Management decision making and ethics: practices, skills and preferences

This article summarises the findings from a study of practising managers which explored experiences of and views on decision making about actual ethical issues in organisations. Data gathering was based on a combination of an intensive case study of an organisation and in‐depth interviews with senior managers and management consultants from 32 organisations. A rigorous qualitative analysis of the observed experiences, strategies and responses to ethical issues and problems resulted in categorisation of skills associated with: judgement, integrity, courage and humanity. The different ways in which these skills were integrated led to approaches identified as: legalistic, entrepreneurial, navigation and worried modes. The repertoire of skills which contributes to selection of these alternative approaches and implications for the development of ethical decision making practices are discussed.