Values: Meaning, Characteristics, Types,

Importance
• Meaning:
• They are the beliefs that guide an individual’s actions.
They represent a person’s belief about what is right or
wrong.
• Values lay standards against which behaviour is judged.
They determine the overall personality of an individual
and the organization he is working for.
• Values remain embedded in our minds since childhood.
• Value system is a combination of all values that an
individual or an organization should have.
• Organizations express their values through their work
culture.
 Values: Meaning, Characteristics,
Types, Importance
• According to M. Haralambos (2000), “a value is a belief that
something is good and desirable”.
• For R.K. Mukherjee (1949) , “values are socially approved
desires and goals that are internalised through the process
of conditioning, learning or socialisation and that become
subjective preferences, standards and aspirations”. A value
is a shared idea about how something is ranked in terms of
desirability, worth or goodness.
• According to Milton Rokeach, “Values are beliefs that guide
actions and judgements across a variety of situations”.
• Familiar examples of values are wealth, loyalty,
independence, equality, justice, fraternity and friendliness.
 Characteristics of Values
• Values are inherent in all cultures and societies.
• Values guide people to take specific positions on
societal issues.
• Values provide standards of morality.
• Values are comprehensive standards that direct
conduct in a variety of ways.
• Values are manifested in thoughts, speech and
actions of people.
• Values are relatively stable as these are passed
from one generation to another.
 Types of Values:
• The five core human values are: (1) Right conduct, (2)
Peace, (3) Truth, (4) Love, and (5) Nonviolence.
• 1. Values related to RIGHT CONDUCT are: (a) SELF-HELP
SKILLS: Care of possessions, diet, hygiene, modesty,
posture, self reliance, and tidy appearance (b) SOCIAL
SKILLS: Good behaviour, good manners, good relationships,
helpfulness, No wastage, and good environment, and (c)
ETHICAL SKILLS: Code of conduct, courage, duty.
• 2. Values related to PEACE are: Attention, calmness,
concentration, dignity, discipline, equality, faithfulness,
focus, happiness, harmony, inner silence, optimism,
patience, reflection, satisfaction, self-acceptance, self-
confidence, self-control, self-discipline, self-esteem, self-
respect, sense control, tolerance, and understanding
 Types of Values:
• 3. Values related to TRUTH are: Accuracy, curiosity, fairness, fearlessness,
honesty, integrity, intuition, justice, optimism, purity, quest for knowledge,
reason, self-analysis, sincerity, sprit of enquiry, trust, truthfulness, and
determination.
• 4. Values related to LOVE are: Acceptance, affection, care, compassion,
consideration, dedication, devotion, empathy, forgiveness, friendship,
generosity, gentleness, humanness, interdependence, kindness, patience,
patriotism, sacrifice, selflessness, service, sharing, sympathy,
thoughtfulness, tolerance and trust.
• 5. Values related to NON-VIOLENCE are:
• (a) PSYCHOLOGICAL: compassion, concern for others, consideration,
forgiveness, manners, happiness, loyalty, morality, and universal love
• (b) SOCIAL: Appreciation of other cultures and religions, brotherhood, care
of environment, citizenship, equality, harmlessness, national awareness,
perseverance, respect for property, and social justice.
Types of Values by Milton Rokeach
• He developed 2 sets of Values:
• 1. Terminal Values: A terminal value is an
ultimate goal/aim of a person. It might include
comfortable life, family security, sense of
accomplishment, self respect, freedom, social
recognition etc.
• 2. Instrumental Values: It relates to the means
for achieving the desired outcome/end. In other
words it is a tool to acquire a terminal value.
 Types of Values by Milton Rokeach
Instrumental Values
These relate to the means in achieving
the terminal values.
These are core values and comprise
personal characteristics and character
traits.
These refer to preferable modes of
behaviour and include values like honesty,
sincerity, obedience, independence,
competitiveness etc.
These could be changed.
Terminal Values
These represent the ultimate goals of life
of a person.
These are those that one thinks are most
important and most desirable.
These refer to desirable state of existence.
They include things like happiness, self
respect, family security, recognition,
freedom, comfortable life etc.
These are not changeable.
 Formation of Values
• 1. Culture is the principal source of values.
• 2. In Indian culture, peace, co-operation,
harmony, equity, democracy are considered
desirable.
• 3. Such values are not fixed but they change
very slowly.
 Following types of factors influence
the formation of values of people:
• 1. Family factors: Family puts a direct impact on the value system of an individual. Some
values are inculcated in the individual from the childhood and remain throughout his life.
Family is the most influential factor in the individual’s learning of social behavior, values
and norms.
• 2. Social factors: School plays the most important role in developing the value system of
an individual. The child learns the basic discipline from the school after interacting with
teachers, classmates and other people in the school. Other social factors which may affect
values are religious, economic and political institutions in the society.
• 3. Cultural Factors: These factors include everything that is learned & passed on from
generation to generation. Culture includes certain beliefs and other patterns of behavior.
Whether a person is co-operative, friendly depends upon the culture he belongs to.
• 4. Personal factors: The se include attributes like intelligence, ability, appearance and
educational level of the person determines his development of values. For ex: one’s higher
intelligence may result in faster understanding of values.
• 5. Organizational Factors: Every organization has its own culture. The organization. In
which an individual works for a long period, develops and shapes his value system. In the
process of interacting with peers, boss and subordinates, a person develops certain attitudes
and beliefs.
 Values and Behaviour
• Values affect the behavior of individuals in organizations. Every
manager should have a proper understanding of the values of his
subordinates. The role of values in understanding behavior is as
follows:
• 1. Values lay the foundation of understanding the attitudes,
perceptions and motives which shape the behavior of individuals.
• 2. A system of shared values of the organizational members help in
developing the organizational culture.
• 3. Organizational values which promote ethics and are in the
interest of the society enhance the image of the organization.
• 4. Value influences the way, in which an individual looks at other
individuals, i.e., interpersonal relationship.
• 5. Individuals judge organisational success as well as its
achievement on the basis of their value system.
 Values of Indian Managers
• According to SK Chakarborty the important values which are deep
rooted in the Indian social-cultural ethos are:
• 1. The individual must be respected.
• 2. There should be an atmosphere of cooperation and trust.
• 3. Jealousy is harmful for mental health.
• 4. Delivering of top quality product/service to the consumers and
society which is a primary function of quality of mind.
• 5. Work is worship.
• 6. Ethico-moral soundness.
• 7. Self-discipline
• 8. Customer satisfaction
• 9. Creativity
• 10. The inspiration to give.
 Meaning of Business Ethics:
• ‘It is related to social responsiveness of a firm. It is “the
discipline dealing with what is good and bad, or right
and wrong, or with moral duty and obligation. It is a
standard of behaviour that guides individual managers
in their works”.
• Business ethics refer to the moral principles which
should govern business activities.
• Business ethics is application of ethical principles to
business relationships and activities. When managers
assume social responsibility, it is believed they will do it
ethically, that is, they know what is right and wrong.
 A few examples of ethics are:
• 1. To charge fair prices from customers.
• 2. To use fair weights for measurement of
commodities.
• 3. To pay taxes to the gov. honestly.
• 4. To earn reasonable profits.
• 5. To give fair treatment to the workers.
 Ethical Decision-making

• Concept: Decision making is a process of

selection from a set of alternative courses of
action which is thought to fulfill the objectives
of the decision problem more satisfactorily
than other.
 Stages in Ethical Decision-Making
Process
• 1. Defining the problem.
• 2. Developing alternative solutions.
• 3. Evaluation of alternatives.
• 4. Choice of best alternatives.
• 5. Implementing the decision.
• 6. Follow-up.
Ethical aspects of Decision-Making
• In every step of decision making some ethical
aspects are given due consideration. This
approach is called PLUS approach which takes
care of
• (P)Policies, (L) legal aspects,
• (U)Universality, (S)Self.
 Ethics: Management Process and Ethics
• Management as a Process
• As a process, management refers to a series of inter-related functions. It is the
process by which management creates, operates and directs purposive
organization through systematic, coordinated and co-operated human efforts,
according to George R. Terry, “Management is a distinct process consisting of
planning, organizing, actuating and controlling, performed to determine and
accomplish stated objective by the use of human beings and other resources”. As a
process, management consists of three aspects:
• Management is a social process - Since human factor is most important among
the other factors, therefore management is concerned with developing
relationship among people. It is the duty of management to make interaction
between people - productive and useful for obtaining organizational goals.
• Management is an integrating process - Management undertakes the job of
bringing together human physical and financial resources so as to achieve
organizational purpose. Therefore, is an important function to bring harmony
between various factors.
• Management is a continuous process - It is a never ending process. It is concerned
with constantly identifying the problem and solving them by taking adequate
steps. It is an on-going process.
Ethics: Management Process and
Ethics
 Management & Ethics
• 1. Management of a business must be ethical i.e. The business managers
should take ethical decisions and ethical actions to achieve the objectives.
• 2. Managers face ethical dilemmas at all times. An ethical dilemma occurs
when one has to make a choice from among alternatives which involve
conflict among different interests. In such a situation personal beliefs,
attitudes and values of a manager will be the deciding factors.
• 3. Loyalty to company, efficiency, honesty, transparency and service are
such values.
• 4. Ethical norms are relevant in each element of management and each
functional area of the business.
• 5. Ethics and profits go together in the long run and ethics makes for an
efficient economy.
• 6. Management associations all over the world have formulated codes of
ethics to guide managers.
 Ethical Issues/Dilemmas
• Waters, Bird & Chant conducted a research study in 1985 using
open-ended interviews with a sample of managers at different
positions in a variety of organisations. The question was “ what
ethical questions come up or have come up in the course of your
work-life?” They identified the following ethical issues:
• 1. With respect to employees: Feedback about performance,
employment security, appropriate working conditions.
• 2. With respect to peers and superiors: truth-telling, loyalty and
support.
• 3. With respect to customers: Fair treatment, truth-telling,
questionable practices etc.
• 4. With respect to suppliers: Fair/impartial treatment, balanced
relationship, truth-telling etc.
• 5. With respect to other stakeholders: Respecting legal constraints,
truth-telling in public relations, shareholders interests.
 Ethos of Vedanta in Management
• ETHOS are the characteristic spirit and beliefs of community &
people.
• Ethos represent the habitual character of a group/community.
• VEDANTA is the conclusion of the Vedas.
• The management gurus like Lord Krishna, Swami Vivekananda and
Peter F. Drucker assert that managers should develop the
following values:
• 1. Move from the state of inertia to the state of righteous action.
• 2. Move from the state of faithlessness to the state of faith and self-
confidence.
• 3. Their actions should benefit not only them but the society at
large.
• 4. Move from unethical actions to ethical actions.
Ethos of Vedanta in Management
• 5. Move from untruth to truth.
• 6. ‘No doer of good ever ends in misery’. Good
actions always produce good results and evil
actions produce evil results.
• 7. Take the best from the western models of
efficiency, dynamism and excellence and tune
them to Indian conditions.
 Salient Features of Indian Ethos
• 1. Each soul is potentially divine.
• 2. Indian ethos gives much greater emphasis
on values and ethics.
• 3. The individual is taken as the central focus
by Indian ethos.
• 4. Balance is the keynote of Indian thought.
• 5. Character is based on divine values.
 Principles of Management Based on
Indian Ethos
• 1. Each soul is potentially divine:The partnership of God and Man
can bring about extraordinary or miraculous results only if man
chooses willingly to collaborate with God and actively participates
in the affairs of the society by right action under his guidance and
grace.
• 2. Holistic Approach: Holistic approach in Management is based on
spiritual principle of unity, oneness, non-dual concept. Under this
principle of unity, the universe in an undivided whole where each
and every particle is connected with every other particle. Thus,
entire Humanity is ONE. Such an integrated human personality of
self-developed manager and worker can assure best and competent
management of any enterprise, involving collective works and
efforts.
 Principles of Management Based on
Indian Ethos
• 3. Karma Yoga:
• It is yoga of selfless service to others. Karma Yoga is all
about identifying your priorities and trying to achieve
them.
• Also, a person should have accountability i.e. he should
always hold only himself responsible for whatever goes
right or wrong. This brings about the union of human
being with the Divine.
• Gita says that do your duty without ego and without
calculations of gain or loss. One should believe in
Nishkama Karma i.e. fruits of work should not be
thought of while performing the duty.
 Principles of Management Based on
Indian Ethos
• 4. Co-operation Vs Competition:
• Co-operation refers to the collective, teamwork. In the
modern life, there is too much competition for survival
and growth.
• Only healthy competition will provide services for
social and common good. By mutual help and
cooperation, we can achieve the heights of human
welfare and development and this will lead a
harmonious and peaceful life.
• The spirit of cooperation can only be developed if we
really manage our ego, which moulds everything to
fulfilment of some selfish end.
 Principles of Management Based on
Indian Ethos
• 5. Excellence of Work:
• According to Indian Ethos, Yoga refers to
concentration for excellence. Every work should
be excellent.
• We should work with determination and ability.
• It will result in excellent work.
• Our head, heart and soul should cooperate with
our hands.
• It will give us the qualities of wisdom worker.
 Relevance of Vedanta in Current
Environment
• 1. Contribution to society: Ethical managers have
flexible working hours for employees, provision
of creche and other facilities for female
employees, serve the customers with the goods
and services required/desired by them etc. All
these have contributed to improvement of the
lives of people.
• 2. Safeguarding the interested of stakeholders:
Ethics at workplace improves and strengthens
relationships amongst superiors, peers and
subordinates.
 Relevance of Vedanta in Current
Environment
• 3. Teamwork & Productivity: Workplace ethics
promote teamwork among the employees which
leads to higher productivity.
• 4. Employee Growth: Training in values and
ethics makes the employees to take ethical
decisions in the uncertain and critical situations
which helps in their personal growth.
• 5. Public Image: An organization that regularly
gives attention to its ethics can portray a strong
positive image to the public.
 Relevance/Importance of Ethics and
Values in Business
1. Ethical decision-making
2. Standards of behavior
3. Social Responsibility
4. Credibility
5. Stability and growth