BUSN9229 Sustainability and Ethics in Management

2015

4.5

1 x 2-hour lecture weekly
1 x 1-hour tutorial weekly

BUSN9204 has been successfully completed

The topic aims to assist participants to think strategically on a domestic and international scale on a sustainable level. The topic also requires you to think about how an organisation functions from the top management, considering the way in which an organisation coordinates and integrates sustainable policies, which includes social, economic, environmental and ethical. Sustainable management policies are not confined to profit-making business organisations, nor only to the organisation as a whole. The concepts are useful also for not-for-profit (NFP) or non-government organisations (NGOs) as well as for organisational sub-units and individual career planning. Participants will review case studies and draw on their own knowledge from work experience to assess sustainability practices involving social, environmental, ethical and economic issues within organisations.

This topic aims to introduce participants to the analysis of sustainable management which considers the 'triple bottom line' in organisational planning and implementation. The major areas for consideration are the social, environmental, ethical and economic performance issues that make claim to an organisation's sustainable practice. The topic is designed to develop and sharpen your analytical management skills in applying the basic fundamentals of sustainable management practices to selected organisations within a multitude of industries.

On successful completion of this topic, students will be able to:

1. Explain and analyse various stakeholder perspectives on corporate social responsibility
2. Describe and analyse the factors influencing ethical behaviour and outline approaches to ethical behaviour
3. Explain and analyse major problem types facing decision makers with particular regard to sustainability: social, ethical, economic and environmental
4. With reference to the concept of sustainable competitive advantage describe the process of sustainable economic performance (profit maximisation) and recognise problems with implementation
5. Distinguish between the different ethical theories and approaches to ethical decision making
6. Identify the ethical and global ramifications of the strategic management process
7. Apply the principles of content analysis to analyse and evaluate a firm's activities in order to gauge/ measure the level of corporate sustainability
8. Examine and compare corporate governance systems and explain why governance is important to organisations
9. Identify and discuss ethical issues potentially faced by professionals.