Ethics adopted by the business should be followed strictly by each and every person working with the business.
There should be a reward-punishment system linked with business ethics for those violating these ethics and one who properly abide by these ethics. Business ethics have an important role in raising the profitability and productivity of a business and improves its goodwill in the market. Ethics programs thus benefit organisations in many ways, one they help lay down standards of behaviour and second they help in clear communication of the same.
This prevents the employee plead on condition of ignorance, which is not the case with the manual containing policies and procedures that are hardly known to any of the employees.
Organisations have now realised the importance of having ethics management programs. Unlike the belief held earlier that it only helps the employee, the belief is gaining more ground that ethics programs are equally beneficial to the organisations. No wonder more and more number of organisations are implementing these programs for the greater benefit of their own, the employees and most importantly the employee relationship.
Hence, ethical behaviour may help restore trust and confidence in the capital market system and reduce financial reporting fraud.
Literature review Code of ethics are important since they implicitly set limits or unethical behaviour and are intended to offer guidance in ambiguous situations. Code of ethics can perform several organisational functions, such as making explicit the ethical values that were previously unstated or unclear, alert employees as to what actions are unethical and unpunishable, and helps firms shift accountability of actions from organisation to individual.
An ethical theory expresses the principles that give reasons for choosing to act in specific ways. An ethical framework is a set of norms and principles that serves as guidance for individual actions.
Individuals act to achieve something they contemplate as good, something valued. To frame an ethical theory one has to identify a purpose. It is of utmost importance to consider this carefully because one will get different theories depending on the purpose. If the purpose is to serve society, you get one kind of ethics; but if the purpose is to perform a duty, one has another kind of ethics.
Ethically, things may seem relativelystraightforward at the level of the individual auditors engaged in the practice of auditing. Auditors ought to carry out their standard procedures carefully, diligently and punctually in accordance with their instructions and the appropriate auditing standards and procedures.
The virtues of integrity, objectivity, independence, confidentiality, upholding technical and professional standards, competence and due care, which are all highlighted in the Code of Professional Conduct, seem particularly appropriate. Among the concepts that have been used — apart from Corporate Social Responsibility — are sustainable development, corporate citizenship, sustainableentrepreneurship, the triple bottom line and business ethics 11 Even supposing the adequacy of such categorisations of virtues 10 , putting these virtues into practice is not a simple matter.
There may be morally relevant problems for practicing auditors when tasks are set that go beyond what the time and expertise available render feasible. In these circumstances, should those involved seek to disguise the limitations of their work, thereby risking the displeasure of their superiors and hazarding their career prospects, or should they just do what they can, perhaps in the dim awareness that their superiors might prefer not to be informed of weaknesses in the process that they are not themselves in a position to remedy.
Moral rules are held to be binding independently of the consequences of putting them into practice. It is not for us to calculate the consequences of truthfulness, just to be truthful. A moral person knows what is right and must be what is right simply because it is right 7. The value of the ethical audit is that it enables the company to see itself through a variety of lenses: it captures the company's ethical profile.
Companies recognise the importance of their financial profile for their investors, of their service profile for their customers, and of their profile as an employer for their current and potential employees. An ethical profile brings together all of the factors which affect a company's reputation, by examining the way in which it does business.
Codes of ethics are important since they implicitly set limits for unethical behaviour and are intended to offer guidance in ambiguous situations. International Business and Ethics Recent corporate collapses around the world show that there are no national boundaries for these occurrences. Tel, Ansett Australia and Harris Scarfe have raised public expectations of investigation of the causes of collapses Since the promulgation of the Standards, internal auditors worldwide have had the opportunity to standardise internal audit practice.
It is, though, precisely these special issues which can make ethical auditing so valuable to multinationals. Executives of such companies are well aware of the added complications which operating across a number of cultures brings.
But problems tend to multiply when differing value bases are permitted to take hold within different cultures. One of the issues which most concerns multinationals is that of corruption - how to do business in countries where backhanders are expected in the common course of events. Working practices and human rights are other major areas of concern. Some companies make a principled withdrawal from countries where they could otherwise manufacture profitably, because they are not prepared to work within that regime, as Levi Strauss did in China.
Protest from outraged consumers may force companies manufacturing in India or Thailand to sack the underage children they were previously employing as machinists.
Companies alone cannot right all the evils of society. Many of the decisions they have to take have no ideally right or ideally good answer. What matters is that they should have a clearly thought out framework of values, and that these values should be consistent wherever they operate. A multinational company must test its values across all its areas of operation, if it wants the findings of its ethical audit to be comprehensive and provide the greatest payback in terms of identifying potential areas of vulnerability to consumer pressure.
The fundamental positioning of the role of internal auditors, it is contended, creates a challenge to their ability to function with independence. Share It. To explain why internal control is important in a business, it's helpful to share some examples.
Approval loopholes: An employee who ends up being able to approve items that benefit him in some way has a conflict of interest. For example, no one should be able to give himself a raise or promotion. Employees also should not be able to make large purchases without approval from another person. Financial fraud: When only one person ever sees, evaluates and shares the financial reports while also handling all the cash flow, it's all too easy to intentionally adjust the numbers for personal benefit.
Also, mistakes can be made on accident that still have an effect on the company. Either way, the importance of internal control in accounting is astronomical. Stealing property: Everyone walks away with a company pen or other mundane office item now and then. However, other items can be stolen, whether it's inventory from the warehouse or just basic supplies stocked around the office.
0コメント