Ethics Essay

O R I G I N A L P A P E R

Measuring Individuals’ Virtues in Business

David Dawson1

Received: 15 November 2015 / Accepted: 10 March 2017 / Published online: 24 March 2017

� Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht 2017

Abstract This paper argues that Shanahan and Hyman’s (J

Bus Eth 42:197–208, 2003) Virtue Ethics Scale (VES)

should be abandoned and that work should begin to

develop better-grounded measures for identifying individ-

ual business virtue (IBV) in context. It comes to this con-

clusion despite the VES being the only existing measure of

individuals’ virtues that focuses on business people in

general, rather than those who hold specific leadership or

audit roles. The paper presents a study that, in attempting to

validate the VES, raises significant concerns about its

construction. In particular, investigation of the VES items

leads to adjustments in the language used and examines

participants’ understanding of the virtue terms and their

descriptors. Confirmatory factor analysis of data collected

from a sample of 137 HR practitioners establishes that the

6-factor solution identified by Shanahan and Hyman is not

appropriate for the sample under examination. Rather,

exploratory factor analysis results in three dimensions

based in 13 items focusing on the individuals’ reliability,

resourcefulness, and leadership. Finally, multiple regres-

sion establishes that these dimensions do not on the whole

show associations with MA or PRESOR, two measures

through which it would be expected to establish convergent

and divergent validity. The paper concludes by suggesting

guidelines for the development of future measures of IBV.

Keywords Virtue ethics � Measurement � Moral attentiveness � PRESOR

Introduction

Studies of virtue ethics have begun to examine how the

concepts related to philosophical theories may be measured

in practice. This paper reports on part of a wider study that

attempted to validate existing measures of individual and

organisational virtue and examine their interaction within a

wider range of concepts related to ethics. 1

Indeed, although

studies have developed measures at the individual (Libby

and Thorne, 2007; Riggio et al. 2010; Sarros et al. 2006;

Seijts et al. 2015; Shanahan and Hyman 2003; Thun and

Kelloway 2011; Wang and Hackett 2016), team (Palanski

et al. 2011; Rego et al. 2013, 2015), and organisational

level (Cameron et al. 2004, 2011; Chun 2005; Fernando

and Moore 2015; Kaptein 2008; Moore 2012a), limited

work has taken place to validate these measures after they

have been created. It is important to establish credible

measures of virtue, and that existing measures undergo

critical examination and testing. Only through testing of

measures across different samples and locations will their

credibility be established. This paper reports on the ele-

ment of the study that focused on the measurement of

individuals’ virtue when working in a business context.

Focusing on Shanahan and Hyman’s (2003) Virtue

Ethics Scale (VES), this paper attempts to validate the

measure and its ability to measure individual business

virtue (IBV) with a sample of established business people.

It does this by following through three phases of investi-

gation: (1) examining the nature of the VES items, (2)

testing the dimensions of the measure, and (3) examining

the association of VES dimensions with moral attentive-

ness (MA) and the Perceived Role of Ethics and Social

Responsibility in creating organisational effectiveness

& David Dawson [email protected]

1 The Business School, University of Gloucestershire,

Cheltenham, Gloucestershire GL50 2RH, UK 1

Another part of the study is reported in Dawson (2015b).

123

J Bus Ethics (2018) 147:793–805

https://doi.org/10.1007/s10551-017-3505-7

(PRESOR), two measures with which it should be possible

to establish convergent and divergent validity. This work

raises significant concerns about the VES leading to the

recommendation that it be abandoned.

The paper starts by considering ‘Progress to the Mea-

surement of Individual Business Virtues’ and the back-

ground to current efforts to measure peoples’ virtues in the

business context. It continues to examine ‘The Origins of

the Virtue Ethics Scale’ and its basis in Solomon’s

(1992, 1999) work. It continues to outline the ‘Method’ of

the study and the three-phase process of investigation

before presenting the ‘Results’. Finally, in ‘Discussion’ and

‘Conclusions’ the implications of the results for the use of

the VES in research and practice are discussed.

Progress to the Measurement of Individual Business Virtues

Proponents of virtue ethics argue that the fundamental

question for ethics to answer is ‘what kind of person should

I be?’ rather than ‘what should I do?’ As a result, it puts

people and their characteristics in the foreground and

focuses on how good character traits (the virtues) and the

habits they invoke lead people to work for the good and

promote human flourishing (Dawson and Bartholomew

2003). Human flourishing is focused on peoples’ well-be-

ing and is achieved when they are meeting their physical

and emotional potential.

A focus on virtue ethics in business has developed since

the late 1980s when authors including Klein (Klein 2002),

Kohn (1995, 1998), Solomon (1992), Warren (1996), and

Whetstone (1998)—recognising a resurgence of virtue

ethics in the philosophical literature—introduced it to the

business ethics literature. During the early 2000s, debate

focused on the potential for virtue in business (see Beadle

2002; Dobson 1997a; Dawson and Bartholomew 2003;

Moore 2002, 2005). The debate about the use of virtue

ethics on the business ethics literature has two strands. The

first has focused on answering critiques of virtue as an

approach to ethics and the second on more specific con-

cerns about the use of virtue in a business context. Whilst it

is beyond the scope of this paper to address these concerns

at length, it is important to note how they have been

answered by proponents of virtue in the business ethics

literature.

Critics of virtue as an approach to ethics have focused

on two issues in particular, its ability to direct action and its

reliance on character. First, critics argue that virtue fails to

provide any meaningful direction to those who want to

know what it is to act ethically (e.g. Louden 1984). In

response proponents of virtue ethics point out that in the

same way that under other approaches to ethics there is a

need to educate people so they know what rules they need

to follow or outcomes are legitimate to pursue, a person

who is new to virtue has to be educated into what it is to be

virtuous. This ethical education may use virtue rules, which

work to assist people who have less experience of working

by virtue and are exploring for the first time how they can

contribute to human flourishing given their particular skills,

talents, and role in society. In short, the virtue approach is

no different to others in having to provide education in its

operation, but by being clear about the need for induction

into the virtues it brings that process to the fore and opens

it up to examination.

Second, critics argue that by relying on character the

virtue approach to ethics is deficient. Harman

(2000, 2003, 2009) argues that when it is claimed that

behaviour results from a person’s character that an error of

attribution is being made. He argues that it isn’t actually

differences in character that lead people to act in particular

ways, but it is the situational differences that people find

themselves in. Whilst acknowledging the different chal-

lenges that may be presented in the situations that people

who are acting by virtue face, the repost provided by

proponents of virtue to the situationalist critique is both

simple and clear-cut. If people act fundamentally against

human flourishing, they cannot be counted as virtuous

irrespective of the situation they find themselves in. The

proponents of virtue provide the same response to critics

who argue that basing an evaluation of someone on their

character is faulty because a person’s character may shift.

Because a person moves from behaving by virtue to not

doing so does not mean that the virtue approach is faulty. It

only points to that person having shifted from being vir-

tuous to not being virtuous.

Debate about the legitimacy of using the virtue approach

in the context of business has focused on answering

MacIntyre’s (1985) critique of management and business

more broadly. MacIntyre (1985) presents a framework that

argues that virtue is displayed by those who work for

human flourishing through the performance of practices

including medicine, fishing, and farming that are based in

community. He argues that because managers could be

working in any field they lack the ability to contribute to a

clearly defined good. Hence management cannot constitute

a practice like farming or fishing. More generally,

MacIntyre (1985) argues that the value-free nature of

business and its capitalist foundations will inevitably lead

to the prioritisation of profit and to the practices that he

sees as being essential to virtue being corrupted.

In response, proponents of virtue in the context of

business have argued that MacIntyre promotes a view that

fails to recognise the potential for management to support

practices and their associated internal goods through gov-

ernance (Moore 2012b) or regulation (Sinnicks 2014).

794 D. Dawson

123

They also argue that MacIntyre fails to recognise potential

for business to support the virtues (Maitland 1997) and

focus on community (Dawson and Bartholomew 2003)

especially where for many small- and medium-sized busi-

nesses profit is not the dominant driver for their owners.

Indeed, Dobson (2016) argues that by focusing on the

potential for institutions to corrupt practices rather than

rogue practices to corrupt institutions, MacIntyre funda-

mentally misidentifies the threats to virtue in a business

context. Add to this the move to apply the virtue frame-

works of other contemporary virtue ethicists that are in

many ways less demanding on business (Dawson 2015a), it

can be concluded that virtue ethics is at least theoretically

useful in discussing how to further the role of ethics in a

business context (Beadle 2013; Dawson 2015b; Moore

2015; Sinnicks 2014).

Having progressed to the stage where it was accepted

that the examination of virtue in a business context is

legitimate, the literature began to examine its application to

business issues. Studies examined the application of virtue

to circus practices (Beadle 2013), environmental issues

(Dawson 2005), garment manufacturing (Fernando and

Moore 2015), health care (Dawson 2009; Oakley and

Cocking 2001), pharmaceuticals (Fernando and Moore

2015), and retail organisations (Moore 2012a; Whetstone

2003) amongst others. Most recently, there has been a shift

in the discussion as attempts in the business ethics litera-

ture have moved beyond the application of general

frameworks for virtue in business to examine the structure

and potential for the measurement of virtues in business.

Although some remain sceptical about the possibility of

measuring virtues (e.g. Beadle 2013; Robson 2015), there

have been notable attempts to develop measures in the

business arena (Table 1).

First to develop a measure of individual business virtue

were Shanahan and Hyman (2003), who in creating their

Virtue Ethics Scale (VES) were progressive and ahead of

other authors examining virtue ethics in a business context.

Shanahan and Hyman (2003: 198) developed the VES to

‘…assess the value placed on aspects of moral character like courage or tolerance’ and provide an alternative to

measures that use principle-based criteria when evaluating

ethical decision-making. In this, they recognise virtue

ethics as an alternative to Deontological and Utilitarian

approaches where decisions are guided by rules or princi-

ples. Libby and Thorne’s (2004, 2007) measure of Audi-

tors’ virtues is the other example of an attempt to measure

individual virtues that comes out of the business ethics

literature. When developing their measure, they inter-

viewed Auditors to provide a basis for modifying Pincoffs’

(1986) typology of the virtues. Whilst some aspects of this

scale’s development are to be commended, its concentra-

tion on virtues that are highly relevant to the Auditor’s role

means that it would be unwise to take it as a measure of

virtue for people who work in other roles in business.

Moving beyond the business ethics literature, several

measures of leadership virtues relevant to business have

been developed (Riggio et al. 2010; Thun and Kelloway

2011; Sarros et al. 2006; Seijts et al. 2015; Wang and

Hackett 2016). Sarros et al.’s (2006) Virtuous Leadership

Scale (VLS), that is based on seven items measuring

humility, courage, integrity, compassion, humour, passion,

and wisdom generated by a qualitative study of leaders in

Australian business organisations conducted by Barker and

Coy (2003), is an early example. On the face of it these

virtues could be applied to business people generally.

However, it is important to note that in focusing on leaders

the VLS likely excludes virtues that people in business

more generally would be expected to hold. This concern is

heightened where the items are written so that they are

clearly focused on leader behaviours (e.g. Riggio et al.

2010; Wang and Hackett 2016) and the psychometric

properties of all the measures are assessed with data focused

on leaders’ qualities. Indeed, whilst these measures may be

useful in assessing virtue with leaders in business, it is

unlikely to be appropriate to use them with people who

work in other roles.

So, whilst the field has progressed to a point where

several measures of individual virtue in the context of

business exist, Shanahan and Hyman’s (2003) VES

remains the only measure that focuses on people who work

in a business context generally rather than focus on people

who hold particular roles. Keeping in mind the aims of the

broader study to examine the virtues of people working in

business and that there has been no published work that

attempts to validate the VES, work was undertaken to

validate the VES. It is the results of that work on which this

paper reports.

The Development of the Virtue Ethics Scale

Drawing on Dobson’s (1997b) interpretation of MacIn-

tyre’s (1985) work, Shanahan and Hyman (2003) see virtue

as an approach that asks individuals to aim for excellence

based in communities. Rather than relying on rules or

principles, virtues are developed by emulating role models

and the character traits that drive good behaviour are

developed over a person’s lifetime.

In order to establish their measure Shanahan and Hyman

(2003) needed to identify a list of appropriate virtues. Their

literature review identified nearly fifty that had been

applied to business, but they turned to Solomon’s (1999)

list of 45 virtues to underpin the measure. Solomon’s

(1992, 1999) project, based in an Aristotelian perspective

on the virtues, is one of the few that examines the operation

Measuring Individuals’ Virtues in Business 795

123

Table 1 Measures of virtue in business

Level of

analysis

References Measures Samples

Organisation Cameron et al. (2004) Organisational Virtue Instrument Location: Midwest USA

Respondents: employees of 18 organisations from a

range of sectors

Sample size: 804

Organisation Cameron et al. (2011) Positive Practices Survey Location: Northeast USA

Respondents: employees of financial services

organisation/nursing units

Sample size: 1989/442

Organisation Chun (2005) Virtue Ethical Character Scale (VECS) Location: UK

Respondents: staff and customers of 7 firms

Sample size: 2548

Organisation Kaptein (2008) Corporate Ethical Virtue scale

(CEV)

Location: Holland

Respondents: employees of Dutch organisation

Sample size: 312

Organisation Moore (2012a) Organisational Virtue Interview Location: UK

Respondents: Allianz Boots managers

Sample size: 21

Team Palanski et al. (2011) Team Transparency, Behavioural Integrity

and Trust

Location: Northeast USA

Respondents: nurses and nurse managers

Sample size: 83

Team Rego et al. (2013) Team Virtuousness (adapted version of

Camron et al. 2004)

Location: Portugal

Respondents: university employees

Sample size: 222

Individual Libby and Thorne (2007) Measure of Auditors’ Virtue Location: Canada

Respondents: members of the Canadian

Institute of Chartered Accountants

Sample size: 376

Individual Riggio et al. (2010) Leadership Virtues Questionnaire Location: USA

Respondents: managers

Sample size: 200

Individual Sarros et al. (2006) Virtuous Leadership Scale Location: Australia

Respondents: Australian Institute of Management

members

Sample size: 238

Individual Seijts et al. (2015) Measure of Leader Character Dimensions Location: Canada and USA

Respondents: leaders of multidivisional

conglomerate organisation

Sample size: 364

Individual Shanahan and Hyman

(2003)

Virtue Ethics Scale Location: Southwest USA

Respondents: business students

Sample size: 445

Individual Thun and Kelloway

(2011)

Character Strengths Leadership Survey Location: Atlantic Canada

Respondents: university employees

Sample size: 327

Individual Wang and Hackett (2016) Virtuous Leadership Questionnaire (VLQ) Location: North America

Respondents: MBA students

Sample size: 193

796 D. Dawson

123

of a range of virtues in a business context and at that stage

was the only example of a substantial list of IBVs.

Shanahan and Hyman (2003) validated the items by

asking focus groups of business undergraduate and doctoral

students to identify the preferred traits of a new employer,

employee, and an advertising agency when responding to

business scenarios. They found evidence to support the use

of all of the 45 virtues in Solomon’s (1999) list. A pre-test

of the questionnaire based on 102 student responses, 11 of

which used verbal protocols, confirmed participant under-

standing of the items.

The main study was conducted with 455 business stu-

dents and asked them to respond to a business scenario

which related to the hiring of a new employee. The

respondents were asked to rate to what extent they agreed

that it was important for the new employee to hold the

traits described using a 6-point Likert scale. Exploratory

factor analysis resulted in six dimensions: ‘empathy’

(a = .94), ‘protestant work ethic’ (a = .90), ‘piety’ (a = .76), ‘reliability’ (a = .73), ‘respect’ (a = .72), and ‘incorruptibility’ (a = .67) based in 34 items. Comparison with categorisations of virtues in the business ethics liter-

ature (Murphy 1999) lent face validity to the dimensions

described.

Although the development of the measure was robust,

its use is limited by its focus on student perceptions of

desirable traits in potential employees, rather than relying

on the reporting of these traits by business people.

Although it is useful to develop measures using student

samples, it is important that the measure is validated using

a sample that has experience of business and encountering

ethical issues in that context if it is to be accepted as a

valid measure of virtues in an organisational context. The

original study also fails to establish convergent and

divergent validity with associated concepts. It is with these

issues in focus that this study set out to attempt to validate

the VES.

Method

This section presents the three-phase process adopted when

validating the VES measure. The three phases are the

‘examination of the items prior to measurement’, ‘confir-

mation of the measure’s dimensions’, and ‘establishing

convergent and divergent validity’.

Phase 1: Item Analysis and Redesign

In order to establish if the VES items were appropriate for

the measurement of individual virtue with a sample of

business people in a UK context, items were examined to

ensure:

• that the use of language was appropriate for the UK • the appropriateness of the language for people in a

business context

• there was no inappropriate overlap in terms used between each item

• that item titles were seen to match with their descriptors by participant groups

This phase used a panel of 12 business academics

working in the UK. All of the panel had experience of

managing in businesses prior to entering academic careers.

First, two of the panel examined each item to identify terms

that would not be familiar to UK business people and

where there was overlap in the language used between

items. Where language was found to be inappropriate or

there was overlap in the terms between items, items were

rewritten by one of the academics and the second academic

reviewed the rewritten items to ensure that the alternative

was now in appropriate language and reflected the original

item’s meaning.

Second, when establishing match between items and

descriptors, the remaining 10 panel members were indi-

vidually asked to match the item titles to the descriptors.

Item titles were pinned to the left-hand side of a board and

the descriptors in a random order on the right. The indi-

vidual was asked to pin the descriptor to the title that they

felt it best described.

Phase 2: Confirmation of the Measurement

Dimensions

In order to carry out validation of the VES with UK

business people, a survey was conducted. The survey used

the full 45-item measure after it had been adjusted for the

premeasurement examination of items. In order to establish

the level of individual virtue that exists, rather than pref-

erences for individual virtue in others, respondents were

asked how much each statement was true or false for them

using a 5-point Likert scale from definitely true to defi-

nitely false. Typical items were: In my job I ‘go above and

beyond, show bravery’, ‘fulfil my obligations’, and ‘get

things done without relying on others’. The survey pro-

vided data for factor analysis which aims to establish fit

between the dimensions found by Shanahan and Hyman

(2003) and the current sample.

During the summer of 2014 Human Resource Manage-

ment professionals who were LinkedIn with a university in

the South West region of the UK were contacted to fill in a

survey that included Shanahan and Hyman’s (2003) mea-

sure as well as others that were of interest to the wider

project. Respondents were contacted with a message that

outlined the objectives of the project and a link to a Survey

Monkey questionnaire. Using an electronic survey allowed

Measuring Individuals’ Virtues in Business 797

123

participants who were geographically dispersed to be

contacted easily. It also facilitated easy monitoring of

responses and administration of reminder emails that were

sent in line with Dillman et al.’s (2014) process for

administering surveys.

Of the professionals 383 had graduated from the uni-

versity between 1991 and 2013, the remaining 52 having

connected with the university for a range of other reasons

including being ex-employees or part of business networks

run in collaboration with the university. Responses were

received from 172 (40%) people who had been sent the

request to fill in the survey. This compares well with

response rates of other surveys with organisations that

typically gain 35% (Baruch and Holtom 2008). Of the

respondents 35 omitted to fill in at least one significant

section and were excluded from the analysis. This meant

that the analysis was based on 137 participants and 32% of

the potential respondents.

The majority of the respondents had worked for their

organisations for between 2 and 9 years (72.3%), were

working in the private services sector (55.5%), and were

female (74.8%). Their roles ranged from HR administrator

through to HR Director, with the largest group HR Busi-

ness Partners representing 18.2% of the respondents. The

characteristics of the sample are broadly representative of

the UK’s professional body for HR professionals, the

CIPD.

Phase 3: Establishing Convergent and Divergent

Validity

Confidence in the VES can also be strengthened by

examining its association with other constructs that may

be expected to drive ethical behaviour, what is known

as its construct validity. It is argued that moral atten-

tiveness (MA) (Reynolds 2008) and the perceived role

of ethics and social responsibility in supporting the

effectiveness of business (PRESOR) (Singhapakdi et al.

1995) are two measures that would be expected to

correlate with VES scores and demonstrate convergent

and divergent validity. It is to these issues that the

paper now turns to.

Given the origins of the VES, individuals who show

high scores would also be expected to demonstrate a more

ethical approach both generally and in business. In this

section it is argued that holding IBV should be positively

associated with moral attentiveness and perceptions of the

importance of ethics and social responsibility in promot-

ing organisational effectiveness. In underpinning the

methodology adopted to validate the VES measure it is

important to provide a theoretical justification for there

being associations between IBV and MA, and IBV and

PRESOR.

Moral Attentiveness

Reynolds (2008) works from the perspective of social

cognitive theory and argues that ethical behaviour is driven

by a combination of individual characteristics and external

influences. From this perspective, he argues for moral

attentiveness as a predictor of ethical behaviour. Drawing

on Fiske and Taylor’s (1991) work, he argues that acces-

sibility and how easily ethical stimuli fit with an individ-

ual’s cognitive frameworks is central to the influence of

ethical issues on their decision-making. Where accessibil-

ity to ethical stimuli is deeply embedded it becomes

automatic, more efficient, dominates cognition, and as a

result, has greater influence on a person’s decision-making

processes. In turn, Reynolds (2008) argues that moral

attentiveness focuses us on the mechanisms through which

people perceive their environment and how that determines

the impact of ethical issues in their thinking.

Reynolds (2008) identifies two dimensions. First, the

perceptual where a person interprets information in their

environment immediately from an ethical perspective and,

second, the reflective where people review their experi-

ences deliberately with reference to their ethical frame-

works. In his view, both attentions to moral issues in the

perceptual and reflective modes should lead a person to

display more positive ethical behaviours.

Individuals who demonstrate higher levels of IBV

would be expected to, also, demonstrate higher levels of

moral attentiveness. People who hold individual business

virtues will be aware of their requirements. The caring

business person will—through the very process of caring—

have an understanding of the requirements of caring that

someone who is not caring is much less likely to com-

prehend. Moreover, because caring becomes embedded in

their thinking and decision-making, that individual is going

to become more attentive to issues of caring in their con-

text and the decisions they face. They would be expected to

be both more perceptive of moral issues related to caring in

the day-to-day situations they face, but also consciously

reflect on those issues more than those who do not hold the

virtue of caring. As a result they go hand in hand and any

measure of IBV would be expected to be associated with

higher levels of Reynolds’ (2008) MA and be evidence of

convergent validity.

Reynolds’ (2008) 12-item measure of moral attentive-

ness was used. The 12 items were rated by an expert panel

as representing the concept of MA. Testing of the measure

using a sample of 123 management students based in the

USA resulted in a two-factor solution with ‘perceptual

moral attentiveness’ (a = .87) being represented by seven items and ‘reflective moral attentiveness’ (a = .84) by five. Perceptual moral attentiveness focuses on people’s imme-

diate responses to situations which they perceive to be

798 D. Dawson

123

ethical. Reflective moral attentiveness focuses peoples’

reflections on ethical issues.

Subsequent studies have shown high alpha validity with

Wurthmann (2013) replicating the factor structure with

similarly sound reliability (perceptual moral attentiveness

a = .82 and reflective moral attentiveness a = .76) with US-based undergraduate students and Whitaker and

Goodwin (2013) reporting a = .89.with US-based adults. The current study confirmed the results of previous studies

producing a two-factor solution (perceptual moral atten-

tiveness a = .84 and reflective moral attentiveness a = .79). Higher reported scores for IBV dimensions would be expected to be positively associated with both

MA dimensions.

Perceived Role for Ethics in Business

Singhapakdi et al. (1995) focus on the perceived impor-

tance of ethics and social responsibility in creating organ-

isational effectiveness as a driver of ethical behaviour.

They argue that the perception that ethics and social

responsibility are important to organisational effectiveness

will significantly increase the chances that an individual

will act ethically. ‘This is a pragmatic view based on an

argument that managers must first perceive ethics and

social responsibility to be vital to organizational effec-

tiveness before their behaviours will become more ethical

and reflect greater social responsibility’ (Singhapakdi et al.

2001: 134).

In turn, a person who has come to the view that ethics

and social responsibility are not just socially desirable,

but also important to the long-term performance and

survival of their business will make them central to their

decision-making (Singhapakdi et al. 1996). Studies that

examine the perceived importance of ethics and social

responsibility suggest that they are important to the pro-

cess people follow when translating experiences of their

environment into behaviour and evaluation of the impact

of that behaviour for individuals and organisations (e.g.

Valentine and Fleischman 2008; Singhapakdi and Vitell

2007).

Individuals who show higher levels of IBV would also

be expected to perceive a significant role for ethics and

social responsibility in promoting organisational effec-

tiveness. Holding virtue is not something that can be

switched on and off depending on context. Where a person

holds a virtue it is embedded into the way they act across

all areas of their life (Dawson and Bartholomew 2003). In

turn, they would be expected to appreciate the benefits of

virtue not just in their personal lives, but also in their

business lives. That is, they will have experiences and

understanding of how ethical behaviour through virtue can

drive organisational effectiveness.

Singhapakdi et al.’s (1995) measure was adopted to

measure PRESOR. Based on 16 items that place emphasis

on either ethics and social responsibility or other facets of

organisational effectiveness, the PRESOR measure drew

upon Kraft and Jauch’s (1992) Organisational Effective-

ness Menu. Singhapakdi et al.’s (1995) study generated a

three-factor solution (good ethics is good business

(a = .72), profits are not paramount (a = .69), and quality and communication (a = .60)).

The 15 studies 2

that examine the factor structure of the

PRESOR measure provide either two- or three-factor

solutions. In each solution, a single dimension contains

items that detract from ethics and social responsibility by

focusing on other business priorities. The other dimensions

place ethics and social responsibility as integral to business

success. In this study, a three-factor solution results from

the analysis for PRESOR that reflects the results of pre-

vious studies (e.g. Axinn et al. 2004; Shafer et al. 2007;

Wurthmann 2013). Stakeholder: Effectiveness (a = .79) best describes the first factor and is comprised of items that

focus on the importance of ethics to sustainable business

performance. The second factor Stakeholder: Compatibility

(a = .77) contains items that focus on how ethics and social responsibility are compatible. The Stockholder

(a = .64) factor contains items that prioritise business objectives. Higher reported scores for IBV would be

expected to be positively associated with the PRESOR

stakeholder dimensions demonstrating convergent validity

and negatively associated with the PRESOR Stockholder

dimension demonstrating divergent validity.

Results

In this section the results of each of the three phases of

investigation are reported.

Phase 1: Item Analysis and Redesign

Examination of the VES items to ensure that they would be

understood in the UK rather than the USA found that none

of the terms were inappropriate in themselves for use in

UK English, although spelling was changed appropriately.

Only a limited number of changes were made because it

was felt the terms were not appropriate for presentation to

business people. For example, the term ‘cosmically edified’

used to describe spirit was deleted from the description as it

2 The following studies each examine the factor structure of

PRESOR: Axinn et al. (2004), Elias (2004), Etheredge (1999),

Godos-Diez et al. (2011), Groves and LaRocca (2011a, b), Kurpis

et al. (2008), Park (2005), Promislo et al. (2012), Shafer et al. (2007),

Singhapakdi et al. (1995, 1996, 2008), Vitell and Paolillo (2004),

Vitell and Hidalgo (2006), Wurthmann (2013).

Measuring Individuals’ Virtues in Business 799

123

was felt business people would not connect with the term.

At this stage, items were also reworded to ensure that they

were in the present tense and first person.

Inappropriate overlap of terms was found in the VES,

with virtue titles used in the description of another item.

For example, the descriptor for integrity was ‘Being one’s

true good self; being a model of trustworthiness’. The use

of the word trustworthiness caused overlap because it was

also used as a virtue title. Similarly, there were instances

where more than one item descriptor used the same term in

a way that caused overlap. For example, the term ‘being

admired by others’ was used to describe both honour and

pride. Where these conflicts were found the item descrip-

tors were rewritten to ensure overlap was eliminated.

Matching of the items with the item descriptors by the

10 panel members revealed mixed results. Overall the

participants matched 58% of the items to the descriptors

with one participant matching over 80% with the lowest

matching 33%. Nineteen of the items were matched by at

least 7 of the participants including compassion, competi-

tiveness, fairness, honesty, and wittiness. Ten other items

were matched by less than 4 of the participants, items

including acceptance, determination, saintliness, and zeal.

Moreover, conversations with the panel identified that

some of the item descriptions were overly long and caused

confusion because they could conceivably contain two

concepts. Some respondents found some of the items dif-

ficult to relate to. For example, panel members questioned

items including saintliness, spirit, and zeal. In response to

these findings items with longer descriptions and those that

had performed poorly in the matching exercise were

examined in an attempt to shorten and clarify descriptions.

Items were not deleted because their status as virtues had

been questioned by members of the panel as the comments

were not consistent across the group.

Phase 2: Confirmation of the Measure’s Dimensions

Confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) was used to examine

the extent to which the 6 IBV dimensions in Shanahan and

Hyman’s (2003) study were reflected by data collected

from the current sample. CFA was conducted using IBM

SPSS AMOS software. Multiple fit indices were adopted

with the following cut-offs being used when assessing

model fit with Chi-square/df (\3), P ([.05), CFI ([.95),

GFI ([.95), AGFI ([.80), RMSEA (\.05), and PCLOSE ([.05). The results show that the model tested is not a good fit for the data in this study (Table 2).

In order to identify the factor structure in the current

data, exploratory factor analysis (EFA) was carried out

using the principal components method and varimax rota-

tion with Kaiser normalisation with n = 137. Loadings of

0.5 were considered to represent statistical significance

with a sample of this size (Comrey 1973; Tabachnick and

Fidell 1996; Hair et al. 1998).

EFA for the VES measure resulted in a three-factor

solution based on 13 items. The three factors reflect items

which together represent ‘reliability’, ‘resourcefulness’,

and ‘leadership’ (Table 3). People who are high on ‘reli-

ability’ act with integrity, honour, are articulate, cooperate

with others, and show tolerance of others. A high score on

‘resourcefulness’ indicates a person who is cool headed,

determined, and entrepreneurial when acting. Finally,

people high on ‘leadership’ display passion, style, and

saintliness.

Comparison of the three dimensions to those found by

Shanahan and Hyman (2003) reveals that the dimensions

show remarkably little similarity. Only one of the dimen-

sions, reliability, shares the same title. Closer examination

of that dimension in the two studies shows that the

majority of items are not shared, although they can be

considered together to point to the same meaning. Indeed,

examination for similarities in the items across each

dimension across the two studies shows very limited

sharing of items. It is clear that fundamentally different

factor structures have been found with a UK sample of

working HR practitioners than was found with US business

students.

In addition, that more than 70% of the items were dis-

carded from the solution is unusual, breaking the 25–50%

threshold that would be expected (Velicer and Favor 1998).

This suggests that a majority of the items (virtues) included

in the measure act independently of each other. This would

be unusual where the virtues would be expected to be

integrated by the individual who holds them and lead to

coherent action. So, the results show that this study has not

been able to replicate the factor structures found by

Shanahan and Hyman (2003) and also suggest that many of

the items may work independently to one another contrary

to the expectations of theory.

Table 2 Confirmatory factor analysis results

Variable modelled Chi-square/df P CFI GFI AGFI RMSEA PCLOSE

Individual business virtue

(VES—Shanahan and Hyman 2003)

1.408 .000 .789 .780 .744 .055 .199

800 D. Dawson

123

Phase 3: Establishing Convergent and Divergent

Validity

The descriptive statistics (Table 4) display an accept-

able range of values where a five-point Likert scale has

been used. The means of the IBV dimensions are each

above the midpoint of the scale with respondents reporting

higher scores for IBV reliability (M = 1.64) and IBV

resourcefulness (M = 1.86) over IBV leadership

(M = 2.20). In line with Reynolds’ (2008) results, MA

perceptual moral attentiveness (M = 2.92) and MA

reflective moral attentiveness (M = 2.27) show means

above the midpoint of the scale. The means for the PRE-

SOR dimensions show that respondents prefer PRESOR

Stakeholder: Compatibility (M = 1.73) and PRESOR

Stakeholder: Effectiveness (M = 2.41) over the PRESOR

Stockholder (M = 3.80) dimension. This reflects the

results of studies carried out by Axinn et al. (2004), Shafer

et al. (2007), and Wurthmann (2013). Examination of the

Pearson correlation coefficients for multicollinearity

between the dimensions fails to raise any concerns.

Associations between IBV and the MA dimensions are

addressed by multiple regression with MA perceptual

moral attentiveness and MA reflective moral attentiveness

as dependent variables (Table 5). Only IBV leadership

provides significant associations with MA perceptual moral

attentiveness (p \ .05) and MA reflective moral atten- tiveness (p \ .05). Indeed, in general there is little support for convergence between IBV and MA.

The multiple regression with the PRESOR Stakeholder:

Effectiveness, PRESOR Stakeholder: Compatibility, and

PRESOR Stockholder dimensions as dependent variables

are shown in Table 6. The results show that IBV leadership

is positively associated with PRESOR Stakeholder:

Table 3 Individual business virtue items and factor analysis results

Items Virtue Factor loading

Factor 1—reliability (a = .762)

Deal with people in a way that is right Justice .646

Act in line with my principles—am true to one’s self Integrity .628

Act correctly and hold my head high Honour .609

Get along—work through reciprocity Tolerance .566

Get things done through working with others Cooperativeness .562

Make my case by expressing myself clearly Articulateness .510

Factor 2—resourcefulness (a = .666)

Make decisions for myself—have a personal identity Autonomy .702

Retain control and reasonableness in heated situations Cool headedness .661

See difficult activities through, am resolute Determination .607

Take risks by being the first to implement new ideas, products or services Entrepreneurship .563

Factor 3—leadership (a = .639)

Am interesting, elegant, charming Style .721

Have an infectious and inspiring enthusiasm about my work Passion .716

Approach the ideal—behave extraordinarily Saintliness .574

Table 4 Descriptive statistics and Pearson’s correlation coefficients (N = 137)

Mean SD 1 2 3 4 5 6 7

1. IBV reliability 1.64 0.42

2. IBV resourcefulness 1.86 0.50 0.464

3. IBV leadership 2.20 0.59 0.376 0.288

4. MA perceptual moral attentiveness 2.92 0.79 0.067 0.118 0.195

5. MA reflective moral attentiveness 2.27 0.74 0.273 0.171 0.296 0.567

6. PRESOR Stakeholder: Effectiveness 2.41 0.71 -0.003 -0.090 0.220 0.215 0.366

7. PRESOR Stakeholder: Compatibility 1.73 0.47 0.111 0.125 0.243 0.166 0.283 0.495

8. PRESOR Stockholder 3.80 0.72 -0.282 -0.242 -0.171 0.020 -0.229 -0.372 -0.450

Measuring Individuals’ Virtues in Business 801

123

Effectiveness (p \ .005) and PRESOR Stakeholder: Compatibility (p \ .05). The results also show that IBV reliability is negatively associated with the PRESOR

Stockholder dimension (p \ .05). Whilst these associations are interesting, there is only limited evidence of association

between IBV dimensions and PRESOR dimensions and

little support for convergence or divergence between the

measures as expected across the dimensions.

Discussion

The results raise several concerns about the VES. These

concerns focus on the theoretical grounding and structures

used to underpin the measure, the specification of the

measure’s relationships with other constructs, and the

selection and specification of the items when constructing

the measure. This section will examine each of these

concerns in turn.

First, in phase two of the validation process, factor

analysis resulted in three dimensions based in 13 items.

Thirty-two of the measure’s items were disregarded, either

because they did not load sufficiently to their factor or

because they formed factors of only one or two items. This

suggests a fragmentation of the virtues included in the

measure so that they act independently of one another. As

already mentioned this would go against theories of virtue

which suggest that individuals integrate their virtues in

order to work towards the good in a cohesive manner and

brings into question the grounding of the items in the

measure.

Closer examination of the measure items shows that by

relying on Solomon’s (1999) work Shanahan and Hyman

(2003) have included an inventory of potential business

virtues. There is no theoretically grounded justification for

the inclusion for each virtue and no conceptualisation of

how the virtues relate to one another. For example, how

groups of virtues would be expected to complement each

other and whether they operate as part of a hierarchy is left

unclear. These questions need to be addressed when

developing a measure of individual virtue for business

people to ensure it is theoretically coherent, taking the lead

and building on the work of Libby and Thorne (2004) and

Barker and Coy (2003). As a minimum threshold, cate-

gories of virtue should be developed, with criteria for the

admittance of individual business virtues, and a clear

specification of how virtues in that category would be

expected to act. That is, the framework of virtues under-

pinning the measure needs to be both structured and the-

oretically grounded.

Second, Phase 3 of the validation process finds only very

limited evidence to support the association of the IBV

dimensions and MA and PRESOR, two measures with

which they would be expected to show relationships. That

this is the case may be because the dimensions derived

from the measure are theoretically incoherent as already

discussed. However, it may also point to another issue.

Whilst IBV generally and MA and PRESOR would be

expected to be related, this may not hold for all groups of

virtues.

For example, on what basis can it be argued that the

items under IBV resourcefulness would be expected to lead

to greater MA? Whilst ‘[making] decisions for myself—

have a personal identity’ (Autonomy) and ‘[retaining]

control and reasonableness in heated situations’ (Cool

headedness) might be expected to help a person take an

independent, clear view of situations and may provide

space for perception of and reflection on ethical issues, it is

Table 5 Multiple regression analysis of the MA dimensions

Variables b T value Significance of T

MA perceptual moral attentiveness

IBV reliability -0.042 -0.416 .678

IBV resourcefulness 0.083 0.861 .391

IBV leadership 0.186 2.015 .046*

Adjusted R2 = 0.022, F = 2.004, significance of F = 0.116

MA reflective moral attentiveness

IBV reliability 0.178 1.856 .066

IBV resourcefulness 0.024 0.262 .794

IBV leadership 0.222 2.499 .014*

Adjusted R2 = 0.098, F = 5.945, significance of F = 0.001

* p \ .05; ** p \ .005

Table 6 Multiple regression analysis of the PRESOR dimensions

Variables b T value Significance of T

Stakeholder: Effectiveness

IBV reliability -.036 -.366 .715

IBV resourcefulness -.153 -1.610 .110

IBV leadership .277 3.050 .003**

Adjusted R2 = 0.054, F = 3.579, significance of F = 0.016

Stakeholder: Compatibility

IBV reliability -.002 -.023 .982

IBV resourcefulness .061 .639 .524

IBV leadership .226 2.470 .015*

Adjusted R2 = 0.041, F = 2.945, significance of F = 0.035

Stockholder

IBV reliability -.198 -2.041 .043*

IBV resourcefulness -.134 -1.425 .157

IBV leadership -.058 -.650 .517

Adjusted R2 = 0.078, F = 4.827, significance of F = 0.003

* p \ .05; ** p \ .005

802 D. Dawson

123

far from clear how ‘[seeing] difficult activities through’

(Determination) and ‘[taking] risks by being the first to

implement new ideas, products or services’ (En-

trepreneurship) would. It is clear that better specification of

the expected links between IBV dimensions and related

constructs needs to be provided. Again, this needs to occur

during the construction of the measure where the rela-

tionship between categories of individual virtues and other

constructs needs to be made explicit and play a part in item

selection.

Finally, in the first phase of the validation process there

was evidence that business people may not relate to all of

the virtue items presented in the measure. Whilst this

finding may result from panel members’ lack of under-

standing of particular virtues, it also raises the possibility

that some of the items are not relevant to the current

context. Whilst Solomon (1999) adapts an Aristotelian

approach to ethics to twentieth-century business, he pro-

vides no evidence that the virtues in his inventory are

actually relevant in modern day business and would be

accepted as virtues by people in general. Indeed, without

engaging with business people it cannot be clear to what

extent the list includes or excludes the virtues and vices

that they act through.

These points suggest that the inclusion of items in

measures of IBV, whilst being grounded in appropriate

theoretical frameworks, need to be developed empirically.

That is, empirical work needs to take place to establish

what will count as a virtue item and through which lan-

guage to describe that item. Moore (2012a) and Fernando

and Moore (2015) both point to categories of organisa-

tional virtues that are grounded in both theory and empir-

ical work. Whetstone (2003) provides example of how

virtue language displays itself in a business context. It is

these and other studies like them that provide a template

for the justification for inclusion and specification of virtue

items.

So, rather than validate the VES, this study has raised

significant concerns. These concerns are significant in

scope and as such would suggest that the VES does not

provide a sound basis for the study of IBV. It may be

possible to revisit the measure’s development, but this

would be a significant undertaking. It would require a re-

evaluation of Solomon’s (1999) inventory of virtues in the

context of a theoretically grounded categorisation of the

virtues. Even then it would require validation of the virtues

with business people and Whetstone’s (2003) work sug-

gests that only a small number of those in the list would be

confirmed. Indeed, together these points suggest that the

VES should be abandoned and work should commence to

develop better-grounded measures for identifying the vir-

tues of people who work in a wide range of business roles.

Conclusions

This paper is the first attempt to validate Shanahan and

Hyman’s (2003) Virtue Ethics Scale. It does this through a

three-phase process that examines the items included in the

measure, the measure’s dimensions, and the convergent

and divergent validity with other measures of ethical

business practice, and utilises a sample of UK-based

business people. It fails to validate the measure, being

unable to replicate the dimensions found by Shanahan and

Hyman (2003), finding only very limited evidence of

convergence or divergence as expected with related con-

structs, and bringing into question the basis on which items

were selected for inclusion in the measure. The extent of

these deficiencies suggests that the VES should not be used

to examine individual virtue of business people. It also

suggests that it will be better to develop new measures

rather than attempt to redevelop the VES.

This study indicates four issues that need to be taken

into account when developing a measure of IBV. First, it

suggests that the measure needs to be grounded in theory,

a position that is supported by Bright et al. (2014). Any

measure of IBV needs to refer to appropriate theory and

that theory needs to provide enough detail to guide the

structure of the virtues so that any hierarchy and cate-

gories are clear. Second, the development of a measure

needs to pay due regard to links to related constructs, and

be clear on how different groups of virtues would be

expected to interact with them. This should go as far as

determining which items are included and discarded in

the measure.

Third, the development of a measure needs to take steps

to generate items that are appropriate to context. That

means work needs to take place to ensure that items should

be relevant to the twenty-first century and will be under-

stood by people working in business. In practice, this

means that business people rather than the literature on

virtues will need to take priority in the generation of the

measure’s items. Finally, the measure’s items need to use

language that will be understood by respondents. In the

context of this study, that means using the language of

business people to describe virtue items.

In making these recommendations, the limitations of the

current study are recognised. In particular, the choice of

variables used to examine convergent and divergent

validity was determined by the needs of the wider study of

which this work was one part. Release from those con-

straints means that future studies should consider the

examination of additional variables and newly published

measures for that purpose. It is also clear that whilst this

study has the benefit that it uses working people as its

sample, its concentration on HR practitioners is a potential

Measuring Individuals’ Virtues in Business 803

123

limitation. Future studies of IBV will benefit from using

samples of people that hold a wider range of business roles.

In leading to these conclusions, this study has provided

an evaluation of the most promising measure of IBV, the

VES. Although it is disappointing that the study did not

support further use of the VES, examination of that mea-

sure’s deficiencies has enabled clear guidelines for the

future development of a measure for IBV to be established.

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