SYLLABUS IS UNDER CONSTRUCTION.

Professor:  Dr. Barbara R. Bartkus

Constant Hall 2055; Phone  683-3581         Please leave a message!

Office hours:   TBA

email:  bbartkus@odu.edu

website: www.odu.edu/~bbartkus

All students must have schedules that permit consistent and punctual attendance.  Students are responsible for in-class announcements, lectures, quizzes, etc.   The instructor does not give personalized lectures to students who miss class voluntarily.   In the very rare event of an absence or a student is unavoidably tardy, the student is urged to contact a friend or classmate for notes and announcements.   Involuntary absences must be documented, and are a result of confinement to a hospital, court appearances, military duties, death in immediate family (parent, sibling, child).  ALL other reasons for missing class are viewed as voluntary absences.  Employee work hours, interviews, vacations and appointments are NOT acceptable reasons for missing class: please schedule these important events for other days &/or times. 

Course description.  An examination of the relationship between business (usually the individual firm, but occasionally a group of firms in an industry or a set of headline-makers in different industries) and society (an individual, group of people, the general public, or government entity representing the interests of this individual or group or the public).  Emphasizes stakeholders and ethics. The course material is both philosophical and practical for executives and informative and practical for citizens.

Course objectives include the following: that students will learn (1)  how stakeholder groups influence firms; (2)  why firms are pressured to satisfy some stakeholders; (3) how some stakeholder interests conflict with other stakeholder interests; (4) ethical issues that affect organizations and stakeholders.