Managerial work and lying: A conceptual framework and an explorative case study

In the last few years there has been a lot of fuzzy talk, scientific discou rses and comments of business life about the values, ethics and social resp onsibility of companies. Companies are expected to have also some other tas ks besides that of gaining profit. A part of the tasks which management has , except for thinking of the benefits of their own organization, are things which work for the well-being of the whole society. Issues like this are, among others, working for employment, taking care of the environment, and p romoting consumer security. While making decisions of their own action in the company, the management o ften has to face ethical solutions. The benefit of the company may be diffe rent from that of other business stakeholders. In this case, the manager ha s to decide for which part he should act, for the company or for the stakeh olders. The ethical problems in deciding may appear also inside the company . In our study, we are very interested in the decision-making processes whi ch are connected with the honesty of the manager and his/her being honest w ith the stakeholders both inside and outside the company. In our research, we have tried to create a framework which helps us to find out in what kind of situations a manager faces the problem whether he/she should tell the truth to the stakeholders or not. We have also studied the means which the managers use in their potential dishonesty. Further, we hav e tried to find out how the managers see themselves in situations where the y cannot tell the truth or have to cover it.