Business Ethics by Denis Collins

1257 Words3 Pages

The assignment for this week is to conduct an analysis and review of the text Business Ethics by Denis Collins. That chapters chosen for analysis in this essay are chapters two and three. Chapter two deals with the historical implications of how ethics has affected businesses. It talks about the idea of ethics a few hundred years ago as well as the economic system that operated without a guide on how behave ethically. Chapter three describes the process for finding ethical people to come work for you and once they are in your company, how to sustain their ethical decision making.
Historical Perspective on Ethics
Business ethics must be understood from a historical perspective to appreciate how the current economic system and regulatory system has evolved over time. (Collins, 2012) The idea of ethics has expanded slowly over time with more and more “stakeholders” being given particular rights when it came to business decisions. The text describes the evolution of ethics into a few key phases such as in pre-capitalist America, Adam’s Capitalism and the industrial revolution. Those moments give an ideal breakdown on how business ethics evolved into what they are today.
Most people define the beginning of America by Christopher Columbus’s quest to find a sea route to the east. European rulers had been using the land route for some time now and due to religious differences, they saw a need to find another way to conduct trade with the orient. Christopher Columbus secured funding and proceeded to sail west to find an alternative route. He did not find a direct route to the orient but what he did find was the vastly unexplored American lands at least to the Europeans. He concluded that the indigenous people would be easy to exploit an...

... middle of paper ...

...ing the interview.
This chapter is also interesting because of the sequential steps taken by companies who conducts ethics screens such as these. The more that I think about it, I was a part of such a screen when I joined the United States Army. They made sure that I was physically fit and morally sound. The code of ethics the United States has is almost spelled out in the oath of enlistment that we are required to take.
In conclusion, I want to continue to learn about the attempts of companies to attract and retain ethically and morally sound employees. This study will be very useful when it comes time for me to start my own business and I go through the same process of hiring people to work for and represent myself and the company.

Works Cited

Civil Rights Act of 1964, Pub.L. 88-352, 78 Stat. 241 (1964)
Collins, D. (2012). Business Ethics. Hoboken, NJ: Wiley

Open Document