Surveying Ethical Attitudes

Business owners and managers today are making more ethical decisions than their predecessors did in the past two decades, according to research conducted by a group of Baylor business school professors.
Five current and former professors--Dr. Justin Longenecker, Dr. Carlos Moore, MBA '67, Dr. Bill Petty, Dr. Leslie Palich and Dr. Joseph McKinney--surveyed thousands of business professionals in 1985, 1993 and 2001.
The six-page questionnaire, which remained consistent in each survey, featured 16 scenarios with ethical overtones and asked respondents to indicate the degree to which they found each action ethically acceptable. The survey was sent to 10,000 business professionals each year, providing for one of the largest samples ever used in any study of business ethics. 
Survey results show that respondents trended toward more ethical decisions across time, the professors reported in the April 2006 issue of the Journal of Small Business Management.

Scenarios from the survey:

• An executive earning $50,000 a year padded his expense account by about $1,500 a year.
• Because of pressure from his brokerage firm, a stockbroker recommended a type of bond that he did not consider a good investment.
• A highway bidding contractor deplored the chaotic bidding situation and cutthroat competition. He, therefore, reached an understanding with other major contractors to permit bidding that would provide a reasonable profit.
• A corporate executive promoted a loyal friend and competent manager to the position of divisional vice president in preference to a better-qualified manager with whom he had no close ties.
• An engineer discovered what he perceived to be a product design flaw that constituted a safety hazard. His company declined to correct the flaw. The engineer decided to keep quiet, rather than taking his complaint outside the company.