The Morality of Everyday Activities: Not the Right, but the Good Thing to Do

This article attempts to understand and develop the morality of everyday activities in organizations. Aristotle's concept of phronesis, practical wisdom, is utilized to describe the morality of the everyday work activities at two call centres of an Australian insurance company. The ethnographic...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Journal of business ethics 2008-09, Vol.81 (3), p.587-598
Main Author: Nyberg, Daniel
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Ambiguity
Applied ethics
Aristotelean ethics
Aristotle
Australia
Business and Management
Business Ethics
Business management
Business practices
Business studies
Call centers
Case studies
Codes
Consequentialism
Corporate image
Corporate responsibility
Deontological ethics
Education
Ethical behavior
Ethical codes
Ethics
Insurance companies
Management
Moral judgment
Morality
Organizational analysis
Organizational effectiveness
organizational ethics
Philosophy
phronesis
Principles
Quality of Life Research
situated ethics
Social ethics
Studies
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Summary:This article attempts to understand and develop the morality of everyday activities in organizations. Aristotle's concept of phronesis, practical wisdom, is utilized to describe the morality of the everyday work activities at two call centres of an Australian insurance company. The ethnographic data suggests that ethical judgements at the lower level of the organization are practical rather than theoretical; emergent rather than static; ambiguous rather than clear-cut; and particular rather than universal. Ethical codes are of limited value here and it is argued that by developing phronesis members of the organization can improve their capacity to deal with this ethical complexity.
ISSN:0167-4544
1573-0697
DOI:10.1007/s10551-007-9530-1