Understanding the Ethical Cost of Organizational Goal-Setting: A Review and Theory Development

Goal-setting has become a popular and effective motivational tool, utilized by practitioners and substantiated with decades of empirical research. However, the potential for goal-setting to enhance performance may come at the cost of ethical behavior. I propose a theoretical model linking attributes...

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Bibliographic Details
Published inJournal of business ethics Vol. 81; no. 1; pp. 63 - 81
Main Author Barsky, Adam
Format Journal Article
LanguageEnglish
Published Dordrecht Springer 01.08.2008
Springer Netherlands
Springer Nature B.V
SeriesJournal of Business Ethics
Subjects
Applied ethics
Behavior
Business and Management
Business Ethics
Corporate crime
Corporate responsibility
Corruption
Economic performance
Education
Empirical research
Employees
Environmental ethics
Ethical behavior
Ethical justification
Ethics
Goal setting
Management
Morality
Motivation
Normative ethics
Organizational behaviour
Payroll costs
Philosophy
Productivity
Quality of Life Research
Regulation
Scandals
Self regulation
Social ethics
Studies
self-regulation
business ethics
corruption
motivation
goal-setting
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Summary:Goal-setting has become a popular and effective motivational tool, utilized by practitioners and substantiated with decades of empirical research. However, the potential for goal-setting to enhance performance may come at the cost of ethical behavior. I propose a theoretical model linking attributes of goals and goal-setting practices to unethical behavior through two psychological mechanisms - ethical recognition and moral disengagement; and addressing the moderating role of individual differences (e.g., goal-commitment and conscientiousness), as well as the broader organizational ethical context.
Bibliography:ObjectType-Article-2
SourceType-Scholarly Journals-1
ObjectType-Feature-1
content type line 23
ISSN:0167-4544
1573-0697
DOI:10.1007/s10551-007-9481-6