Ethical Issues in Businesses

Question: Identify what you think is the most important ethical issue facing businesses, and how you think businesses should cope with or respond to theat issue. Answer: Ethical dilemma in businesses is a matter of global concern. The ethical issues more often arise from a variety of matters within the organization. Over time, increased cases of unethical accounting practices in the listed companies have been noted. As such, it is noteworthy that accounting practice ethics ranks among the important ethical issues facing modern businesses (Bhasin 145). Therefore this paper seeks to analyze the accounting practices ethics and ultimately give recommendations that significantly reduce cases of unethical accounting practices. Accounting is an indispensable part of any institution as it significantly contributes to the success of the businesses. Similarly, the general public needs relevant accounting information to aid their decision-making process. Accordingly, accountants are required to be individuals of unquestionable integrity so as to prepare financial statements that comply with the necessary code of ethical conduct as well as the stipulated accounting standards. However, in some cases, Accountants present unclear and subjective information that do not show the accurate financial position of the company hence misleading the financial information users that heavily rely on the financial statements (Bhasin 147). Moreover, unethical accounting practices have largely contributed to the increasing cases of corporate scandals globally. Remarkably, organizations should put in place measure to curb the instances of unethical accounting practices. In 2002, the US federal government responded with an Act called the Sarbanes Oxley Act that required publicly traded companies to comply with the new financial reporting requirements (Shaw 76). As such, organizations should put great emphasize on the requirements of the Act. Furthermore, internal controls need to be strengthened to assist in detection and prevention of fraudulent activities in the accounting system. Works Cited Bhasin, Madan. "Survey of Creative Accounting Practices: An Empirical Study."Wulfenia Journal KLAGENFURT23.1 (2016): 143-162. Shaw, William.Business ethics: A textbook with cases. Nelson Education, 2016..