Tuomo Takala

An alternative view of relationship marketing: a framework for ethical analysis

At present, a continuing widespread debate on the moral nature of business is widely recognized. However, it seems that the ethical evaluation of business practices is not very common in the area of relationship marketing. Analyses relationship marketing from the viewpoint of ethical theories. The theories applied are deontology, utilitarianism, virtue ethics, and emotivism. Reviews and analyses studies on relationship marketing issues in order to construct a framework for the ethical analysis of relationship marketing principles. Finally presents a framework for ethical analysis in the form of a constructive solution. Includes a model or code of business ethics for relationship marketers. The code will help make relationship marketing practices ethically longer lasting and, in this way, make the practices also more competitive and profitable.

Individual, Collective and Social Responsibility of the Firm

The main concern of this paper is the moral responsibility of the firm, as well as of the individuals in a firm, to uphold environmental protection. Much of the business ethics literature defines corporate social responsibility in terms of stakeholder relationships, and the emphasis is frequently on collective as opposed to individual responsibility. This paper has three objectives. The first is to clarify the nature of moral responsibility, and the distinction between legal and moral responsibility. The second objective is to steer academicians and others towards a new vision of the firm. We argue that a firm is not just a singular legal entity but also a collectivity of morally responsible individuals who are liable for immoral acts of the firm. By expanding the boundary of responsibility of action from an intangible collectivity - the firm, to all the individuals within it, this vision moves beyond the typical emphasis on the firm as being the only moral agent responsible for corporate actions. The paper emphasizes not simply the responsibility of top echelon managers, but of every employee across ranks. The third goal of this paper is to examine the circumstances where application of moral responsibility becomes crucial, for instance, in the context of protection of the natural environment by a firm and its employees.

Ownership, responsibility and leadership – a historical perspective

The aim of this article is to present the great lines of managerial thoughts concerning ownership, business, social responsibility and leadership. The perspective of consideration is historical, and especially conceptual. We noticed that in the twentieth century a modern business ideology began to take form. Old suppositions according to the classical economic theory about the nature of economic activities started to give way when the modern professional manager type came into the management of the firm. At that time also there developed the idea of the firm as an institution with many targets. The position of the firm in society changed, people started to make demands for a wider social responsibility. It was desired that this responsibility would be allocated to the firm and the top management on the basis that they had the obligation to do so. In this way management as a public steward is obliged to maintain and develop social targets. Further, it was essential that firms themselves began to understand the necessity of taking responsibility. Instead of maximizing profit in the short run, this was replaced by the relevant functioning which emphasized the firm’s long‐term benefit.

Managerial Work and Lying: A Conceptual Framework and an Explorative Case Study

In the last few years there has been a lot of fuzzy talk, scientific discourses and comments of business life about the values, ethics and social responsibility of companies. Companies are expected to have also some other tasks besides that of gaining profit. A part of the tasks which management has, except for thinking of the benefits of their own organization, are things which work for the well-being of the whole society. Issues like this are, among others, working for employment, taking care of the environment, and promoting consumer security.While making decisions of their own action in the company, the management often has to face ethical solutions. The benefit of the company may be different from that of other business stakeholders. In this case, the manager has to decide for which part he should act, for the company or for the stakeholders. The ethical problems in deciding may appear also inside the company. In our study, we are very interested in the decision-making processes which are connected with the honesty of the manager and his/her being honest with the stakeholders both inside and outside the company.In our research, we have tried to create a framework which helps us to find out in what kind of situations a manager faces the problem whether he/she should tell the truth to the stakeholders or not. We have also studied the means which the managers use in their potential dishonesty. Further, we have tried to find out how the managers see themselves in situations where they cannot tell the truth or have to cover it.

Business and Leadership Ethics Conference – three current themes

Collects thoughts that emerged during the recent virtual conference, Business and Leadership Ethics. For the consumer, legislation often seems insufficient to control the activities of business and business suffers as a result. A company’s ethical stance is frequently as important as more traditional considerations like product, service and even pricing. Considers three themes as a basis for the ethical orientation of organizations. Postmodernism is important – after all, this new collective consciousness is largely responsible for the changing view of business that necessitates this study. Despite links with older business styles, competition can be used to shift the ethical base, provided that the ethics of competition (as in sport) are also considered. Total quality management can easily be adapted – the TQM fundamental of “excellence” can become “ethical excellence”. Concludes that as business and society become partners a true moral leadership will be needed to make the relationship work.

Power and strategic change in a multinational industrial corporation

Purpose – The aim of the study was to analyze the use of power in a strategic change process within a large forest industry company. The organization in question had a total of 7,700 employees, 6‐8 organizational levels, over 30 production units and a widespread international sales network. The study highlighted the organizations internal narration as an important element in the use of power. It started in conjunction with the appointment of the new management group and continued throughout the two‐year monitoring period, so that gradually all organizational layers were involved in interpreting their roles and positions in the new structure.Design/methodology/approach – The empirical data were collected during a period of more than two years through participatory observation and the change narrative was made using the change report method. The use of power was observed from the perspective of the management group. The researcher had a dual role; he served both as a researcher and a member of the manageme...

Strategy implementation as fantasising – becoming the leading bank

In this empirical case study we explore the fantasy nature of strategy work and propose fantasising as a framework contributing to the nascent literature dealing with the previously overlooked fantasy nature of strategy. More specifically, our interest is on examining how the meaning of official strategy gets constructed as it is being implemented, as well as and how and why the perceptions may evolve during implementation. Our data consists of official strategy documents and interviews from Finlands largest financial services group and its largest unit. The interviews cover all organisational levels, enabling us to reveal the variations of perceptions of strategy as it is being implemented. The data analysis is carried out by means of qualitative interpretation. According to our findings, the main goal of becoming the leading bank, as outlined in the official strategy, had been adopted throughout the organisation hierarchically. However, conceptions of what would constitute ‘a leading bank’ varied, especially horizontally. The plausibility of the official strategy is constructed through rational techniques (e.g. numerical ‘objective’ accounting information) intertwined with storytelling. As a result we propose that strategy implementation may best be understood as fantasising involving two forms: functional (explicit, short-term-oriented) and symbolic (metaphorical, long-term-oriented). We offer fantasising in these two forms as an addition to fantasy-oriented strategy literature for further exploration to better understand the nature of strategy work.

Ethical Investment Policy of the Evangelical Lutheran Church of Finland

Business ethics and investment ethics have been a topic of lively discussion in Finland in recent years. In the activities of the Church and the parishes, investment operations are by no means an end in itself. The main purpose of Church investments is to secure adequate conditions for operations also in the long term. A major part of the investment activities has to do with investing the assets of the Church pension fund. With these assets the Church must be able to cover its statutory pension liability. The parishes, for their part, have to be prepared for certain major expenses such as renovations from time to time, and therefore it is important how their assets are managed. The low interest rate level has made it necessary to resort to other forms of investment than bank deposits in order to preserve the real value of the assets.

Racism and ethics in the globalized business world

This paper analyzes the concept of racism in the context of business ethics and globalization. It first introduces three ethical traditions to understand moral issues in business: deontological, utilitarian and virtue ethics. Then it discusses about the challenges and demands that globalization has set to multicultural and multinational business operations. Third, it clarifies how racism works when it is understood as an ideology‐based phenomenon. It argues that there is a great value of knowing how racism works for the development of an anti‐racist and nondiscriminating organization. Although any of the three traditions on ethical thinking does not give direct answer to the question of how to develop and manage an anti‐racist business organization, but connected with the understanding of racism they can be useful tools for the leader of a multicultural organization.

Apposition, contradiction, conflict and domination

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to qualitatively describe and explain the contemporary Finnish discourse of municipal managers. The emphasis within is on analyzing the encounters of the public sector management discourse and the private sector management discourse, and the effects that these encounters have on the construction and representation of municipal management. Design/methodology/approach – The study is based on a three-phase discourse analysis, proceeding from the textual and linguistic level through interpretive analysis to critical analysis. This analysis is based on the proceedings and presentations of a seminar of municipal leadership and management, arranged in 2013 in Finland. Findings – The encounters of the discourses form three types: apposition of actors; contradiction and conflict of contexts; and domination of the private sector discourse. Apposition is a surface-level phenomenon, synonymizing the actors of the two discourses. Contradiction and conflict are caused by the incom...