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Managers and ethical capacity

Guest commentary by Bernd Irlenbusch and Julian Conrads

Prof. Dr. Bernd Irlenbusch

Against the background of current scandals, effective advises for managers of enterprises seem more important than ever regarding its implementation. In their guest commentary, Prof. Dr. Bernd Irlenbusch and Dr. Julian Conrads of the Seminar of Corporate Development and Business Ethics delve into ethical behaviour in enterprises. They argue that the classical actions of Compliance Management (Code of Conduct, whistle-blower system, ISO certification etc.) were obviously not sufficient, for example in case of the diesel scandal of VW. Preventing such situations and blind spots, which limit ethical behaviour, depends on the environment the enterprise is constructing.

Irlenbusch and Conrads say: “The mainly part of unmoral actions which happen in the economy can be dedicated to people who do not recognise intuitively that they are going to be in an unethical situation. In science it is called blind spots.”

The complete commentary can be found here (in German): Ethical capacity in human behaviour is limited – qualified managers are aware about it! Published in Creating Corporate Cultures / Blog, guest commentary by Bernd Irlenbusch and Julian Conrads.