managerial
  decision making. He believed that when they have
  occupied the role of business then automatically
  they are supposed to throw away their role of
  autonomous moral agent in favour of making
  efforts for fulfilling the purpose of
  shareholders. According to Friedman there is one
  and only social responsibility of business and
  that is to use its resources and engage in
  activities designed to increase its profits so
  long as it stays within the rules of the game,
  which to say, engages in open and free
  competition without deception or fraud.

15

• John Ladd believes that by virtue of basic nature
  of business organization the possibility of
  ethical evaluation of its actions is ruled out.
  Ladd argues that there are specific goals of
  business which are meant to be achieved and these
  goals are non-moral. So, business organizations
  should be evaluated from the point of view of
  achieving those specific goals successfully or
  not instead of from the point of view of ethics
  or morality.
• Another argument against the business ethics is
  that the organizations and corporations cant be
  held morally responsible for anything, simply
  because they dont act, its the individuals who
  act.
• According to free economy promoters, the market
  regulate itself without any need for externally
  induced controls. So let the rules of the economy
  and free markets work instead of the rules of
  ethics.

16
Arguments for the Business Ethics

• Those who argue for the business ethics are of
  the view that the profit is not the only motive
  of business business organizations deserves
  ethical reasoning business does not enjoy any
  special status and morality is as much applicable
  to it as to any one else and rules of ethics and
  morality are as much intrinsic to business as the
  rules of economy and free markets. The acts of
  bribery, corruption, and deception in business
  are strongly criticized in this view.
• As the organizations are run by individuals they
  are as much liable for ethical judgements as any
  individual. They cant get away by stating their
  impersonal nature.

17

• The special status for business free from ethical
  evaluation is also opposed by many economists,
  philosophers, academicians, and other ethicists.
  They argue that ethics and business cant be
  separated and there is no ethical relativism
  between business and others.
• Peter Drucker argues that ethical code remains
  same for everybody whoever he may be. It is same
  for rich, poor, kings, business leaders,
  managers, mighty or meek.

18

• For business to operate successfully and in
  accepted manner these social interactions should
  provide mutual benefits and for that ethics is
  one key element that make these interactions
  mutually fruitful.
• Against the argument of allowing rules of economy
  and free markets to operate without ethical
  considerations, ethicists argue that businesses
  operate in a society and their actions have both
  direct and indirect impact on the society and so
  many cases of fraud, corruption, and bribery have
  come up in recent times doing excessive harm to
  the society that relevance of ethics to business
  is more than ever. Rules of free markets in no
  way can justify fraud, corruption, bribery,
  deception, and other immoral acts.

19
Three Role of Business Ethics The first
role of business ethics is to do three level
investigation
20
The second role is to develop theoretical
foundations of universal nature for business
ethics on the basis of three level investigation
or study such as
21
(No Transcript)
22
Importance of Business Ethics
23

24
Morality and Ethics

• Morality is concerned with understanding of
  what is right and wrong behaviour. In the study
  of business ethics many people treat the concept
  of ethics and morality as same. There is no harm
  in it. However treating them as different but
  strongly inter-related is a better approach in
  enriching the field of business ethics. Morality
  could be considered as one of the subject matter
  of study in business ethics.

25
Difference between Morality and Ethics

• Ethics
  Morality
• 1. Ethics is the study of framework such as
  standards, Morality is right action,
  conduct or behaviour
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
• principles, rules or codes and traits for
  ensuring
• right action, behaviour or conduct.
• 2. Ethics is the philosophical study of morality
  Morality is the subject matter of
  ethics
• 3. Ethics encompasses morality
  Morality is the
  sub-field of ethics
• 4. Ethics attempts to bring rationalization to
  morality Morality gets
  rationalization through ethics
• 5. Ethics tries to systemize morality
  Morality becomes systematic
  through ethics
• 6. Ethics legitimizes morality
  Morality gets
  legitimized through ethics
• 7. Ethics is covert as well as overt
  Morality is overt

26
Rest Model of Moral Behaviour
27
Kohlberg Model of Moral Development
28
Virtues and Ethics

• The word virtue is derived from the Greek word
  arete which is translated as excellence.
• Virtues are the good moral habits that are
  acquired over a period of time by repeatedly
  choosing the good.
• Virtues play an important role in the decision
  making process of individuals and that is why
  virtues are important from the ethics point of
  view.
• The foundation of morality lies in the
  development of virtues.
• Good character traits or moral habits, when
  learned and practiced repeatedly, gets cultured
  or internalized in the people and takes the form
  of virtues.

29

• Right conduct, action or behaviour of an
  individual which we call morality can be temporal
  but through the development of virtues
  righteousness becomes a habit.
• Virtues imply that there is a set of qualities
  which will make people fulfill their functions as
  people, properly and well. Without virtue, people
  are unable to do justice with their tasks.
• For Aristotle, the difference between doing
  something and doing it well or excellently lies
  in virtues. In other words, we do not display
  virtue when we do something that happens to be
  good, but we must act with a deliberate desire to
  perform our function as human beings properly.

30
Aristotle on Virtues
31
(No Transcript)
32
Spirituality and Business Ethics

• Spirituality is integral and holistic,
  incorporating within itself the material, moral
  and cultural values.
• There is a misconception regarding spirituality
  that spiritual value is opposed to the material
  one.
• The term spiritual as also the Sanskrit
  substitute Atmika or Adhyatmik literally
  meaning any thing that pertains to the spirit
  (the Self or soul or atman).
• There are virtues and values associated with
  spirit (Atman) as its very nature, provided the
  Atman (spirit) is in natural state, freed from
  impurities.

33

• Impurity here means something that is mental it
  is ego and selfishness and raga (infatuation or
  favoritism) and Dvesa (abhorrence or enmity). So,
  purity would really mean freedom from these
  mental impurities, and not rejection of material
  life.
• For the practice of value it is not necessary to
  have metaphysical (ontological) presupposition
  about the spirit (the Self) neither for the
  practice of morality, nor for the spirituality.
  One can practice morality, for example, even
  without believing in the higher Self (the higher
  spirit) or God.
• One can practice the spiritual values just with
  phenomenal and limited self, present in the body,
  even without accepting any extraordinary
  metaphysical status of the existing self.

34

• The Budhist and the Jaina way of life is highly
  spiritual and yet there is no belief in God
  there.
• In the Brahmana (Vedic) tradition too, half of
  the philosophical schools (Vaisesika, Samkhya and
  Mimamsa) do not believe in God and yet they
  present a moral and spiritual way of life to
  follow, although the definition of morality and
  spirituality differs from school to school.
• However, faith in God or the Higher Self
  strengthens the moral and spiritual attitude, and
  facilitates the ethico-spiritual living. So,
  faith in the metaphysical spiritual reality is
  also a value a supplementary value.

35
Two Aspects of Sprituality

• While defining spirituality, we have to
  understand that there are two aspects of
  spirituality a negative aspect and a positive
  aspect, and the two aspects are complementary to
  each other. Negatively, spirituality means
  melting or effacing the ego, and positively it
  means realizing ones unity with others (or in
  other words, having universal love).
• Ego is the principle of differentiation of
  oneself from others ego rests on the feeling of
  otherness (what in the spiritual philosophy is
  technically called dvaitabhava or
  bheda-bhava).
• Ego takes place when I do not consider the
  so-called others as me or my own and cut
  myself off from them and confine myself to my own
  individuality.

36

• In the ego-state we wish only the good of
  ourselves and not the good of others, we impose
  ourselves on others and even exploit others for
  our own end. Selfishness and ego are like the two
  sides of one and the same coin.
• Ego is the foundation and the root cause of all
  evil, of all immorality.
• If spirituality negatively means effacement of
  the ego, and if the ego means separating oneself
  from the others and confining oneself to one's
  own individuality and taking into consideration
  only oneself and the others, then it becomes easy
  to understand the positive meaning of
  spirituality as what in the spiritual philosophy
  is technically called 'Advaita-bhava' or
  'Abheda-bhava' which means feeling of one's unity
  with all.

37

• Spirituality is the state of consciousness in
  which the feeling of otherness is gone and the
  feeling of affinity and unity with the so-called
  others is established.
• The feeling of unity can be explained with the
  help of examples. One such example is that of the
  loving mother. The mother feels that the children
  are her own or herself the happiness and
  suffering of the children are the happiness and
  suffering of the mother. The bodies of the
  children are separated from the mother, and in
  that sense the children are 'others' to her, but
  in her consciousness or in her feeling they are
  not others. What she does good for the children,
  she thinks she is doing for her own self, as she
  feels that the children are herself or her own.
  This is what is called love. Thus love is the
  meaning of spirituality love is 'the' spiritual
  value.

38

• Love is considered as 'the' spiritual value. But
  love should be distinguished from such mental
  states and situations that are falsely taken to
  be love. For example, infatuation,
  possessiveness, selfish attachment, etc are not
  love. Love may be understood as the opposite of
  selfishness.
• In love which is the spiritual value, there is
  natural synthesis of what is called 'Sreya' (the
  good) and 'Preya' (the pleasant). Love is
  actually the two in one the good and the
  pleasant both at once.
• In love the good of oneself and the good of
  others become one, as the 'others' too become
  one's own. Morality becomes natural in love, as
  one would not exploit the beloved person and, on
  the contrary, would do good to him/her.

39

• Thus the spiritual value (love) satisfies the
  demands of Dharma (morality) and Sukha (pleasure
  or happiness) both at once. It gives immense
  pleasure and satisfaction to oneself on the one
  hand, and on the other hand one becomes
  spontaneously inclined to do good to the so
  called others.
• Egolessness and love or the feeling of unity-are
  the two negative and positive meanings of
  spirituality. The two meanings are complementary
  to each other, or it would be more true to say
  that the two denote one and same state of
  consciousness. One cannot be loving without being
  egoless, because the very meaning of ego is the
  separation of oneself from others and more the
  ego is tight, the less loving we are.
• There is inverse relationship between love and
  ego.

40

• That is why Kabir, the great mystic poet, has
  said "If you want to drink the nectar of love
  and also want to keep up your ego, this is
  impossible like putting two swords in one and
  same sheath.
• Karuna (compassion), Bhakti or Bhaktiyoga
  (surrender to God or surrender to Truth), Jnana
  or Jnanayoga (Advaita-bhava or realization of
  one's unity with all beings), Karmayoga (doing
  all work with the sense of being the instrument
  of God or with the sense of selfless duty) all
  these are co-relates or corollaries of the
  central spiritual value which negatively means
  egolessness and positively means love or unity of
  oneself with all.

41
Difference Between Spirituality and Morality
42
(No Transcript)
43
(No Transcript)
44

• In the general Western tradition, morality is
  accepted as the highest value. (However, there
  are strong exceptions also, for whom spirituality
  is the highest value.). But in the Indian
  tradition, spirituality is taken to be the
  highest or the ultimate value. This is not
  because the moral value is underrated - not at
  all the moral value (Dharma) is rated very high
  and is taken to be absolutely necessary for
  lifeboth individual and social. But spirituality
  is placed even above morality (or above mere
  morality) because spirituality (Adhyatma)
  naturally incorporates morality (Dharma) within
  itself it is the state of natural morality.
  Moreover, the morality present in spirituality is
  free from its possible minus points, namely (i)
  the ego, (ii) the effort or exertion of the will,
  and (iii) the dichotomy of Sreya and Preya. Mere
  morality, although valuable in itself, is a dry
  value, in order to be more effective and more
  satisfying, it has to be saturated with
  spirituality.

45
Understanding Moral and Spiritual Impurity

• There are two types of impuritythe moral
  impurity and the spiritual impurity.
• Unscrupulous life of deceit, dishonesty,
  corruption including various kinds of crime, etc.
  all these come under the category of moral
  impurity.
• There may be persons who are free from these
  impurities (the moral ones) and yet they may be
  suffering from another kind of impurity which is
  equally bad, sometimes even worse. This is what
  is called 'Ahamkara' (ego).
• Ego is the spiritual impurity.
• The moral impurity harms and hurts others ego
  too hurts, sometimes even more deeply. Therefore,
  it is necessary to free oneself not only from the
  moral impurities but also from ego.
• One cannot be called pure-hearted unless one is
  free from both these impurities. The life of
  values cannot become perfect with moral
  perfection alone the spiritual value of
  egolessness (resulting in love) must also be
  incorporated then alone the life of values world
  become complete.

46
Spiritual Lessons for Business Leaders

• Acquisition of material wealth (Artha) and
  satisfaction of desires (Kama) become unhealthy
  only when they are done selfishly and
  egoistically.
• Remove the feeling of possessiveness (mamatva)
  towards the wealth and become unattached
  (Anasakta) with the wealth. Then enjoy the wealth
  in an unattached manner, and in the unattached
  state of consciousness. Then you will find that
  you enjoy the wealth far better.
• The psychology of relishing or enjoying is that
  if we are strongly attached, the degree of
  relishment or enjoyment is very low whereas if
  we are unattached, the enjoyment is much better.

47

• It can be safely proposed that only an unattached
  person can really enjoy the world the attached
  (Asakta) person accumulates and possesses but
  does not enjoy.
• The purity of money means that it is spent not
  only for your good but for the good of all (of
  course, including yourself). The society has
  share in your earning because you are indebted to
  the society, and you can clear your debt to the
  society by parting with the extra money and
  giving the society their share.
• One who appropriates all money for oneself
  without giving others their due share, is
  virtually a thief ( yo bhunkte stena eva sah
  ) or "... such a person is a thief and deserves
  punishment " ( sasteno dandamarhati) or,
  "those who cook only for themselves, eat sin"
  (bhunjate te tvaghnan papa ye pacantyatma
  karmat).

48
Spiritual Lesson for Corporate Social
Responsibility

• Serve the people not in charity but in love
• Charity is moral act but service with love is
  spiritual act.
• The act of charity may generate ego, but the
  service done out of love reduces or melts the ego.

49
Make Material Life Spiritual

• By cultivating proper attitude towards Nature and
  the world, the material life itself can be made
  spiritual and the so-called dichotomy between the
  material and the spiritual be abolished.
• Really there is no dichotomy between the two, we
  have created the dichotomy by vitiating the world
  of matter. It is we who have made the material
  life impure by our ego and selfishness.
• If the material life is freed from the ego and
  selfishness, it itself would become spiritual in
  fact, originally it 'is' spiritual, the impurity
  is introduced from our side.

50

• " Love gives and forgives, selfishness gets and
  forgets".
• 
  (Sai Baba)

51
THANKS