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It took me a while to find it, but today's Spotlight is a long standing blogger. In fact, his blogging career started on November 20th, 2005. That was the day when Chris MacDonald, who teaches Philosophy and Business Ethics at Saint Mary's University in Halifax, Canada, started The Business Ethics Blog. The reason was simple enough, he hadn't found a good business ethics blog yet, so he decided he had to make one himself. Isn't that how many great bloggers start in the first place? And for sure,  Chris has now become one of those great bloggers.

Climbing the blog ladder to success

His second post starts off with "Maybe this blog was a mistake. Apparently, I may not be very well qualified to write a blog on business ethics"...hear hear. He must have done something right, though, because he has come a long way since his then fumbling first steps, and in 2008 ethisphere.com nominated him as #81 among the 100 most influential people in business ethics:

MacDonald writes one of the longest continually-running blogs on business ethics written by a researcher and educator in the field, which has operated continuously over the last 3 years. Moreover, MacDonald explores and uncovers issues that, at first, might not appear to touch upon subjects relating to ethics; however, upon further inspection, they challenge the reader at a much more core level.

I can only agree to that.

Why should you read this blog?

You may think that The Business Ethics Blog is only for business students, MBA prospects and CEO wannabees. Wrong. It is just as much for the ignorant consumer,  who duped by advertising, buys his favorite products from his favorite company without even caring, or at least without even thinking too much about it.

One of Chris' most recent articles deals with consumer trust and Big Pharma. Despite the industry's spotty track record, there are some good reasons for trusting Big Pharma...to some extent.

One the more fun side, there is a review of the movie The Yes men Fix the World, a movie I haven't heard of, but a movie Chris uses in class so the students learn not just to lament corporate wrongdoing, or to poke fun at it, but to understand the world in which that wrongdoing goes on. On the more serious side you can find a review of Food Inc, which may make you rethink what you plan on having for dinner tonight.

There's a vast reservoir on business ethics on Chris' blog, and he does not shy away from religion either. Most articles are well-commented, too, showing a truly engaging blog. Indeed, the Business Ethics Blog is definitely worth reading, bookmarking, and coming back to.

Not the only one

Back in 2005, Chris may very well have been the first and only business ethics blogger on BlogCatalog. Since then, many have joined him, such as: It's Just Good Business, featuring stories about businesses who do good. Notes on Noble Business, where corporate futurist and author Darwin Gillett examines "nobility" as a model for sustainable business success. There is also another lecturer's blog, Teaching Business Ethics, where Tony Birch and friends reflect on how to teach business ethics.

Bottom line

I don't know who coined this phrase or whether I am actually reciting it correctly, but the saying is that if you take care of your customers, your customers will take care of you, i.e. your bottom line. For sure, without business ethics, there isn't going to be much bottom line in the long run.

Written by Jan Husdal, BlogCatalog Blogger Advocate
http://www.husdal.com/
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