Abstract
A comparative study of business related values among business students was conducted over the last 10 years in two neighbouring countries. Although Estonia and Finland are culturally related, according to an empirical study of managerial values, including the ethical values of business students, the two countries display significant differences. During the last decade, Estonia has changed from being a country characterised by an authoritarian, centralized, totalitarian state socialism, to a democratic country with a free market economy and different attitudes and values. At the same time Finland has experienced almost a century of capitalism and democracy. It is argued that the differences in values exhibited by these two countries could be explained by using the institutional and historical context. The authors propose a model of value hierarchies in relation to institutionalism.
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Ruth Alas is the Chair of Management at Estonian Business School. She has a Ph.D. in economics and a Ph.D. in business administration. She has written 19 books (in Estonian) on the following subjects: Strategic Management, Fundamentals of Management, Change Management, Human Resource Management, and Organizational Learning. Her research focuses on behavioural factors influencing changes in organizations. Jaan Ennulo, is the Chair of Behavioural Sciences at Estonian Business School. He has been a lecturer of General and social psychology, Pedagogical psychology and Behavioural Economics, a coach in training for communication. His degrees include BSc from Tallinn Technical University and from Tartu University and Ph.D. in Psychology from Tartu University. Primary research interests at the moment are in values, particularly ethical aspects of value judgments among business school students in different countries and ethics in the execution of power. Lembit Türnpuu has Ph.D. in Pedagogy. He has been in different managerial positions in the Estonian educational system. From 1995 to 2000 he was a professor-consultant at Estonian Business School and he is a part-time professor at Tallinn University at the moment.
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Alas, R., Ennulo, J. & Türnpuu, L. Managerial Values in the Institutional Context. J Bus Ethics 65, 269–278 (2006). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10551-005-5494-1
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10551-005-5494-1