Russell Baker Quotes

Companies and leaders are role models - not just with the business community - but in the broader world.

He or she must be successful in economic terms, but always within an ethical framework. Whether his or her constituency is a corporation and its shareholders or the customers in a small and privately held business, his or her first responsibility is to serve that constituency.

Commerce is against morality. Morality is going to lose every time.

Ethics or simple honesty is the building blocks upon which our whole society is based, and business is a part of our society, and it's integral to the practice of being able to conduct business, that you have a set of honest standards.

I do believe anybody manufacturing products for healthcare cannot regard it truly as a 100 per cent business: it is business plus a humanitarian approach to society because you are saving lives. You are playing with people's lives.

Any business whose sole purpose is making money is not worth doing. Business must serve a larger purpose.

A free enterprise system that is not underlaid with values is bankrupt.

Our core values and business ethics will always be paramount in all that we do, and we are always looking to do the right thing and settle claims fairly and accurately.

A company not under sanction is just like any other company, period.

If partnering with Facebook meant that we had to change our values, we wouldn't have done it.

How do you defend inaction in the face of crisis? How is that defensible for anybody?

As business leaders, we should not choose between profit or good; rather, we must choose to profit from good. And that requires connecting what we do with a purpose beyond profit - a reason to exist that meets our shared sense of 'doing good.'

I would not allow CIA to undertake activity that is immoral, even if it is technically legal.

An organization's culture of purpose answers the critical questions of who it is and why it exists. They have a culture of purpose beyond making a profit.

Purpose has always been part of Unilever's DNA. Our founder, William Lever, built a business around the sale of Lifebuoy soap that was not only profitable and sustainable but also helped transform the health of the poor in Victorian Britain.

People say values are expensive, but I say they create economic value.

We can no longer pretend that business is immune from the rising tide of environmental or social challenges or that companies can create value in isolation from the communities of which they are a part.

Wrong does not cease to be wrong because the majority share in it.

Ethical and responsible behavior needs to become the cornerstone of corporate behavior

Some people would argue the other side: that the business of business is business, and companies should only be focused on profits. But in today's world, I don't think corporations can only be focused on profits, because they are inextricably linked with the communities that they serve. I do not believe you can be a leader in your industry without being a leader in your community. It's a fundamental shift in how you think about business.

The emphasis placed by more and more companies on corporate social responsibility, symbolises the recognition that prosperity is best achieved in an inclusive society.

What we are trying to do is to create a new business paradigm, simply showing that business can have a human face and a social conscience.

We believe responsible business can be profitable business

A man of business will often deceive you without the slightest scruple, but he will absolutely refuse to commit a theft.

American business, while it does not frown on helping the human race, frowns on people who start right in helping the human race without first proving that they can sell things to it.