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'Ambitious goals are only of value if pursued honestly and fairly. Clandestine gains fail all: the community, business, and particularly the offenders.' John Gourlay
In 2004 John and Louise Gourlay provided a $2.5 million endowment to Trinity College to establish the Gourlay Visiting Professor of Ethics in Business initiative. Inspired by a belief that the exercise of uncompromising integrity and morality is not only intrinsically desirable, but also delivers improved and more certain business outcomes, the professorship promotes an over-riding ethical approach to business activity and decision making.
The Gourlay Visiting Professor endowment is used to bring an internationally distinguished professor to reside at Trinity College each year to teach ethics in business at Trinity College and the Faculty of Business and Economics, and within the wider Australian university community, plus local and business communities. The program exposes students from many disciplines to the world’s best minds in applied ethics, and helps them understand critically important principles, values and decision making frameworks.
2022 Gourlay Ethics in Business Week event: The Coal Conundrum at the Wheeler Centre.
Gourlay Ethics in Business: past visiting professors
2022: Gourlay Ethics in Business Week
To celebrate Trinity's 150th anniversary, five former Gourlay Professors were invited back to Melbourne for a series of events. The professors tackled a variety of business ethics issues, alongside local experts, in panel discussions, hypotheticals and questions and answer forums. The Gourlay Professors who attended were Professors Andy Crane, Professor Robert Phillips, Professor Dirk Matten, Professor Joanne Ciulla and Professor Jeremy Moon.
2021: Professor Andy Crane
Andrew Crane is a Professor of Business and Society and Director, Centre for Business, Organisations and Society (CBOS) at University of Bath, School of Management in the UK. He is a multi-award winning author and teacher, as well as a popular speaker and media commentator.
For the past 25 years, he has been examining the changing roles and responsibilities of the corporation in the global economy. He specialises in issues of corporate social responsibility and business ethics, with a particular focus on modern slavery, the political role of business, cross-sector partnerships, and communication.
He is a member of the Transparency in Supply Chains Advisory Group at the Home Office for the UK Government and a founding member of the Data Strategy Board for TISC (an open data platform committed to ending corruption, supply chain labour abuses and modern slavery.
2018-19: Professor Dirk Matten
Professor Dirk Matten is from the Schulich School of Business at York University, Toronto, Canada, where he is the Associate Dean of Research and holds the Hewlett-Packard Chair in Corporate Social Responsibility.
Dirk is also the co-founder and director of the Centre of Excellence in Responsible Business at the Schulich School of Business. His research is noted for bringing important global and political views to the work being conducted in the area of corporate social responsibility.
2016-17: Professor Rob Phillips
Professor Rob Phillips is Professor of Management and Philosophy, Politics, Economics and Law (PPEL) at the E. Claiborne Robins School of Business of the University of Richmond, Virginia.
Rob is known as one of the leading thinkers in stakeholder theory and organizational ethics. Rob’s published work includes three books and dozens of scholarly articles published in journals such as the Academy of Management Review, Strategic Management Journal and Business Ethics Quarterly.
He is a Senior Fellow at the Olsson Center for Applied Ethics, has been associate editor of Business & Society, a Representative-at-Large at the Strategic Management Society and is Past-President of the Society for Business Ethics.
Rob completed his PhD from Darden Graduate School of Business Administration at the University of Virginia and has since also taught at the Cheung Kong Graduate School of Business, Shanghai, China, the University of San Diego, the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania, and the McDonough School of Business at Georgetown University.
Professor Phillips' visit to the University of Melbourne and Trinity in 2016.
2014: Dr Rosamund Thomas
Dr Rosamund Thomas is director of the Centre for Business and Public Sector Ethics, Cambridge. The centre was established in 1988 at a time when Cambridge did not yet have a business school, and was the first of its kind in Europe.
Rosamund, a Fulbright scholar, is an expert in corporate social responsibility, business ethics, business management and government ethics. She taught and examined in these subjects at the London School of Economics and Political Science, prior to undertaking further research at Cambridge University as a senior research fellow. Rosamund also has separate higher degree qualifications in social administration and policy in respect to third world countries.
Rosamund was named Woman of the Year in 2005 by the American Biographical Institute, honoring her overall accomplishments and contributions to society. She is also listed in the Dictionary of International Biography, 31st Edition, 2004, and is included in Great Women of the 21st Century, 2004-05; and The Cambridge Blue Book, 2006.
2013: Professor Jeremy Moon
Jeremy Moon is professor and founding director of the International Centre for Corporate Social Responsibility, Nottingham University Business School.
He has held visiting positions at the European University Institute; McGill University; the University of Toronto; Churchill College, Cambridge; the Institute for Advanced Studies, Princeton; and the University of Manchester.
He is co-editor of The Oxford Handbook of Corporate Social Responsibility (2008 Oxford University Press), co-author of Corporations and Citizenship (2008 Cambridge University Press), and co-editor of the Cambridge University Press series Business, Value Creation and Society.
2012: Professor Ronald Jeurissen
Professor Ronald Jeurissen is from Holland and has been identified by previous Gourlay professors as one of the top three business ethicists in the world. He is adept at engaging accountants, fund managers, controllers, chief financial officers, compliance officers and other finance professionals on a number of topics, including soft controls, corporate ethics and matters of integrity. His research interests include the theoretical foundations of business ethics, corporate social responsibility, corporate integrity and marketing ethics.
View Professor Jeurissen's presentation on Managing for Organisational Integrity, presented on 3 October 2012.
2011: Professor Joanne Cuilla
One of the founding faculty members of the Jepson School, Professor Joanne B Ciulla teaches courses on ethics, critical thinking, conflict resolution and leadership in international contexts. A demanding and creative teacher, she was honored in 2007 with the university's highest award for teaching, and in 2003, with the Outstanding Faculty Award from the State Council of Higher Education for Virginia. Her academic appointments have included the UNESCO Chair in Leadership Studies at the United Nations International Leadership Academy in Jordan and appointments at La Salle University, the Harvard Business School, the Wharton School and Oxford University. She currently holds visiting appointments with the University of Fort Hare in South Africa and Nyenrode Universitit in the Netherlands.
Joanne's research interests are leadership ethics, business ethics, international leadership and the philosophy of work. Her books include Ethics, The Heart of Leadership; The Working Life: The Promise and Betrayal of Modern Work; and The Ethics of Leadership. She co-authored a business ethics text titled Honest Work: A Business Ethics Reader and co-edited a collection of essays on The Quest for Ethical Leaders: Essays in Leadership Ethics. The book critics at Amazon.com ranked The Working Life as number two in their list of the 10 best business books of 2000. She also published the three-volume set, Leadership at the Crossroads: Leadership and the Humanities. She gives lectures and seminars all over the world and has worked with organisations such as the Aspen Institute, the World Economic Forum and the Brookings Institution.
2009-10: Professor Ed Freeman
Professor Ed Freeman is the Elis and Signe Olsson Professor of Business Administration at the Darden School at the University of Virginia. He is also academic director of the Business Roundtable Institute for Corporate Ethics and co-director of Darden's Olsson Center for Applied Ethics. He is Professor of Religious Studies, a faculty advisor to the university's Institute for Practical Ethics, and adjunct professor of stakeholder management at the Copenhagen Business School in Denmark. Ed is perhaps best known for his award-winning book Strategic Management: a Stakeholder Approach, published in 1984, in which he proposed businesses build their strategy around their relationships with key stakeholders.
2007–08: Professor Laura Hartman
Laura Hartman is Professor of Ethics in the Business Management Department at DePaul University, a private institution of higher education and research in Chicago, Illinois. Laura is a recognised expert in the field of business ethics on issues related to corporate governance, responsibility and culture, the employment relationship, global labor conditions and standards, the impact of technology on employment relationships, and the alleviation of global poverty through profitable corporate partnerships.
2006–07: Professor Steve Salbu
Professor Steve Salbu joined Georgia Tech College of Management as dean and Stephen P. Zelnak Chairholder in July 2006. Previously, he was associate dean for graduate programs at the McCombs School of Business at the University of Texas, and director of the McCombs School Business Ethics Program and editor-in-chief of the American Business Law Journal. Steve is a recognised expert in the fields of business ethics, the legal environment of business and cyber law.
The Gourlay Visiting Professor commitment
The Gourlay Visiting Professor of Ethics in Business participates in and contributes to a range of programs. This may include:
- living at Trinity College and engaging with the Trinity community
- presenting a public lecture
- providing a range of learning opportunities for students and academic staff by offering master classes to Trinity students, for example
- being a guest of honour and speaker at a major dinner
- being a guest of honour at an event for Melbourne’s business community.
About John Gourlay
John Gourlay was a resident student at Trinity from 1954–56. He graduated from the University of Melbourne with a Bachelor of Commerce, and in 1957, joined Coopers and Lybrand. During an 11-year career with the company, he worked in the Melbourne, Toronto and London offices, eventually holding the position of senior audit manager.
In 1968 he joined share brokers Davies and Dalziel as a client adviser and in 1972 moved to Parsons and Co share brokers as an institutional adviser and partner, furthering his successful and rewarding career as a stock broker and financial analyst.
John became a member of the Australian Stock Exchange in 1973, and a Fellow of the Institute of Chartered Accountants in Australia. In 1974 he became a partner in McCaughan Dyson and Co, and was appointed chairman and managing director when the company was incorporated in 1984. He was awarded an Order of Australia medal in 2007 for his contribution to accountancy and the community.
He and his wife Louise have made significant contributions to education, health and other spheres through philanthropic activities. John was the inaugural chairman of the Trinity Foundation in 1983, and his wife, Louise Gourlay OAM, was the inaugural president of Trinity’s Warden’s Circle.