Enhancing Effectiveness of Values and Ethics Education through Spirituality

Abstract

The importance of business ethics as a subject in management schools has been highlighted since decades. Time and again the importance of value-based education has been emphasized and perceived to be necessary for conducting ethical business practices. This paper discovers While there is general sensitivity towards the importance of values and ethics in personal and professional life there is a gap in relating their significance to the common understanding and perception of 'success' and 'failure'. Even though a section of the students show interest in such 'soft' courses as values, ethics and sustainability the interest gets diluted over time primarily because of the hackneyed and stereotyped manner in which such courses are offered with a preponderance of antiquated theories of ethics and case studies that have increasingly lost their relevance. There is an element of skepticism bordering on cynicism towards initiatives around bringing spirituality and values into the fold of mainstream management education stemming primarily from lack of knowledge and conviction of spirituality among the faculty and students. There is also a major confusion in the minds of students between enlivening spiritual wisdom and dogmatic, institutionalized religion infused in their minds by instrumentally rational and secular orientation of thinkers, researchers and academics posing as opinion leaders for future generations