Managerial Ethics: Moral Management of People and Processes

Joseph A. Petrick Wright State University

The vast research literature in the fields of managing organizational integrity ( De George, 1993; Ethics Resource Center, 1994; Le Clair, Ferrell, & Fraedrich, 1998; Paine, 1997; Petrick & Quinn, 1997; Solomon, 1992b) and organizational quality ( Bounds, Dobbins, & Fowler, 1995; Evans & Lindsay, 1996; Lindsay & Petrick, 1997; Vroman & Luchsinger, 1994) are often unintegrated in business, education, and management practice. Yet, they exhibit points of parallel convergence that merit conceptual integration in research activities and demonstrate usefulness to practicing managers ( Collins & Porras, 1994; Kotter & Heskett, 1992; Posner & Schmidt, 1992).

Too often, however, ethics development and quality improvement initiatives emerge only after a major crisis occurs within a company, in an industry, or as a global disaster ( Allinson, 1993; Halfon, 1989; Taylor, 1985). At that time, the reactive, piecemeal task of fixing the problem is delegated to middle managers and technical experts. What is needed at the outset is integrated strategic leadership that simultaneously develops organizational integrity and quality systems to leverage their reciprocal benefits ( Bounds et al., 1994; Lindsay & Petrick, 1997).

Quality initiatives obtain their operational power to reduce costs, improve competitiveness, and generate customer value by relying on the soundness of management processes ( Bottorff, 1997). Piecemeal quality initiatives will not be sustained without committed integrity at work, and organizational integrity efforts are more likely to be endorsed when linked with quality processes ( Bounds et al., 1995; Stahl, 1995). To honor customer demands,

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