Gerald F. Cavanagh

Spirituality for managers: context and critique

Spirituality enables a businessperson to gain a more integrated perspective on their firm, family, neighbors, community and self. Hence, business people and business faculty show a significant increase in interest in spirituality in the workplace. The new interest is measured by the growing number of professional presentations, journal articles, books and conferences devoted to the subject. A consensus is emerging on the principal elements of a spirituality for working people. It includes acknowledging God, the importance of prayer, other people and a sustainable world. Some managers and firms encourage spirituality in the workplace. Many religiously‐oriented universities are integrating mission, spirituality and service in their education.

Making Business Ethics Practical

Our critics confuse the role normative ethical theory can take in business ethics. We argue that as a practical discipline, business ethics must focus on norms, not the theories from which the norms derive. It is true that our original work is defective, but not in its form, but in its neglect of contemporary advances in feminist ethics.

The importance of ethics to job performance: An empirical investigation of managers' perceptions

This study probed a crucial assumption underlying much of the ethics theory and research: do managers perceive ethical behavior to be an important personal job requirement? A large sample of managers from a cross-section of industries and job functions indicated that, compared to other job duties, certain ethical behaviors were moderate to somewhat major parts of their jobs. Some noteworthy differences by industry, organization size, tenure and job function were also found. These findings underscore the importance of ethics for business education. They also have implications for manager selection, training, and development by organizations.

Integrating Spirituality into the Workplace: Theory and Practice

The presence of spirituality in the workplace meets a variety of personal and professional business objectives, including meaningfulness of work, ethics and productivity. Three essential dimensions of spirituality—beliefs, rituals and community—can be developed in the workplace. It is the clear, coordinated, comprehensive and continued development of these dimensions that cultivates workplace spirituality and promotes the related individual and organizational business benefits.

POLITICAL COUNTERBALANCE AND PERSONAL VALUES: ETHICS AND RESPONSIBILITY IN A GLOBAL ECONOMY

The extraordinarily rapid growth of global communications, information technology, and investments have energized hundreds of millions of business people and opened up immense opportunities in most of the countries of the world. Yet this apparently inevitable global business growth also has parallel dangers for people. In two areas the weaknesses ofthe global economy are evident: (1) Global business and financial operations with little accountability for long- term human needs; and (2) Goals and values of business managers that are not sufficient for business or for life. products, services, jobs, and family income, along with the creativity, flexibility, and entrepreneurship that go with it. These successes, plus democracys triumph over communism and socialism, have convinced most people that such global free markets are inevitable and irreversible. Nevertheless, serious problems also accompany global markets. This fast-moving global economy results in major ethical problems. The fol? lowing are the result of a rampant, global free market system, with few regulations or constraints:

The Invisible War: Pursuing Self-Interest at Work

The article reviews the book “The Invisible War: Pursuing Self-Interest at Work,” by Samuel A. Culbert and John J. McDonough.

Religion and Business: The Catholic Church and the American Economy

In 1986, the American Catholic Bishops wrote a letter on the American economy. It went through three revisions, took three years to write, and involved the input of thousands of people. In its final form, it elaborated several moral principles and described the implications of these principles for economic policies pertaining to employment, poverty, agriculture, the international economy, and collaboration. The letter has incited a significant amount of discussion, both pro and con, and its policy recommendations have generated considerable controversy. The authors detail the process of writing the letter, review its contents, and analyze its positions.

Research and Teaching on Social Issues Some Accomplishments and Future Challenges

This essay comments on some accomplishments and future challenges concerning research and teaching in social issues. The author chaired the All-Academy of Management Task Force on Ethics. The SIM Division’s role is to examine critically the suitability of the actions and policies of business managers, organizations (mostly business firms), and the free market system itself. The scope of inquiry covers ethics, governance of organizations, and stakeholders. The emphasis in that inquiry is on the benefits and harms to people from businesses and the market system. Three major issues deserve our examination: 1) the growing influence of the global corporation, 2) global climate change and the negative environmental impact of our lifestyles, and 3) the moral maturity or lack thereof of contemporary decision makers and citizens. Corporations have immense influence, reflected in the growing role of lobbying. Environmental degradation is one of the most serious problems that face people of our ever smaller planet, so it challenges us to examine our lifestyles and the carbon footprint of our actions. We are now able to research and teach the development of good moral habits (virtues) and character.