What is Corporate Social Responsibility? - InnoTrain CSR

Communication of CSR
6.5. In-house codes of conduct and ethics
In short
A code of conduct and ethics is a voluntary self-commitment of companies. It
serves as orientation guideline for the ethical management and correct
performance of activities of all employees in the business routine. With respect
to Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR), a code of conduct and ethics is
suitable to make the employees of the company aware of the implications their
individual integrity and "co-responsibility" has on the entire (institutional)
corporate level. A code can be a permanently binding tool to communicate
CSR internally and to integrate it comprehensively among the actors in the
company. Applied to industries and professions, codes are intended to
promote essential professional basics of job-related actions and increase the
public perception of trust and acceptance.
Learning targets
� Be able to reflect the goals and purposes of codes of conduct and ethics
� Discuss the integration of employees into a CSR strategy by means of codes
of conduct and ethics
CSR learning contents
The purpose of a code of conduct and ethics is to support the management and
employees in a company with the independent resolution of moral conflicts. As a
guideline for professional conduct, the code of ethics sensitises the members of the
company to ethical concerns. In doing so, it is essential that moral conflicts which
appear to be difficult or impossible to resolve on the level of individual employees can
be handled based on the principle of subsidiarity on other corporate levels. This
means that it is crucial on the one hand to promote ethical conduct on all levels of cooperation
in the company in order to solidify a foundation for CSR. On the other
hand, ethics should not be delegated "downward", but rather be based on overall
corporate responsibility.
Some companies are choosing to appoint ethics officers and an ethics committee in
connection with codes of conduct and ethics for the individual level of the employees
or on the institutional level or to establish additional tools such as an ethics hotline.
Nevertheless, the particularly critical and sensitive factor associated with the
The project "InnoTrain CSR" is organized by GILDE GmbH and has been funded with support from the European Commission. This publication reflects the
views only of the author, and the Commission cannot be held responsible for any use which may be made of the information contained therein. 12/2010
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