Contents

• Introduction 2
• Ethics and Morality 2
• Codes of Conduct or Rule Based Ethics 3
• Voluntary Approach to Ethics or Principles Based Ethics 5
• Difference Between Rule Based Ethics and Principle Based Ethics 7
• Conclusion 9
• References 11

Description

Businesses and corporate organizations deal with many stakeholders including customers, employees and society. Any act by a business organization may adversely influence some of the stakeholders of the organization (Tran, 2008). Being responsible to the society and other stakeholders, a business organization needs to act in responsible ways in order to protect the interests of all the stakeholders (Fullerton, 2008). The business organization needs to have strong values and have accountability towards its operations and people. Business ethics is that branch of philosophy, which deals with the way businesses function with regard to their responsibility towards environment, people and other resources (Johnson, 2011). This essay discusses the statement “Ethics is often seen as a universal panacea to ensure true accountability and effective and fair operations of an organization”. To ensure the compliance of a rule based approach to ethics should be implemented for all organizations” from the perspective of the author of this essay. The essay first defines ethics and tries to understand the difference between rule based ethics and principle based ethics. The essay would then discuss the ethical approach at Citibank, Hong Kong and attempts to arrive as to which approach suits the operations of the organization.