Employee empowerment is vital to ensure that companies and banks act more ethically.

This was the unanimous view of attendees at a recent CIMA-organised debate at St Paul’s Cathedral – a venue that has featured prominently in ethical discussions stimulated by the financial crisis.

CIMA’s vice-president, Keith Luck, FCMA, CGMA, was one of the key speakers at the event, entitled “Business must value good people”.

He said the issue of ethics had risen to the top of the corporate agenda as calls for transparency were being driven by public disenchantment and protest.

“Protest group Occupy played out this debate outside the cathedral,” he noted, calling for a values-based approach to which management accountants could make a strong contribution with measures such as integrated reporting.

“CIMA recognises the importance of management accountants in steering businesses in the right direction,” he said.

Fiona Stewart-Darling, bishop’s chaplain in London’s Docklands, where many global financial services firms are located, said: “In some parts of organisations something had gone wrong.”

The response needed to “be about empowering people so they could speak up about unethical behaviour”.

A joined-up agenda for ethics, involving the HR department to ensure the employee’s voice could be heard, was suggested by Peter Cheese, chief executive of the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development.

The event, chaired by the Reverend James Walters of the London School of Economics, included a role play featuring a real-life ethical dilemma, introduced by CIMA’s head of ethics, Tanya Barman.

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