Oct. 20, 2004

Establishing an Ethical Approach to the Bottom Line

New Business Ethics Professorship Will Position GW School of Business as a Leader in the Quest for Corporate Responsibility

By Greg Licamele

With an eye on instilling ethical principles in its graduates, the GW School of Business is conducting an international search for the new Lindner-Gambal Professor of Business Ethics, who will play a visible and viable role in the school, at GW and across the country.

Through the support of James Clark, CEO of Clark Enterprises, with a matching gift from the University, the professorship is named to honor two alumni and their business careers — Thaddeus Lindner (BA, ’51) and Sergius Gambal (BA, ’52). The search for this first chair, professor and director of an ethics research center is scheduled to conclude Nov. 1. A committee will review the applications, invite select candidates to campus and fill the position for next fall.

“Making the world a better place isn’t the exclusive province of business schools,” said Susan M. Phillips, dean of GW’s School of Business. “But business schools can and should equip their students to be ethical and successful managers and leaders. Having a chaired professorship in business ethics will underscore this business school’s commitment to graduating principled members of society.”

Phillips recently chaired The Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business (AACSB) International’s Ethics Education Task Force, a 19-member group that included deans, professors and representatives from the private and nonprofit sectors. The group conducted exhaustive reviews of literature, consulted an ethicist and debated how business schools should teach ethics to the world’s future leaders. AACSB, the premier accrediting body of business schools, published the task force’s report this past summer.

“This professorship is a signal that the business school is concerned with its educational and research activities on ethics, and it’s also a response to the AACSB report,” said Donald Hawkins, chair of the search committee and Eisenhower Professor of Tourism Studies. “We’re concerned with corporate social responsibility, we’re concerned about abuses by corporations and we need to examine corporate governance.”

The Lindner-Gambal Professor would become a catalyst for focusing on creative methods to introduce and enhance ethics education for students and faculty. More specifically, the School of Business envisions the individual to design and integrate ethics into the curriculum; lead ethics courses and become involved with students at different levels; organize major public events and lectures at GW; produce visible scholarship in the field; collaborate with ethics scholars in other GW schools and at other institutions; and provide a voice in the public debate about business ethics.

Hawkins said GW’s position in Washington allows the business school to take a leadership role in this area. “We can connect our endeavors with people making policy and those enforcing it.”

Hawkins said the five-member committee encourages applications from within the School of Business, from around Washington, from across the country and from the international arena. The committee will recommend its choice to Phillips and Executive Vice President for Academic Affairs Donald R. Lehman.

Send feedback to: bygeorge@gwu.edu