Tags:
Outgoing IBE chair David Grayson reflects on his six years in office: a period punctuated by the COVID pandemic, lockdowns, global economic shocks, renewed war in Europe and the Middle East and political turbulence around the world. It has been a challenging time for champions of doing business ethically.
It has been a privilege to chair the Institute of Business Ethics (IBE) for the past six years. My term as chair has made me even more convinced than before that the basis of Responsible Business, of aspiring to do business more sustainably, is a strong ethical culture. This means being clear about how an organisation expects its employees to behave: how to treat each other; how to treat customers, suppliers, competitors and wider society fairly. Ultimately, it is about the Golden Rule of all the world’s great religions and philosophical traditions: to treat others as you would wish to be treated.
Developing the IBE’s Business Ethics Framework
Implementing the multiple dimensions of the IBE’s Business Ethics Framework does not, in itself, ensure an ethical culture; nor does it guarantee that there will never be any ethical lapses. Almost certainly, there will be. Implementing and then continuously improving on the Business Ethics Framework, however, makes it more likely that rogue behaviour will be called out earlier and the organisation will have a better chance of recovering faster and more effectively.
IBE’s Business Ethics Framework is the distillation of academic research and of the IBE’s practical work with businesses over 40 years. The Business Ethics Framework has been refined over the years. In 2023, for example, we explicitly added the link to remuneration, rewards and recognition. We acknowledged the dangers of perverse incentives of the kind that derailed Wells Fargo Bank in the States.
An innovation in 2024 was a pilot benchmarking exercise for supporter companies to get feedback on how they compared against their peers on different dimensions of the Business Ethics Framework. This is a substantial development of the benchmarking previously offered by the IBE on Codes of Ethics. There is great potential in combining the IBE’s Business Ethics Framework benchmarking with the methodology refined over many iterations of the IBE’s Ethics at Work international survey, to help companies understand their culture. Understanding culture is something that boards are now expected to be able to do. I was delighted that the 2024 version included a record sixteen countries.
Our analysis of how many of the FTSE (2021) and how many of the FTSE350 (2023) have a publicly available Code of Ethics was an important innovation. Crucially so, because of the simple steps identified by the IBE that any company could take to improve the quality and effectiveness of their Code. This was a good example of the rigorous and practical nature of the IBE’s work.
Guidance for Boards
If the IBE’s advice and messaging do not feel relevant in boardrooms and C-suites, we are not doing our job. I am particularly grateful for the group of business leaders, convened by our President of the IBE Advisory Council, Simon Thompson, who provided clear direction and oversight to executive colleagues producing the IBE’s guidance for boards about embedding ethical leadership and culture. “No more than two sides of A4 or it will not be read!” was the mantra. The model of an ad hoc, short-life taskforce to help executive colleagues has great potential for our future work.
Over the past six years, we have produced several papers on building ethical cultures, why this should be important to investors as an integral element of investor scrutiny of the firms they invest in, and how investors and analysts can assess organisational culture. We have also developed more guidance for Ethics and Compliance practitioners as well as boards and Senior Management Teams about specific elements of the IBE’s Business Ethics Framework, such as innovations in ethics training. We have also published well-received guides to AI and Ethics and on why a more mature approach to what is often shorthanded as “Diversity, Equity, Inclusion” (or even less helpfully “DEI”) is fundamental to treating everyone fairly and with respect, and including all the talent available. In some quarters, this is now highly contentious. I would argue that attracting, developing and retaining the best possible talent is commonsense, a fiduciary duty and the ethical thing to do. We should not, though, get hung up on terminology. As ever, substance over form!
Going Virtual
When COVID struck, the IBE – like so many others – had to go virtual overnight. Before lockdowns, the IBE had experimented a little with webinars, but if we are honest, our knowledge was pretty basic. Our team did a fantastic job of upskilling and then professionalising our online events, in real-time. Our new CEO, Lauren, has taken our webinar series to new heights with some timely conversations with authors of new books impacting on ethical business, as well as with individuals and organisations such as the Wellcome Trust who are doing some fascinating innovations in how to socialise their Code of Ethics and embed an ethical culture. I think I have participated in or caught up on the recordings of all the webinars we have done over the last six years. Post-COVID, I have become something of a webinar-aficionado. I can honestly say, the IBE’s output in recent years has been really impressive.
The great advantage of going virtual is that many more of our supporters, partners and friends around the UK and internationally can join in – either live or by watching the recording on-demand. Nevertheless, we humans are social beings. We need connection. This is why our Annual Lectures (happily back in person) and our Summer Receptions are so important. I am thrilled that Prof. Alison Taylor from NYU Stern School of Business gave the 2025 lecture. Alison was, of course, Lauren‘s first webinar guest and is the author of an award-winning book which brilliantly links Responsible Business, Corporate Sustainability and doing business with integrity: “Higher Ground.”
IBE as a Critical Friend of Business
As I have been examining the IBE’s 40-year history, talking to past chairs and directors, I have come to understand better that one of our enduring strengths is that we are of business and for business. We understand the challenges and complexities of running a business, especially those operating globally. Having personally served on several advisory boards and now a main commercial board, I have at least a small insight into the ethical dilemmas leaders often face. The IBE benefits hugely from the experience and insights of our Advisory Council. I am enormously grateful to Simon Thompson for taking on the IBE presidency from his long-serving and dedicated predecessor, Sir Tim Melville-Ross. Both Tim and now Simon have given me great advice – and even more to the IBE. Simon has created new opportunities for Advisory Council members to flag opportunities and potential topics, and workstreams for the IBE. Again, this is something I hope the IBE can develop further.
IBE is often called in by businesses and other organisations that have been ethically challenged. This is an important part of our work. By definition, we can only do that successfully if our advice remains confidential. The team have done some “meaty” assignments for international organisations and global businesses in recent years. The board encourages our executive colleagues to draw out broader lessons from these assignments, but rightly, we do not get involved in the substance of specific advisory projects.
Raising Our Profile
The IBE has never been – and I hope won’t be – a “rent-a-quote” type of organisation, ready to opine on any and all topics. When corporate scandals break, it is invidious – from the outside and without all the relevant facts – to opine on the specific case. What we can do, however, is to draw out the broader lessons from a particular scandal. In the last few years, the board has encouraged our executive colleagues to substantially increase our social media presence. It took a while, but I hope our supporters and friends have noticed a greater output of blogs and LinkedIn posts. I have tried to contribute my fair share and aim to continue that after I step down as chair!
We are heavily business-influenced, and we recognise the important contribution that responsible, ethical business can make to society. This, though, must never blind us to where business can improve. Providing the secretariat and “holding the pen” for the recent Law Taskforce was not without risk or controversy. Still, it is important that the IBE continues its honourable tradition of “speaking truth to power” just as it did, twenty years ago, through its very substantial involvement in the Wolf Inquiry – one of the early, defining moments of the IBE. I very much hope that law firms and their clients will engage seriously with the ideas and substance of the Law Taskforce.
Personal Thank Yous
On a personal note, I would like to extend my personal thanks to the three directors / CEO of the IBE that I have worked with: Philippa Foster-Back CBE, Dr Ian Peters MBE, and Lauren Branston. I have learnt a lot from all three. I am excited now for the potential of the IBE with Lauren and my successor, Flora Page KC. I know that Flora will quickly realise what an engaged and committed group of trustees she is working with. My thanks to all the IBE trustees (past and present) that I have had the privilege of working with. Whilst it is invidious to single anyone out, I will say a special thank-you to Mike Tuffrey. Mike helped recruit me, served as our Treasurer and for the last two years, has been our charity equivalent of the SID on a commercial board. He has also been an incredibly diligent member of the Nominations Committee that we formalised when I came on board. He has been part of two rounds of trustee recruitment (2019 and 2023), when, between us all, we considered the applications from almost 200 people. Also, on that Noms Committee journey throughout has been our external, co-opted member Anita Hoffmann, who has given us far more time, expertise and hard work than she could ever have imagined when she rashly accepted the invitation to join. Thank you, Anita.
Finally, a huge thank you to our small but very hard-working IBE staff colleagues (past and present) – and above all, to our supporters. You are the IBE.
I am confident that the rich 40-year heritage of the IBE, refreshed for the second half of the 2020s, will be a highly credible and sought-after partner for those speaking up for doing business with integrity, ethical culture and leading with values. The world desperately needs more examples of leadership with integrity and decency.
Author
Professor David Grayson CBE
Chair
David is Emeritus Professor of Corporate Responsibility at Cranfield School of Management. From 2007-2017, he was director of the Doughty Centre for Corporate Responsibility and Professor of Corporate Responsibility.
David became Chair of the Trustees Board on 01 April 2019.
He joined Cranfield in April 2007, after a thirty year career as a social entrepreneur and campaigner for responsible business, diversity, and small business development. This included founding Project North East which has now worked in nearly 60 countries around the world; being the founding CEO of the Prince's Youth Business Trust and serving as a managing-director of Business in the Community.
David has an Honorary Doctorate of Law from London South Bank University and was a visiting Senior Fellow at the CSR Initiative of the Kennedy School of Government, Harvard (2005-10).
He has served on various charity and public sector boards over the past 35 years. These have included the boards of the National Co-operative Development Agency, The Prince of Wales' Innovation Trust and the Strategic Rail Authority. He chaired the National Disability Council and the Business Link Accreditation Board; in each case appointed by the Major Government and re-appointed by the Blair administration. David now serves on the board of a financial services company in Asia where he leads on embedding ESG/sustainability and chairs the board’s Group Risk Management Committee.
He has previously chaired the national charity Carers UK and one of the UK's larger social enterprises and largest eldercare providers, Housing 21 during which the organisation made corporate history by becoming the first-ever not-for-profit successfully to acquire a publicly quoted group of companies. David received an OBE for services to industry in 1994 and a CBE for services to disability in 1999. He is a Companion of the Chartered Institute of Management.
David has written a number of books on responsible business and corporate sustainability including most recently: ‘All in - The Future of Business Leadership’ and The Sustainable Business Handbook – both with Chris Coulter and Mark Lee. He is part of the faculty of the Forward Institute and of the Circle of Advisers for Business Fights Poverty.
The Guardian has named David as one of ten top global tweeters on sustainable leadership alongside Al Gore, Tim Cook - CEO of Apple, and Facebook's COO Sheryl Sandberg.