Abstract:

Concerns for the ethical standards of business students are of major concern to many. Today’s business student is tomorrow’s business manager.
Today’s business students have grown up in a society where distinctions between right and wrong have become blurred and where unethical behavior is observed and even expected in highprofile leaders. Especially troubling is the impression educators have that many students no longer view cheating as morally wrong (Pavela and McCabe, 1993; Kidwell, 2001).

The main objective of this research is to highlight the perception of "ethics" by students who study in their final year of management at a higher management institute in Lisbon. The methodology employed was quantitative, descriptive and causal research with the application of 60 questionnaires from students of the management degree of a Higher Education Institution (HEI/IES) located in Lisbon in 2019 and 2020.

The data was collected by applying an online questionnaire. The analysis was carried out by descriptive statistics and the SPSS program.

The importance recognised in relation to the Code of Ethics of the Management Profession to guide professional conduct is stressed. However, 15 % of respondents at the generalist level said they had not even read the code before this investigation.

The main results reveal that the Ethics, Social Responsibility and Citizenship curricular unit, which takes place during the 3rd semester, is considered important in the management degree and only 18% of the students disagree with the undue practice of retaining accounting documents from delinquent clients, thus 48% believe that the fees are more important than their ethical attitude.

It is concluded that management students fully agree (90%) that the use and understanding of the code of ethics is important in the conduct of the management profissional.

Keywords:

Ethics, Code of Ethics, Business Administration, Students.