Robert Hoyk

Paul Hersey

In the socially responsible, conscience-focused marketplaces of today, the demand for more ethical business processes and actions is increasing. Enron, Worldcom and - most recently - individual rogue financial traders have all helped to shake the public's faith in business. Studies have shown that 60% of people don't trust business leaders to tell the truth, yet many companies don't even have a code of ethics - and if they do there is no guarantee it will be followed. The Ethical Executive provides guidelines for anyone in business who wants to do the right thing. It looks at the root causes of unethical behaviour and describes psychological traps that the unwitting executive can fall prey to. Using case studies from international business such as Johnson & Johnson and Worldcom, it describes how corporate culture can encourage unethical behaviour through slavish obedience to authority, the sidestepping of responsibility, all-encompassing self interest, the blame culture and a self-serving bias. The Ethical Executive will help you to become aware of these traps - so you can be more cautious, vigilant and then hopefully avoid them.

Avoiding the Traps of the Unethical Workplace

The Ethical Executive

In this book, Hoyk and Hersey describe 45 "unethical traps" into which any one of us can fall. These traps, they say, can erupt in any organizational environment. Some of these traps distort our perception of right and wrong—so we actually believe our unethical behavior is right. Many of them are psychological in nature, and if we are not aware of them they are like illusions—webs of deception. In the authors' analysis, these traps significantly contributed to the large-scale corporate disasters we witnessed in recent years. Hoyk and Hersey take account of these realities and offer a "real-world" method that will predict, preclude, and, if necessary, "get us out of" these traps. Given the increased scrutiny under which all executives and mangers operate today, this book is a 'must read' for anyone who is charged with achieving an organization's mission—whether that mission is increasing profit, serving the common good, or both.

Robert Hoyk

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