Ethics: Business Ethics

In this course, we focus on ethical challenges that managers are facing during their careers and discuss how these challenges can be addressed successfully.

In consequence, we will deal with ethical questions that are relevant to managers, such as:

1) “How to prepare ethically sound decisions?”

2) “How to make ethically sound decisions”

3) “What makes people tap into an ethics trap?”

4) “How should we individually respond to ethical failures?”

To address these questions, theoretical concepts and empirical findings will be introduced and then applied to real-life case studies.

Thus, above and beyond a lecturing part by the lecturer, there will be case study presentations by students. For this aim, students will be grouped in teams and each student team will prepare one case study (out of class) to be presented in class.

Please note that the number of participants is limited to 62 students. Places will be distributed on a first come first served basis.

• Analytic interpretation of facts
• Systematic ethical decision making preparation: Developing decision making options

How to make ethically sound decisions?

• Values- vs. consequences based ethical decision making
• Rationalizations: Potential flaws in the decision-making process

What makes people tap into an ethics trap?

• Individual characteristics that contribute to a lack of awareness
• Corporate characteristics that contribute to a lack of awareness

How should we individually respond to ethical failures?

• Individual responses to individual failure
• Individual responses to corporate failure