BUSINESS ETHICS Undergraduate Syllabus

Department of Management & Global Business

Rutgers Business School - Newark & New Brunswick
Syllabus Fall 2015
Note: This syllabus is subject to change
Professor Christopher Young
Office:
Office hours:
Courses:

Course website:
Phone:
Email:

1WP, Room 1022

12:30-1:30pm on Tuesday and Thursday in Newark, or scheduled
appointment
33:522:334
Section 01 BRR 5101 1:40-3:00
Section 02 BRR 5109 3:20-4:40
Section 04 BRR 1071 6:40-9:30
http://blackboard.newark.rutgers.edu/
347-522-0480
chris.young@rutgers.edu
COURSE OVERVIEW & OBJECTIVES

Overview:
This course provides a multidisciplinary, interactive study of business ethics and social
responsibility in business organizations; raises awareness of difficult ethical conflicts and
dilemmas in business; and explores the application of multiple frameworks and decision-making
tools. Further, the course features an overview of foundational concepts such as virtue theory,
rights, justice, utilitarianism, stakeholder management and social contract theory as well as a
review of relevant psychological and sociological influences in decision-making and policymaking. These concepts will be applied to business cases that depict dilemmas faced by
managers working in various business roles and industries. The core concepts are applied to the
international marketplace, where issues grow more complex because of factors such as religion,
culture, national sovereignty, and stages of economic development, as well as the absence of
authoritative political and regulatory institutions. Disciplinary perspectives include professional
and applied ethics, law, and management. At the end of the course, students should possess a
richer understanding of their own position on ethical issues in business and a broader sense of the
available approaches to resolving such issues.
This course will provide you with core knowledge of major topics in business ethics, and will
assist you in integrating these major topics with other core areas in the curriculum, and skills in
writing, presentation, analysis, and advocacy. Areas of concentration in Business Ethics will be:

Major normative approaches to ethicsdeontology, utilitarianism, virtue ethics, others

1

Ethics in different culturesrelativism and other responses to differences in ethics

The relationship between business and government

Ethics and markets

Moral developmentHaidt

The role of the corporationshareholder primacy, stakeholder management

Corporate citizenship and corporate social responsibility

The relationship of business ethics to finance, accounting, supply chain, management,

marketing, information systems, and international business (around half the course will
be devoted inter-subjective material)

Management often involves making value-laden judgments under conditions of uncertainty.

Business Ethics is designed to develop your skills in dealing with such managerial situations. In
particular, you should gain:

Greater ability to make clear, logically sound, and factually well-supported arguments as
to what should be done to resolve business issues with an ethical dimension

Enhanced skills in identifying, articulating, refining, and deepening their own ethical
perspectives and relating them to business practice

Better knowledge of the relevant ethical approaches for dealing with business issues

Greater strength in being able to understand the position of the other side, to state that
position, and to appreciate its value

Better skills in writing and presenting on issues in business that involve value-laden
judgment under conditions of uncertainty

Enhanced ability to analyze and take reasoned positions on current business topics in the
news

A better sense of the skills involved in interdisciplinary, cross-functional, and general

management

A stronger foundation for acting ethically as a manager

Course Objectives:
1.

Gain knowledge of major normative approaches to business ethics and their

relationship to practice.

2.

Develop skills in identifying, analyzing, and resolving ethical issues in a wide

variety of business domains.

3.

Clarify, refine, and deepen your perspective on ethical issues in business and
increase your ability to contribute constructively to the resolution of these

issues.
REQUIRED READING MATERIALS
The Moral Life: An Introductory Reader in Ethics and Literature, Pojman (Available in
bookstore)
Morality, Competition and the Firm, Heath (Available in the bookstore)
Why Some Things Should Not Be For Sale, Satz (Available in the bookstore)
Wall Street Values: Business Ethics and the Global Financial Crisis, Santoro (Available
in the bookstore)
Harvard cases. Go To: https://cb.hbsp.harvard.edu/cbmp/access/39742375 [Register at
the site, purchase the cases]
Articles posted on blackboard.
COURSE ACTIVITIES AND REQUIRED WORK

Two Exams. Exams will cover all course materials. This includes material from books
and cases that are presented, material that is presented that is not from the book, and
material from the book that is not presented.

Group Case Presentations. You will each be part of a case presentation group that will
lead class discussion and present the analysis of a case you will be assigned. Your
overheads and class handouts will be your groups deliverable. Individual grades for the
group presentation may vary if contributions vary.

Personal Ethical Challenge. I will ask you each to describe an ethical challenge that you
or someone you know faced in business (about 1,200 words). After describing the

challenge in depth, you will analyze it using the concepts you learned in the class and you
will have to provide an outcome to the dilemma. This is due with the final exam.

Class Participation. Understanding ethical situations, forming ethical judgments,

prioritizing ethical values, and implementing ethical judgments are not spectator sports.
To grasp fully the difficult ethical situations business managers face, you must wrestle
with them. Therefore, participation in classroom discussion is a crucial component of
classroom success. If I know you by first name, you are certain that you will get a good
class participation grade. (participation is 50% of your score)

In addition, during each class there will be questions presented using Top Hat,
and they will be tallied at the end of the semester. These questions will be graded.
Your score will be based on the number of correct divided by the total number of
questions asked. (daily questions is 50% of your class participation score)

Course Grading:

Mid Term Exam

Final Exam
Group presentation/Case
Personal Ethical Challenge
Class Participation:

30%
30%
5%
15%
20%

Grading Criteria for Class Participation

(a) Class attendance is absolutely essential for this course: the daily participation grades
reflect attendance. Only documented illnesses, emergencies, and religious holidays will be
recognized as legitimate absences. Job interviews, job fairs and fraternity events are not
legitimate absences. It is best to contact me promptly in case of a legitimate absence. 3
missed classes and its an automatic one grade reduction in the final grade (example: A goes
to B, B goes to C, etc..). For every additional class miss you will drop grade.
(b) Disrupting the class will negatively affect your participation grade. This includes
arriving late to class. Please, respect your follow students and professor and do not disrupt
the class in any way.
(c) Participation grades depend on the quality and quantity of participation. In particular, the
case discussion classes provide important opportunities to participate and develop strategic
skills and your participation in 'case' classes will be weighted more heavily.
In evaluating your contributions to case discussions, I use the following questions:
(1) Have you read and analyzed the case in depth?
(2) Do you use the case data constructively to analyze the issues and make
recommendations?
4

(3) Do you use the concepts and frameworks taught in the course to usefully analyze the
case?
(4) Are you a good listener? Do you listen and learn from others in class?
(5) Does your participation fit in with the flow of the class discussion and show that you
have been listening and reacting to others' points?
(6) Do you constructively debate points with other students? Do you provoke a dialogue with
other students?
(7) Do you present useful recommendations justified by your analysis and/or by the class
discussion?
(8) Do you help us to look creatively at strategic problems and solutions?
I place less value on participation that primarily repeats case facts without analysis or disrupts
the flow of the class discussion without reason.
If you attend class but do not regularly participate in the discussion, do not expect to
receive a passing grade in the class participation . Remember that effective communication is
critical in the business world and that, if you have problems communicating (for example, due to
shyness), this class provides you with the opportunity to tackle them. Please feel free to discuss
any participation issues with me (before it's too late and the semester is ending!) I will do my
best to assist you, as long as it's early enough in the semester.
Group Case Presentation:
You are assigned to a group. The group presentation of the case should last no more than 60
minutes. The presentation should explain the case dilemma, the options available to address the
dilemma and the action advocated by the group. Actions should be supported with logic and
rigor and the case dilemma should be analyzed with care and great criticism. The group will
need to address additional questions of the class, so to inspire further thought about the case and
further analyze other normative considerations. Grades will be based upon: identification of
the ethical dilemma, identification of possible solutions to the dilemma, the groups choice to
solve the dilemma accompanied with great care and logic to support the decision, quality of
presentation (both verbal and visual), and questions posed to the class. There will be six (6)
groups this semester, and each group will go once.
Personal Ethical Dilemma
The ethical dilemma you choose should be a decision (i.e., a choice between two or more
alternatives). Each of those alternatives should be something a reasonable person could argue for
(using a principle-based argument). If one of your choices is obviously wrong or obviously right,
its not an ethical dilemma --- so do not use this as a case. Breaking the law is not considered an
ethical dilemma. Do not choose cases where someone is breaking the law and your arguing
for/against the action. Change as many names and places as you need to make sure this will not
betray any confidences or make you uncomfortable. My goal is to see your reasoning process,
not to know your private information. Remember to write in the first person when needed. Please
dont analyze a major social issue (e.g., the death penalty is only relevant if you must pull the

switch). When completing this, make sure to spend time analyzing and establishing a solution
based upon one of the ethical systems discussed. No more than 1,200 words.
Group Project Contribution:
If your groups participation has been uneven, please email me an evaluation of the individual
member contributions by the last day of class. To do so, evaluate each member of your team
(including yourself) on a 1-100 scale in terms of their individual contribution to your team this
semester with a 1 equating to Who is this, Ive never heard of them! to a 100 being someone
who easily met or surpassed your expectations and was a great contributor. If you give 100 to
each person in your group - that would mean everyone provided a more-or-less equal and
valuable contribution. If I do not receive input from you, I will assume that was the case.
Editing:
The above assignments should be carefully written and edited. Sloppy writing, poor grammar
and/or spelling mistakes will influence the grade. The same is not true for the exams because the
testing conditions are different from the conditions in which the above assignments are
completed.
Submission of Assignments
All assignments are to be handed in, in person, by you. I cannot take electronic submissions
and late papers will lose five (5) points for each day a paper is handed in beyond the due
date.
Examinations:
The exams will be a combination of multiple choice, short-answer, and essay questions. In the
event of an emergency, makeup exams may be administered following (not before) the
administration of the general exam. If you are unable to be at an exam, it is important to contact
me immediately.
The final grade is straight forward
A
AB+
B
BC+
C
D
F

greater than a 93
90 to 92.9
87-89.9
83-86.9
80-82.9
77-79.9
73-76.9
C70-72.9
greater than a 65 and including a 69.9
less than a 65

CLASS POLICIES
1. Academic and personal integrity: Violations of honor codes and other integrity problems
are completely unacceptable. In doing projects/ assignments, you should cite all external
sources of information (including Internet sources), fully and completely. Under no
circumstances, should you "recycle" materials from another class or from students who took
the class in the past. To maintain fairness to all other students, violators of academic
integrity will be penalized by receiving failing grades and will be reported to the
appropriate University authorities. I will use the Turn-it-in functionality in Blackboard to
assure that your papers are not plagiarized.
2. You are expected to do all the assignments by their due dates, attend all classes, and be
prepared for class discussion. If you expect to miss more than three class meetings (including
for job interviews), consider taking the class during another semester.
3. If you miss a class, it is your responsibility to find out from classmates what materials were
covered, what assignments are due, and what (if any) handouts were distributed in class. If
you miss a class when a surprise quiz was given, you will not be allowed to make up the quiz
(unless you had a valid and documented emergency).
4. I will attempt to do everything I can to use the class time effectively and ask that you do the
same. This includes arriving, starting, and ending on time. Please respect your follow
students and professor and do not disrupt the class in any way.
5. All written work should be typed and submitted by the due date. Please write your team number
and name, the names of all team members, and your section number on the written work!
6. For weather-related class cancellations, please call the Rutgers main number (973-932-INFO)
or 973-353-1766. If I have to cancel the class for any reason, I will send an email to the class
roster.
CLASS ADMINISTRATION
1. I would like to know each of you personally and make the class atmosphere as informal as is
feasible!
2. I will ask that each of you put up a name card, each class. Place these cards in front of you
during class. This will help me to keep track of your class contributions.
3. I frequently call on students to summarize readings and participate in the discussion. Be
prepared for this!
4. I will use Blackboard to post copies of the PowerPoint presentations that I use in class,
readings and other files for the discussion of current topics.

5. Please feel free to contact me with any questions or concerns you have during my office
hours or at any other mutually convenient time. Email is a great way to communicate, so
dont hesitate to use it. I will try to help you on any day of the week (as long as I am in town
or otherwise available).
SEE PRELIMINARY COURSE OUTLINE EXCEL FILE ON BLACKBOARD