Business Ethics magazine recently awarded the Chroma Technology Corporation, a Vermont-based manufacturer of high-tech optical lens products, the "Living Economy Award" as part of the 16th Annual Business Ethics Awards. The Living Economy Award is offered to the company that best exemplifies "the living economy with practices of employee ownership, fair wages, and environmental stewardship," (Business Ethics). One of the key reasons why Chroma earned the accolade was due to its unique official salary structure: no employee earns less than $37,500 and none more than $75,000; therefore, no upper-level management official makes more than twice as much as anyone on the shop floor. Chroma's unique salary structure in part reflects my vision of corporate business ethics and the values I would like to embody as a professional. There are other reasons why I admire Chroma's policies. They employ an egalitarian meeting format modeled after the Quakers; they ensure environmental sustainability and energy-efficiency in their plant; and the company is entirely owned by employees, who are not at risk of losing their jobs. Chroma therefore provides an optimal corporate role model for the development of a sound approach to business and financial ethics. My value system reflects the ideals that are exemplified by Chroma Technology as well as by individuals who I believe embody morality in action: obvious influenced include Mahatma Ghandi and Nelson Mandela. My personal code of ethics was developed over time in response to such diverse influences as my community, my family,...

For example, I also firmly believe in gender and racial equality in the workplace and elsewhere; prejudice, discrimination, and stereotyping should be discouraged and ideally, eliminated. I admire those companies that promote ethnic and cultural diversity within the workplace and those that boast women and people of color in positions of power. I have made a personal commitment to work only for those corporations that reflect this core value, as well as core values such as equitable pay structures and a dedication to promoting local and sustainable businesses. I would not want to work for a company that I knew had treated its workers unethically in any way and therefore I feel that company ethics can and do reflect personal ethics.
Individual employees have a responsibility to promote their personal ethical codes through their actions in the workplace. For example, the way employees treat coworkers and the way they treat their friends and family members extends into how they treat colleagues and customers alike. I don't think that personal ethics and professional ethics differ all that much; they are both based on the same fundamental principles of integrity, honesty, and cooperation. I also believe that executives and upper-level management officials have a special and weighted responsibility to embody ethical and moral policies. As role models for their employees and as representatives of the…