Includes bibliographical references and index.

Cover; Virtue at Work: Ethics for Individuals, Managers, and Organizations; Copyright; Acknowledgements; Contents; List of Figures; 1: Introduction; What this book is all about; Who is this book for?; Introducing Alasdair MacIntyre; How is this book structured?; Part I: Organizations and Virtue Ethics; 2: Organizations and Ethics; Introduction; The ubiquity of organizations; What are organizations and why do they exist?; Metaphors and theories of organizations; Other approaches to organizational ethics; Corporate Social Responsibility and the Stakeholder Approach; Summary.
3: Virtue Ethics and Organizational EthicsIntroduction; Virtue ethics in context; The various components of virtue ethics; Two criticisms of virtue ethics; Being able to provide reasons for action; Virtue ethics at the organizational level; Summary; 4: A MacIntyrean Approach to Organizations and Organizational Ethics; Introduction; Different kinds of goods; Practices and institutions; Organizations as practice-institution combinations; Organizational purpose and mapping the virtuous organization; Summary; Part II: Implications for Individuals, Managers, and Organizations.
5: Implications for IndividualsIntroduction; Ends, narrative quests, practices, goods, and virtues-MacIntyrean virtue ethics for individuals; Practices and the unity of an individual life; Virtue at work; Meaningful work; Ordering our desires; Making work meaningful; Do managers, organizations, and governments have A responsibility to provide meaningful work?; Summary; 6: Implications for Managers; Introduction; Managers and management: whatś the difference?; Why does MacIntyre have such a negative view of managers?; Is MacIntyre right about managers?
Locating managers within MacIntyreś frameworkCharacterizing virtuous managers; Which virtues will managers need?; Summary; 7: Implications for Organizations; Introduction; The characteristics of a virtuous organization; A taxonomy of organizational virtues and organizational character; Crowding in virtue; Summary; Part III: Organizational Virtue Ethics in Practice; 8: Virtue Ethics in Business Organizations; Introduction; Is anything and everything a practice?; Two specific practices; Organizational purpose and mapping the virtuous organization.
The role of organizational members in promoting virtuous organizationsA conducive mode of institutionalization; A conducive environment; Summary; 9: Virtue Ethics in Non-Business Organizations; Introduction; Examples from the performing arts; Examples from the health sector; Churches and Journalism; Summary; 10: Conclusions; Introduction; MacIntyrean virtue ethics-a summary; MacIntyreś framework-organizational implications; MacIntyreś framework-managerial implications; Is MacIntyrean virtue ethics utopian?; MacIntyrean virtue ethics versus CSR and the stakeholder approach.

Virtue at Work' is about good organizations, good managers, and good people, and how these can contribute to good communities. It provides an integrated and philosophically-grounded framework that enables a coherent approach to organizations and organizational ethics from the perspective of practitioners in the workplace, from the perspective of managers in organizations, as well as from the perspective of organizations themselves. The philosophical grounding comes from the work of the moral philosopher Alasdair MacIntyre. In line with MacIntyre's own commitments, 'Virtue at Work' makes philosophy down-to-earth and practical. It provides a new way of understanding ethics and organizations that is both realistic and attractive, but also challenging. And it also provides tough but realistic suggestions in order to put this approach into practice.