Ethics and Social Responsibility in Strategic Planning
Corporations when faced with difficult decisions have to keep in mind that the decisions that need making not only affect the corporation and the employees that work for the corporation, but it affects the corporations' stakeholders, and the public communities. The decisions made still need to keep the best interest of everyone involved without losing more of the corporation than what needs to be lost.
The role of ethics and social responsibility
Corporations have a great deal of responsibility to their stakeholders to make the best decisions for them as possible. However, the decisions should not be unethical that the reputation of the corporation is jeopardized. "Ethical responsibilities of an organization's management are to follow the generally held beliefs about behavior in society (Wheelen and Hunger, p. 58)." The courtesy to the community and the stakeholders of informing ...view middle of the document...
Those involved and those who listened will always remember the impact it created on Corporate America. Top executives actions were in the form of "off-balance sheet partnerships used to hide the company's deteriorating finances, revenue from long-term contracts being recorded in the first year...
Ethics and Social Responsibility
“The concept of social responsibility proposes that a private corporation has responsibilities to society that extend beyond making a profit.” (Wheelen & Hunger, 2010 p.72)
Social responsibility considers the customers, employees, shareholders, communities, interests and social- environmental consequences of their business activities. A strategic approach, companies can determine activities to devote to being socially responsible and choose activities which will strengthen their competitive advantage. Companies develop strategies with voluntarily integrated social and environmental concern in their business operations (Padala & Suryanarayana, n.d.). The purpose of this paper is to explain the role of ethics and social responsibility in developing a strategic plan while considering stakeholder needs and agendas.
Ethics is described as the control over dealing with the bad and good with moral duty and obligations and business ethics is concerned with the justice, truth and a variety of other aspects including the expectations of fair compensation, society, public relations, consumer autonomy, advertising, social responsibilities, and corporate behavior within the home country as well as abroad (Padala & Suryanarayana, n.d.). Managers and top level management have a responsibility to establish ethics by creating a code of ethics for an organization. Establishing a business code of ethics can offer a basis for which politics can guide daily behavior and decisions at the work site (Padala & Suryanarayana, n.d.). Organizations should conduct periodic ethics workshops to make certain that the employees understand them in true form and guarantee proper implementation. A code of ethics defines the standards of behavior expected of employees and managers alike (Padala & Suryanarayana, n.d.).