WALTHAM, MA - Deloitte & Touche LLP New England Managing Partner William K. Bacic supported the national dialogue on corporate ethics standards at a gathering of business leaders convening at the Bentley College Global Ethics Symposium co-sponsored by State Street Corporation. In his luncheon keynote address, Bacic emphasized that business must reclaim its role as guardian of the public trust to benefit itself and the investing public.

During his speech, moderated by Anthony F. Buono, professor of management and coordinator of the Bentley Alliance for Ethics and Social Responsibility, Bacic said, "Corporate America must realize there are costs and consequences for falling short on ethics. As disturbing as it is to watch the current parade of corporate executives on trial, I value the message it conveys - that there is accountability at stake, and a price to pay for unethical behavior."

Bacic said that he and Deloitte & Touche see this as a challenging time for both the accounting profession and business in general, but also "as an opportunity to renew and strengthen the underpinnings of our entire profession and to close the expectation gap, clarify our goals and reclaim our role as guardians of the public trust."

He added, "We can talk about regulation, about strict codes of conduct, but ultimately integrity begins at home."

He also summarized the steps Deloitte & Touche has taken to reinforce its own culture of ethics, noting that its overall goal is to bring the topic of ethics out into the daily lives of its people. He outlined three formal mechanisms that Deloitte & Touche USA LLP and its subsidiaries (the "U.S. Firms") uses to ensure an ethics-based culture. These include its ethics training program, designed to encourage employees to think about daily challenges in ethical terms, and its ethics helpline that makes it possible for employees to seek guidance or report alleged violations of ethics in a confidential manner.

The third part of the U.S. Firms' ethics platform is its code of ethics and professional conduct that Bacic defined as "personal, unambiguous and explicit about the expectations we have of one another."

Bacic concluded by explaining that, "Perhaps most importantly, we have become more upfront about the importance of ethics and the way we resolve conflicts. Our partners and managers are speaking out about the dilemmas they face and we are encouraging all our professionals to be open and air their concerns."

Bentley's Global Business Ethics Forum
The newly named Global Business Ethics Forum, underwritten by State Street for the next three years, will invite leading business ethics scholars and practitioners for a series of discussions on current trends and best practices in business ethics and corporate social responsibility. This exchange will lead into the teaching workshop, in which 20 selected North American and international faculty will continue to explore how they incorporate ethics and corporate responsibility into their discipline-based courses. Bentley's long-standing program in teaching business ethics went global for the first time last spring, attracting an international group of educators dedicated to helping students raise their ethical awareness and abilities.

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