by Mario Luis Tavares Ferreira

Created on: April 14, 2009   Last Updated: June 22, 2009

About Ethics: "If you can't look yourself in the mirror for something you're about to do, don't do it."

Maybe it is not the unique cause, but, for sure, it is an important and fundamental reason that worsened the current economic crisis.

If we add greed, lack of integrity and a business environment without control, we have the perfect scenario to unscrupulous people develop their affairs.

To understand the core issue and the reason because Ethics are a so important point to have a balanced business environment and allow a stable global development, we need to have a clear concept of what Ethics are.

When a reporter asked Peter Drucker what he would teach in a lecture about Ethics, he answered that it would be the shortest one in the world. He would just say: "If you can't look yourself in the mirror for something you're about to do, don't do it."

Colins Dictionary defines Ethics as moral beliefs and rules about right and wrong. An ethic of a particular kind is an idea or moral belief that influences the behaviour, attitudes, and philosophy of a group of people. Webster Dictionary defines as a discipline that deals with what is good and bad and with moral duty and obligation, or as the principles of conduct governing an individual or a group. Larrouse, a French Dictionary, defines as a part of philosophy that focus on the fundamentals of moral, or as the set of moral principles that are the base of conduct of anyone.

Ethics is about morality and to bringing damage to anyone, to the business, environment, colleague, partner, neighbour, friend, and so on.

Business is Business and Ethics are Ethics. The grey area that many people try to develop, to be used as excuse to fail or to allow, or endorse, unacceptable ethical situations must not exist.

The current economic crisis highlighted the problem of lack of Ethics, but actually we are having that problem for decades and not only in the financial business environment. Just remember the Enron case and others recent disagreeable news.

To steal, to kill and to harm others aren't morally acceptable behaviours in any place in the world. Business rules are made by the human beings and followed in a moral or immoral way, as their conscience and education says.

What we are seeing is lack of Conscience, Ethics, Integrity and Responsibility, not only in the financial environment, but dispersed over the entire business environment. We need urgently to rescue our ethical values and integrity to restore stability and constructive ways of doing and developing business.

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