What Is Goal Based Ethics

What is goal based ethics? A business has to plan its activities in order to achieve a goal. And that goal becomes the goal for all the individuals including some other goals relating to their own individual responsibilities. Some want to achieve their targets and goals through any means and some by ethical means irrespective of any consequences. So, in a simple definition, goal based ethics means the ends that justify means. Now what is goal based ethics for an organization? It will be more or less same as that of the individual but on a broader perspective. If the organization is achieving its goals by ethical measures and fulfilling all the social responsibilities then it will definitely come under goal based ethics.

The goal based ethics has no right or wrong decisions taken by the manager. It is just choosing between the two best or two right decisions of the manager. A good or ethical manager will go for that decision which is ethically more strong and convincing and will drop that only concentrates on earning high profits.

In essence, goal based ethics focus on the consequences of decisions. They may be right or good. It is not necessary that every right decision is ethical or vice versa. It may be in either case. Decisions which satisfy ethical measures and are focused on achieved goals come under goal based ethics.

The goal based ethics can be better understood by some examples. So, here are few examples which will depict a clear picture and practical implementation of goal based ethics.

Strategy of Tyson Foods about hunger relief

The company does efforts to avoid childhood hunger. Tyson signed a deal with social media club and started their campaign for donations.

Strategy of Haagen-Dazs & their efforts for honeybee preservation

We all know that honeybees are very important for our environment. Almost one third of the fruits we eat are rewarded by honeybees and they are disappearing which will result in the change of natural processing of fruits. Haagen-Dazs donates a considerable amount to create microseism in order to raise the awareness among the people. This is also included in their mission statement. It is a very smart act by an ice-cream company to market its product on the basis of a social cause.

Strategy of Greenopolis about recycling

This company is itself dedicated to social work. Others are using social work as their marketing technique but this organization is using social work as their product and earning a good amount out of them. It was developed by an intellectual. He aims it to be an educational tool which will provide teachings on how to be more environmentally sound. The goal of the website is “Learn, Act, Reward Together.” It is wholly owned by Waste Management Recycle America, but operates independently.

These examples give better explanation of what is goal based strategies. These examples show that in the real world also, the organizations are following these strategies not only to serve the society but also to capture more market. You can get an idea of practical implementation of these strategies. These will better give an answer to the question what is goal based ethics?

Goal based ethics are not for promoting social values but social values can be used to define goal based ethics. By taking social responsibilities, many companies are promoting themselves and make a very impressive mark in the minds of people and create a sympathy and good impression in their hearts thereby, increasing their market shares. All these are marketing strategies and they are also proving very beneficial not only for the organization but for the society as well. Serving the society is included in ethics of every personal and when it gets combined with our goals then it becomes goal based ethics. Many companies are still asking that what are goal based ethics because they don’t know how to use ethical values in the business to make it more fruitful. This is not just a concept but a responsibility of every citizen towards its society. When a society can serve us in million ways then why can’t we serve the society in a single way? These goal based ethics definitely help individuals to trust those companies who follow them rigorously and effectively.