<p>Although research in business ethics has of late received increased attention from researchers and practitioners, little has been written on the practical effects of its implementation.</p><p>The aim of the present study is, therefore, to explore the meaning and implications of business ethics from a practical perspective. To these ends, a qualitative study, mainly based on a grounded theory approach, has been carried out. The target of analysis is a corpus material derived from informants from 9 companies ranging from different sectors: 2 from the manufacturing sector, 1 company from the pharmaceutical sector and 6 companies from the financial sector.</p><p>The results show that almost all the companies under consideration have set up some ethical structures for implementing their ethical practices, and lived up to the embraced ethical values in their business conduct. The results also indicate that the companies have actually responded favorably to the requirements and demands of various stakeholders.</p><p>Furthermore, the emerging structures constitute the basis of a fully operative concept for organizing and implementing an ethical business conduct in organizations. This concept mainly consists of the following categories: ethics, rules, institutionalization, observing and abiding. These can all be applied separately or as a whole and as such be an instrument for measuring an organizations ethical level.</p><p> </p>

Although research in business ethics has of late received increased attention from researchers and practitioners, little has been written on the practical effects of its implementation. The aim of the present study is, therefore, to explore the meaning and implications of business ethics from a practical perspective. To these ends, a qualitative study, mainly based on a grounded theory approach, has been carried out. The target of analysis is a corpus material derived from informants from 9 companies ranging from different sectors: 2 from the manufacturing sector, 1 company from the pharmaceutical sector and 6 companies from the financial sector. The results show that almost all the companies under consideration have set up some ethical structures for implementing their ethical practices, and lived up to the embraced ethical values in their business conduct. The results also indicate that the companies have actually responded favorably to the requirements and demands of various stakeholders. Furthermore, the emerging structures constitute the basis of a fully operative concept for organizing and implementing an ethical business conduct in organizations. This concept mainly consists of the following categories: ethics, rules, institutionalization, observing and abiding. These can all be applied separately or as a whole and as such be an instrument for measuring an organizations ethical level.