Developing A Virtue Ethics Scale: Exploratory Survey of Philippine Managers

Abstract

This paper is an exploratory attempt at generating a virtue ethics
scale for managers from the Philippines, using the initial listing of
Shanahan and Hyman (2003). The survey questionnaire consisting
of 34 virtues was administered to a sample of 141 business and
finance postgraduate students who are managers in the companies in
Philippines. Based on the factor analysis of the responses to the items
on the virtues questionnaire, the following were the resulting virtue
or trait factors: (1) Care and concern, (2) Competence, (3) Ambition,
and (4) Superiority. The four resulting virtue factors compare
more or less with the virtue listings generated in the literature:
“Care and concern†is analogous to “empathy†and “respectâ€; and
“competence†seems akin to “integrityâ€, “trustâ€, and “reliability†in
the literature. The results corroborate evidence in the Virtue Ethics
literature that proposes the virtue theory as an improved ethical
paradigm for business. It is indeed possible to augment teleological
and deontological ethics scales with a virtue ethics scale that can
cause both the researcher and the respondents to be more aware
of the virtuous qualities of business people and managers. Such
classifications can aid scale validation and development, which in
turn could help push the strategic role of the virtue ethics theory.
Keywords: Ethics Scales, Philippine Managers, Virtue Ethics