Working Ethically in Finance: Clarifying Our Vocation (Giving Voice to Values on Business Ethics and Corporate Social Responsibility Collection)

To develop a vocation we ask: what do I want to be remembered for? We aspire to personal integrity and a life well lived.
Those of us working in the financial sector fulfil our vocations by finding ways to serve its social purposes, which is to allocate resources efficiently and to provide financial security--not forgetting the needy. This means contributing to institutions where people can flourish personally, and creating appropriate products and services.
The book is based on virtue ethics, a common sense approach to virtue and ethics that is consistent with most traditions. The fundamental personal virtue is integrity: it is concerned with building well, tying our thinking to our words and actions, our work to our motivations and to intrinsic rewards, and means to ends everywhere. At best, we want to develop ourselves: our strengths and capabilities as well as other virtues.
We also cultivate the virtues of self-control and courage to develop ourselves and protect ourselves from the intrusion of others. Justice is the social virtue that underlies flourishing communities based on mutual respect, and also addresses ethical failings. We need communal structures to help us, but regulations achieve their aims better if they are less rule orientated, are forgiving and aimed at bringing out the best in people. The current flaws in the financial system of over-charging, over-servicing and recklessness are unjust, but can be addressed by those who rise to the challenge of finding their virtuous vocation.

Associate Professor, School of Risk and Actuarial Studies, University of New South Wales