Business Ethics: A contemporary approach is a book authored by Gael McDonald that introduces business students to business ethics and their role in the corporate world. Gael McDonald currently serves as the President of RMIT University in Vietnam since February 2014. She has an undergraduate degree in Business from Massey University, New Zealand. She later pursued a master’s degree in Business Administration from the University of Western Australia and a post-graduate degree from the London School of Economics and Political Science, United Kingdom. Professor McDonald’s career in academia has seen her lecture undergraduate and graduate courses in New Zealand, Australia, Malaysia, and the United States. She is an expert in international marketing, organizational behavior, and human resource management. She has authored several academic and professional journals and offered consultancy services to the private sector. She has served as a president of the Australian and New Zealand Academy of Management and a panelist of the New Zealand Performance Based Research Fund Panel in Business and Economics.
Business Ethics: A Contemporary Approach is non-fiction, instructive book written to provide clarity into business ethics for business students. It investigates ethics in different areas of business while presenting ethical principles which are relevant in those areas. It deviates from the traditional approach of using well-known historical cases and focuses on current examples and recent historical developments. The book also covers the strategies applied to strengthen an organization’s ethical climates in an ever-changing business environment. The author covers the basics of ethics and its importance to enable the reader to understand the background of ethics and related terminology. The book gives suggestions on how ethics can be applied in human resource management, the media, IT, accounting and finance, entrepreneurship, and international business. It is suitable for curriculum and teaching that refers to business and how to enhance ethical awareness as it provides different cases and examples that are beneficial to students. The audience of the book could also be teachers of business ethics, leaders, and managers.
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The book has four parts covering the business ethics overview, business issues that require ethics, ethical theories and analysis, and how to apply ethics in personal decision-making. Each of the four parts has chapters that cover the topics in detail. Each of the twelve chapters begins with a quote that is related to the ethical content being covered. The author then clearly states what is covered in the chapter and the objectives she hopes to achieve. Gael also provides classic examples and provides segments for the reader to reflect and accurately practice ethics in different types of business in segments titled ethics in reflection and ethics in media. She introduces every chapter with practical examples, such as when Coca-Cola was prohibited from manufacturing soft drinks in India due to their excessive water usage. The author uses business theories such as the agency and the social contract theory to back up her opinions, giving her credibility in every chapter. The book offers the reader an opportunity to assess their understanding of the topic by answering the questions, providing links to videos that cover the topic available on the web, and movies and experiential exercises at the end of every chapter. For example, at the end of chapter two, she presents a case of legality and ethics to help the reader make a distinction of what is legal and what is ethical from a real-life case. The book contains a scope of issues such as the moral Gael McDonald uses a positive and affirmative tone to express her ideas.
Chapter one gives a detailed introduction of business ethics in different industries to ensure the reader understands ethics in business. Chapter two clarifies the terminology that is related to business ethics. Chapters three through eight are devoted to ethics in different sectors such as information technology, marketing, human resource management, financial accounting, financial entities, and international trade and entrepreneurship. The chapters broadly cover issues relevant to organizations, their operational environments, and the ethical values in the contemporary world. Each chapter deals with the vital ethical matters related to corporate social responsibility and sustainability in the different sectors, which have become the focal point of discussion in today’s corporate world. Chapter ten and eleven cover the available ethical theories and how to make ethical decision-making. They cover the moral angle of ethics and the consequential and non-consequential theories of ethics. The final chapter covers personal decision-making, effectively builds and leads an organization into an ethical culture, and reviews the milestones made. Strategies on how to enhance the moral climate from an organizational perspective are discussed in detail.
I enjoyed reading this book as it replenished my knowledge of ethics and its application in the corporate world. It elaborates with great competence most aspects of business ethics that should be considered. The majority of the chapters can be applied to other financial institutions not mentioned. The book reflects the solid academic and practical competence of its author and editors’. The detailed coverage of social responsibility and sustainability in every chapter is timely in the ever-changing business world that has primarily adopted technological strategies. The chapters are carefully themed and well thought out, and the organization is very logical and concise. The author gives a conclusion of each chapter and uses other studies to give her viewpoints credibility. I recommend the book to academics, students, and business professionals and encourage its use in ethical decision-making.
Reference
McDonald, G. (2015). Business ethics . Cambridge University Press.
