Business Ethics: Ideals and Reality, Reaction Paper Example

Regarding Gini’s conviction that people are the “bottom line” in all business efforts, my reaction is dual.  On one level, I admire Gini’s reasoning and firm belief in this moral stance as the best possible platform for business concerns and operations.  It is an approach inherently ethical in itself, and one certainly promoting commercial behaviors, from the highest ranks, as both serving the interests of the business as well as the concerns of others.  On another level, however, Gini’s viewpoints strike me as unrealistically altruistic. He asserts, for example, that: “Ethics is primarily a communal, collective enterprise, not a solitary one” (Gini 67). This is true, but it ignores that the nature of business often engages in ethics only when it is convenient and/or compelled by law.  With ethics in place, as Gini views it, business leadership is guided by the responsibilities to the interests of others (70). Unfortunately, in my opinion, this is not the typical focus of such leadership, as businesses today still tend to value the “bottom line” before any other consideration, and the interests of people are secondary.

What supports my doubts as to the validity of Gini’s thinking is my experience interning with a law firm, although this in no way is meant to suggest that the firm disregards ethics.  I have personally witnessed many interactions at the firm in which ethical responsibility is central to the decision-making.  At the same time, however, this is not an absolute. Ethics remain a  “side” consideration, as I perceive it in the firm. Those in leadership positions will address the ethics in a wide range of cases and circumstances, and this does carry down to subordinates and interns. Nonetheless, it seems that even these considerations rely on the business worth of the situation as assessed by the leaders.  More exactly, and while ethics are significantly in play in the firm’s thinking and action, this process in itself is dictated by the pragmatic value first understood to be in place.  Consequently, and based on my own experience, it appears that Gini’s ideal of the needs of people as the foremost interest of business is, simply, too idealistic.

Gini, Al. “Moral leadership and business ethics.” Journal of Leadership & Organizational Studies 4.4 (1997): 64-81.