THE ETHICS OF FUTURE BUSINESS LEADERS: A CROSS-CULTURAL COMPARISON
07/02
GRAHAM ELKIN AND STUART KING Department of Management School of Business University of Otago PO Box 56 Dunedin New Zealand Email: gelkin@business.otago.ac.nz
The ethics of future business leaders: a cross-cultural comparison Submitted to Ethics and Education (20 September 2007)
Graham Elkin Department of Management University of Otago PO Box 56 Dunedin 9054 New Zealand gelkin@business.otago.ac.nz
Stuart King Department of Management University of Otago PO Box 56 Dunedin 9054 New Zealand sking@business.otago.ac.nz
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ABSTRACT Undergraduate business students represent the future leadership of corporations. To anticipate future behaviour, an understanding of their current attitudes towards business ethics is important. The influence of culture on these attitudes is an area of growing interest. Our research examines attitudes towards business ethics among business students in the United States and New Zealand. We survey 90 undergraduate business students at New Zealand universities regarding their attitudes towards a number of statements about business ethics. These findings are compared to a survey conducted by Albaum and Peterson (2006). Our survey findings generally reflect the literature- US and New Zealand business students, having similar cultural backgrounds, display a range of similar attitudes. However, we find that gender and religiosity have a greater influence on ethical attitudes in the US than they do in New Zealand.
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Introduction In recent decades, there has been a growing interest shown in business ethics (Cardy and Selvarajan 2006). Research in this area has become increasingly relevant with the recent spate of highly publicized scandals and instances of corruption in large corporations (such as Enron, WorldCom, Tyco, Qwest and Arthur Anderson). Moreover, as businesses continue to globalise they face a need to formulate a concept of business ethics that satisfies concerns about corporate accountability (Barclay and Smith 2003). Indeed, the internationalisation of businesses has been identified as the leading factor influencing the study of business ethics (Ibid.); and it has been stated that groups from different cultural backgrounds often have fundamentally different conceptions of what constitutes ethically appropriate action in the business world.
Despite this, most studies in the field of business ethics have focused on a group within a country. There have been- as Fisher et al. (1999) note- far fewer attempts to compare the ethical attitudes and behaviours of businesspeople in two or more countries. Such a study would allow us to better understand the way in which cultural background influences attitudes towards business ethics. Moreover, such an understanding would better equip businesses to deal with international markets- as Payne et al. (1997:1727) argue, in an increasingly globalised business environment „the truly global company must come to grips with the multifaceted legal and moral atmosphere in which it operates.â€&#x; Understanding the cultural values that lie behind ethical conflicts is an important step towards resolving them (Habermas 1990). This paper seeks to address these issues by examining the ethical beliefs of business students from two countries: New Zealand and the United States. Our work will compare both the overall differences between the two groups, as well as the differences in how gender and religion affect ethical attitudes.
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Theoretical Background Culture and Ethics Hofstede (1991:5) describes national culture as „a collective programming of the mind that distinguishes the member of one group or category of people from another.â€&#x; In a comprehensive research programme, he identified five areas in which different groups differed
in
culture
-
individualism,
power
distance,
uncertainity
avoidance,
masculinity/femininity, and long-term orientation. The work of Barkema and Vermeulen (1997) provided evidence that cultural values are stable over time. Culture has been regarded as one of the most important variables influencing ethical attitudes and behaviour (Singhapakdi et al. 1994).
Where countries diverge in culture we are likely to see significant differences in their attitudes towards business ethics. Nyaw and Ng (1994) examined the attitudes of business students in Japan, Hong Kong, Taiwan and Canada. Whitcomb et al. (1998) found that Chinese students and US students had different perceptions of what constituted bribery. Armstrong and Sweeney (1994) found Australian managers were more concerned about unethical conduct than their counterparts in Hong Kong. Kumar and Strandholm (2002) found that the longer foreign students stay in the US; the closer their ethical beliefs matched domestic students. The central idea that emerges from these studies is that different cultures have fundamentally different ideas about what constitutes ethical conduct in business.
On the other hand, countries with similar cultures are likely to have similar ethical attitudes. A comparison of business students in New Zealand and Canada found that they had much in common- a reflection of the two countries common heritage- and there were just a few
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business practices that the New Zealand sample was more likely to deem unethical (Fisher et al., 1999). There have been little to no significant differences noted in questionnaires comparing the ethical attitudes of U.S. and U.K. business students (Whipple and Swords, 1992) and U.S. and Israeli students (Preble and Rachel, 1988). Akaah (1990) found that marketing professionals from Australia, Canada, the U.K. and the U.S. have similar attitudes towards research ethics.
According to the research of Hofstede, New Zealand and the U.S. have closely related cultures. As can be seen in (Table 1) the two countries received similar scores in the five main aspects of cultural differentiation. The two countries are also one of a small number (the others being Australia, Canada, Denmark, Finland, Germany, Ireland, the Netherlands, Norway, Sweden, Switzerland and the UK) where individualism is the highest ranked trait.
Table 1. Hofstede’s Cultural Dimension Scores for the United States and New Zealanda Power
Individualism
Masculinity
Uncertainity
Long-Term
Avoidance
Orientation
Distance
a-
NZ
22
79
58
49
30
U.S.
40
91
62
46
29
Source:
Geert
Hofstedeâ€&#x;s
Cultural
Dimensions
at
http://www.geert-
hofstede.com/hofstede_dimensions.php
Gender and Ethics That men and women see ethical issues differently has received much support in the literature. In their review of the literature relating to gender and ethics, Albaum and Peterson (2006) reported that more than two thirds of the studies they examined reported a significant gender effect. In all of these cases female survey participants were reported as being “more
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ethical� than male survey participants. Moreover, Galbraith and Stephenson (1993) report that- in general- women use a wider variety of rules when making ethical judgements. Given this literature, we would expect to see clear differentiation between male and female ethical attitudes, and that this differentiation would be in the direction of greater ethical orientation on the part of the female respondents.
Religion and Ethics While the relationship between gender and ethical attitudes has received much attention, comparatively few studies have been generated to examine the relationship between religiosity and ethical attitudes. Each of the six studies examined by Albaum and Peterson found that religiosity had a significant influence on attitudes towards business ethics. Those who reported a high level of religious activity were more ethically oriented (and less willing to accept ethically dubious behaviours). Given the extant literature, we would predict that there will be a positive correlation between religiosity and ethical orientation.
Methodology Our research is based on the 2006 study of U.S. business students conducted by Albaum and Peterson. This study surveyed 2,942 undergraduate business students from a representative sample of colleges and universities in the United States. The questionnaire given to these students consisted of 19 Likert-type scale items designed to measure overall ethical sense and general attitudes towards business ethics. There were two types of ethical attitude items. Thirteen referred to general attitudes towards business ethics, while the remaining six were designed to allow researchers to measure the degree of the participantâ€&#x;s attitude ethicality. Albaum and Peterson derived the ethic attitude statements in their survey from several sources including Beltramini et al. (1984) and Hunt et al. (1989).
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Our study replicated Albaum and Petersonâ€&#x;s on a smaller scale within New Zealand. Here our sample population were 90 business students attending the University of Otago.
Findings Overall Cross-Cultural Comparison The response percentages- along with the responses recorded in the Albaum and Peterson survey- are shown in (Table 2). Given the close cultural similarities between the U.S. and New Zealand, we would hypothesize that the average response to the ethical statements would be similar between the two groups. To test this hypothesis, we have used the Studentâ€&#x;s t-test, the results of which are summarized in (Table 3).
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Table 2. Response Percentages for Total Samplea Attitude
Strongly
Statement
Agree
Strongly 2
3
4
5
Disagree
1 1
6
Current ethical standards in
4.2
15.9
31.6
25.6
18.3
4.4
business meet the needs of
1.1
17.8
27.8
36.7
13.3
3.3
Current ethical standards in
5.1
21.1
38.7
22.2
10.8
2.1
business meet the needs of
7.8
33.3
35.6
20
3.3
0
The ethics of business people
1.7
5.3
16.7
28.8
28.6
19
are worse than the ethics of
1.1
5.6
23.6
35.9
25.8
7.9
The ethics of business people
11.5
25.1
27.2
19.2
10.9
6.2
are worse than the ethics of
16.7
30
21.1
22.2
8.9
1.1
of
4.4
18.2
31.7
24.9
14.4
6.3
large
4.5
16.9
24.7
30.3
18
5.6
have
15.3
30.4
25.6
17.7
8.4
2.5
deteriorated over the last 10
2.3
14.9
33.3
29.8
17.2
2.3
Business ethics will get better
7.1
17.7
31.8
26.8
12.4
4.2
in the future
6.7
15.7
30.3
29.2
15.7
2.2
I believe that all business
35.5
29.5
18.3
9.6
4.5
2.4
students should take a formal
12.4
28.1
34.8
11.2
9
4.5
society 2
business 3
people in government 4
people
in
not-for-profit
organisations 5
The
ethical
people
standards
working
in
businesses are worse than the ethical standards of people working in small businesses 6
Business
ethics
years 7
8
course in business ethics
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Table 3. Mean Values of Agreement with Ethics Statements, by Countrya Attitude Statement
US
NZ
p
1
Current ethical standards in business meet the needs of society
3.51
3.53
<.86
2
Current ethical standards in business meet the needs of business
3.18
2.78
<.01
3
The ethics of business people are worse than the ethics of people in government
4.35
4.03
<.01
4
The ethics of business people are worse than the ethics of people in notfor-profit organisations
3.12
2.80
<.02
5
The ethical standards of people working in large businesses are worse than the ethical standards of people working in small businesses
3.46
3.58
<.37
6
Business ethics have deteriorated over the last 10 years
2.81
3.52
<.01
7
Business ethics will get better in the future
3.32
3.39
<.59
8
I believe that all business students should take a formal course in business ethics
2.25
2.89
<.01
9
The growth of the large multinational corporation has led to a decline in ethical behaviour in business
3.08
3.22
<.32
10
Businesses in my country should be expected to operate on a higher ethical level than businesses in other countries
2.97
2.43
<.01
11
Terrorism is affecting business ethics
3.31
3.55
<.11
12
Business managers often engage in behaviours that I consider to be unethical
3.06
3.20
<.36
13
In order to succeed in business it is often necessary to compromise oneâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s ethics
4.18
3.44
<.01
14
Within a business firm, the ends justify the means
4.03
3.77
<.12
15
Business behaviour that is legal is ethical
3.97
3.76
<.16
16
If a manager in a company is discovered to have engaged in unethical behaviour that results primarily in personal gain (rather than corporate gain) he or she should be terminated or fired If a manager in a company is discovered to have engaged in unethical behaviour that results primarily in corporate gain (rather than personal gain) he or she should be terminated or fired Top business executives should state in no uncertain terms that unethical behaviours in their company will not be tolerated
1.99
2.33
<.01
2.28
2.85
<.01
2.02
2.18
<.19
It is important that ethical considerations be taken into account when designing company policies
1.84
1.70
<.15
17
18 19
a- Top line of results = Original study (Albaum, G. & Peterson, R.A. 2006. Ethical Attitudes of Future Business Leaders. Business & Society 45: 300-321). Second line = current study.
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The responses allow us to make a number of conclusions about the ethical sense of business students in both New Zealand and the United States. The first thing to note is, as we expected, there are large number of issues on which the two sample populations are in agreement. But there are a surprisingly large number of issues on which a statistically significant divergence in attitudes can be detected.
The most noticeable divergence is in relation in statement 6: Business ethics have deteriorated over the last 10 years. 71.3% of U.S. students agreed with the statement, compared to only 50.3% of New Zealand students. This difference may be attributable to a number of highprofile business scandals that took place just prior to time the survey was conducted, such as the collapse of Enron, Tyco and WorldCom. These incidences received wide-spread publicity within the United States. This is in keeping with the research of Conroy and Emerson (2006) who found that U.S. student‟s willingness to describe „accounting tricks‟ and „insider trading‟ as ethically acceptable declined as they became aware of the practices of such firms. New Zealand, by contrast, had very few high-profile businesses collapse as a result of unethical practices.
The New Zealand sample was more likely to agree with statement 2- „current ethical standards in business meet the needs of business‟ and statement 3- „the ethics of business people is worse than the ethics of people in government‟. This reflects perhaps a greater trust of government within New Zealand culture in comparison with the culture of the United States; a result of the greater role the state plays in New Zealand‟s economic life compared to the U.S.
10
Another noticeable difference can be seen in the responses to statement 10. U.S. students were more likely to believe that businesses in their own country should operate at a higher ethical level than businesses in other countries. This is similar to the findings of other research projects: Honeycutt et al. (1995) showed the U.S. to be genuinely more interested than other nations in upholding codes of ethics. It is suggested that this reflects unique aspects of American culture, notably a self-definition of the U.S. as a „model to the world.‟
These differences in the idealism of the two cultures studies can also be seen in the diverging answers to statements 13 to 16. For statement 13 and 14 the New Zealand sample was more likely to take the cynical view that to succeed in business one must compromise one‟s ethics, and that the ends justifies the means. They are also less willing to believe that a manager who has engaged in unethical behaviour for either personal or corporate gain should be fired. Altogether, this leads us to conclude that while the U.S. and New Zealand have sufficiently similar cultures to have similar ethical attitudes, there are points where those cultures diverge. These points of divergence can led to different ethical beliefs and attitudes.
Gender and Cross-Cultural Comparison In their study, Albaum and Peterson found slight but significant differences between the two genders. Women were likely to agree with the statements „All business students should take a formal course in business ethics‟ and „Terrorism is affecting business ethics.‟ They were less likely to agree that „Business in my country should operate on a higher ethical level than businesses in other countries‟ and „In order to succeed in business, it is often necessary to compromise one‟s ethics.‟ Our own research (summarised in Table 4) found that within New Zealand, gender had a lower influence on ethically decisions. There were only two statements in which a significant
11
difference can be discerned. Women were significantly less likely to agree that „current ethical standards meet the needs of business‟ and „the ethics of business people are worse than ethics of people in not-for-profit organisations.‟ In the U.S. study, neither of these statements led to a difference of judgment between men and women. From this we can conclude that gender plays a slightly more significant role in informing ethical decision making in the U.S. than it does in New Zealand.
Table 4. Mean Values of Agreement with Ethics Statements, by Gendera Attitude Statement
Female
Male
p
1
Current ethical standards in business meet the needs of society
3.51 3.53
3.52 3.51
<.78 <.93
2
Current ethical standards in business meet the needs of business
3.20 2.93
3.19 2.51
<.80 <.04
3
The ethics of business people are worse than the ethics of people in government
4.31 4.14
4.37 3.86
<.18 <.23
4
The ethics of business people are worse than the ethics of people in not-for-profit organisations
3.15 3.02
3.07 2.46
<.15 <.04
5
3.49 3.59
3.42 3.51
<.13 <.78
6
The ethical standards of people working in large businesses are worse than the ethical standards of people working in small businesses Business ethics have deteriorated over the last 10 years
2.73 3.51
2.89 3.49
<.00 <.92
7
Business ethics will get better in the future
3.41 3.52
3.23 3.15
<.00 <.15
8
I believe that all business students should take a formal course in business ethics
2.14 3.07
2.38 2.61
<.00 <.09
9
The growth of the large multinational corporation has led to a decline in ethical behaviour in business
3.11 3.27
3.05 3.11
<.24 <.50
10
Businesses in my country should be expected to operate on a higher ethical level than businesses in other countries
3.10 3.42
3.17 3.17
<.00 <.46
11
Terrorism is affecting business ethics
3.29 3.52
3.49 3.60
<.00 <.74
12
Business managers often engage in behaviours that I consider to be unethical
3.06 3.24
3.06 3.14
<.92 <.68
13
In order to succeed in business it is often necessary to compromise one’s ethics
4.29 3.89
4.06 3.46
<.00 <.15
12
14
Within a business firm, the ends justify the means
4.05 3.63
3.84 3.88
<.00 <.36
15
Business behaviour that is legal is ethical
4.06 4.00
3.89 3.97
<.00 <.92
16
If a manager in a company is discovered to have engaged in unethical behaviour that results primarily in personal gain (rather than corporate gain) he or she should be terminated or fired If a manager in a company is discovered to have engaged in unethical behaviour that results primarily in corporate gain (rather than personal gain) he or she should be terminated or fired Top business executives should state in no uncertain terms that unethical behaviours in their company will not be tolerated
1.94 2.38
2.04 2.28
<.00 <.72
2.40 3.00
2.63 2.80
<.00 <.44
1.97 2.18
2.07 2.17
<.04 <.96
It is important that ethical considerations be taken into account when designing company policies
1.74 1.67
1.94 1.74
<.00 <.70
17
18 19
a- Top line of results = Original study (Albaum, G. & Peterson, R.A. (2006). Ethical Attitudes of Future Business Leaders. Business & Society 45:300-321). Second line = current study.
Religiosity and Ethics In their study Albaum and Peterson found that religiosity had a significant influence on attitudes towards a number of the ethical statements. Specifically, respondents who reported themselves as being more religious were more likely to disagree with such statements as „Within a business firm, the ends justifies the means,‟ and agree with such statements as „It is important that ethical considerations be taken into account when designing company policies.‟
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Table 5. Mean Values of Agreement with Ethics Statements, by Religiositya AttitudeStatement
1
2
3
4
Very
Somewhat
Not Very
Religious
Religious
Religious
Current ethical standards in business meet the
3.56
3.46
3.57
<.08
needs of society
4.14
3.30
3.53
<.20
Current ethical standards in business meet the
3.27
3.16
3.17
<.11
needs of business
3.28
2.50
2.80
<.16
The ethics of business people are worse than
4.25
4.30
4.50
<.00
the ethics of people in government
4.00
4.16
3.99
<.84
The ethics of business people are worse than
3.16
3.10
3.12
<.64
the
not-for-profit
3.29
2.95
2.70
<.43
The ethical standards of people working in
3.49
3.45
3.51
<.53
large businesses are worse than the ethical
4.00
4.05
3.35
<.06
Business ethics have deteriorated over the last
2.71
2.82
2.87
<.04
10 years
2.43
3.73
3.55
<.02
Business ethics will get better in the future
3.62
3.70
3.68
<.38
3.43
3.45
3.35
<.95
I believe that all business students should take a
2.06
2.25
2.43
<.00
formal course in business ethics
2.14
2.10
3.21
<.00
multinational
3.14
3.07
3.04
<.32
corporation has led to a decline in ethical
2.14
3.12
3.35
<.02
Businesses in my country should be expected to
2.81
3.00
3.04
<.01
operate on a
3.57
3.40
3.38
<.40
3.35
3.30
3.56
<.00
3.00
3.45
3.64
<.34
Business managers often engage in behaviours
2.96
3.11
3.03
<.04
that I consider to be unethical
3.00
3.20
3.16
<.61
In order to succeed in business it is often
4.50
4.09
4.06
<.00
necessary to compromise oneâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s ethics
4.43
3.65
3.67
<.37
Within a business firm, the ends justify the
4.11
3.87
3.97
<.00
means
4.28
3.52
3.73
<.38
ethics
of
people
in
p
organisations 5
standards of people working in small businesses 6
7
8
9
The
growth
of
the
large
behaviour in business 10
higher
ethical
level
than
businesses in other countries 11
12
13
14
Terrorism is affecting business ethics
14
15
16
Business behaviour that is legal is ethical
4.05
3.94
3.99
<.22
4.71
3.67
4.01
<.16
If a manager in a company is discovered to have
1.97
2.00
1.98
<.86
engaged in unethical behaviour that results
2.71
2.33
2.31
<.70
If a manager in a company is discovered to have
2.33
2.59
2.54
<.00
engaged in unethical behaviour that results
2.71
2.81
2.98
<.76
Top business executives should state in no
1.86
2.08
2.04
<.00
uncertain terms that unethical behaviours in
2.00
2.14
2.21
<.87
It is important that ethical considerations be
1.73
1.89
1.83
<.00
taken into account when designing company
1.29
1.62
1.77
<.30
primarily
in
personal
gain
(rather
than
corporate gain) he or she should be terminated or fired 17
primarily in corporate gain (rather than personal gain) he or she should be terminated or fired 18
their company will not be tolerated 19
policies
a- Top line of results = Original study (Albaum, G. & Peterson, R.A. (2006). Ethical Attitudes of Future Business Leaders. Business & Society 45:300-321). Second line = current study.
Our study found religiosity had some affect on ethical attitudes, but the relationship is not as significant as predicted in the literature. Our findings are shown in Table 5. As can be seen, while the relationship is not as strong as in the U.S. study, there are a number of areas in which religiosity has an important influence on ethical attitudes. Firstly, both U.S. and New Zealand respondents with a high degree of religiosity were more likely than the overall sample to agree that business students should be required to take a course in ethics (statement 8). This seems to reflect a belief in the importance of moral instruction in both sets of respondents. Secondly, both U.S. and New Zealand respondents with a high degree of religiosity were more likely than the overall sample to believe that business ethics have
15
deteriorated over the last 10 years (statement 6). In the New Zealand case, this may be related to religious New Zealand‟s greater acceptance of statement 9- „the growth of the large multinational corporation has led to a decline in ethical behaviour in business.‟ Overall it would seem that religiosity has an affect on the ethical attitudes of New Zealand business students, albeit at a lower rate than in the U.S. This may be because of New Zealand‟s more secular society- the percentage of adults attending religious services at least once a month is half that of the U.S. (Smith and Sawkins 2003). Thus the respondent‟s self-identification as „very religious,‟ „somewhat religious‟ etc., means different things in both countries.
Conclusion As predicted by the literature, business students in New Zealand and the United States share very similar attitudes towards business ethics. However there are a number of areas in which they differ. Specifically, New Zealanders were more likely to believe that the government acts more ethically than business, and that to succeed in business one must compromise one‟s ethics. The U.S. sample was far more likely to believe that business ethics had deteriorated over the past 10 years, and support the teaching of ethics in business schools. Gender and religiosity affected ethical decision making in both cases, although the effect was more prominent in the U.S. sample. What we can conclude from this is that even in countries with similar cultures, there will always be areas of divergence. The U.S. sample was more idealistic and less trusting of government than the New Zealand sample. These cultural differences are reflected in ethical differences.
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