Business Ethics: A Cross-Cultural Study of Tomorrow\u27s American and Hong Kong Business Leaders

A little more than three years ago, political and economic analysts predicted an end to Hong Kong`s golden era as the financial capital of Asia. Three years on, and having rolled into the third millennium on a rising tide of dot.com and technology-led investment, Hong Kong has brushed off prophecies of doom and appears to be living to its hard-earned reputation for adaptability. The recent-signed joint ventures, such as the $1.6 billion Cyberport and Walt Disney projects are good evidence suggesting that Hong Kong`s power as the financial capital of Asia remains undiminished. Perhaps the biggest problem faced by U.S. e-businesses and multinational firms, seeking to establish a foothold in a foreign market such as Hong Kong, is learning how to best treat individuals of the new market. This is because the cultural and ethical values of individuals can vary entirely from those of a multinational firm`s home country. Cultural and ethical differences can exercise tremendous effects on the form, content and consequences of business communications. Multinational firms face a continual imperative to struggle with these culturally-driven differences in how consumers will respond to a given business strategy. This study is designed to examine the determinants of future Hong Kong and American leaders` attitudes toward various forms of unethical practices and detect any differences between them. Multiple regression analysis reveals that American individuals who are young, tolerant, and opportunistic tend to behave less ethically than do other Americans. In contrast, American individuals who are older, idealistic and theistic are more likely to behave ethically than do other Americans. Hong Kong individuals who are tolerant, and opportunistic tend to behave less ethically than do other Hong Kongers. In contrast, Hong Kong individuals who are positive and idealistic are more likely to behave ethically than do other Hong Kongers. Opportunism is found to be one of the most important determinants in explaining misconduct. MANOVA and MDA show that Hong Kong individuals use tolerance, experience, relativism, negativism, humanism, detachment, and nontheism more frequently than do people in the U.S

The Use of Epistemology, Transactional Cost Analysis and Herding Behavior Theories to Explain Ethical Leadership

This study examines the relationship between ethical leadership and employee creativity with mediating role of trust in leader and moderating role of openness to experience. Data were collected from 205 supervisor–subordinate dyads in cellular mobile operator companies across Pakistan. Confirmatory factor analysis confirmed the distinctiveness of variables used in our study. The results also confirmed that ethical leadership promotes creativity at workplace, while trust in leader mediates the effect of ethical leadership on creativity. Furthermore, the results also confirmed the moderation of openness to experience on the relationship between trust in leader and employee creativity. As expected, the relationship was stronger with high openness to experience than when it was lower