Chapter 5: Ethics, Social Responsibility, and Sustainability

In this chapter, the meaning of ethics and morality in the framework of organizations will be discussed. Many similarities will be found from other business ethics’ classes, or normative ethics’ classes offered at a college or university.  However, this text will delve deeper to understand the need for ethics within a learning organization. Furthermore, the concept of corporate social responsibility (CSR), how CSR fits in a modern landscape, and the need for sustainability in organizations will be examined.

The learning outcomes for this chapter are:

  1. Describe and contextualize the definition of ethics, normative ethics, and understand classical ethical concepts.
  2. Define business ethics, ethical leadership, and how these fit within learning organizations.
  3. Define Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) and how a modern view of CSR is relevant in today’s learning organizations.
  4. Define how global organizations develop and maintain sustainable initiatives.

Chapter Tips:

  • What are some ethical questions that are raised in this chapter?
  • How do you relate your personal experience to the ethical discussions in the chapter?

Keep in mind ethics and its relationship to a global outlook.

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Leadership and Management in Learning Organizations Copyright © by Clayton Smith; Carson Babich; and Mark Lubrick is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License, except where otherwise noted.

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