The road to ethical business is paved with good intentions, said Gale Andrews, Boeing's vice president for ethics and business conduct, at Tuesday's installment of the Cardinal O'Hara Lecture Series.

An intentions-centered model is the most effective way to ensure ethical decision-making, said Andrews.

Andrews, who oversees 70 ethics advisors, emphasized the importance of a pervasive ethical culture. Advisers are placed in each business unit, from rocket engines to commercial airplanes, to implement ethical policies throughout the corporation. "It's about each person addressing his own intentions," Andrews said.

He added that all Boeing business plans must include a statement of their intentions, so that consequences and intentions can be compared. "There is a difference between real intentions and window dressing," Andrews said.

The corporate ethics center at Boeing takes an active role in dealing with and learning from ethical problems, Andrews said. His office trains more than 95 percent of Boeing's 170,000 employees and managers at all levels, and Andrews personally reports to the chairman of the board.

Andrews' speech comes on the heels of a string of alleged high-profile ethical failures at large corporations, including Enron, WorldCom, Tyco and Martha Stewart Omni-media. The executive criticized the Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002, a corporate reform bill that President Bush signed this summer. Andrews said laws would not deter executives with bad intentions. "Laws were already on the books, and people chose to break them," he said.

While Andrews spoke about the importance of ethics for all employees, especially the need for well-intentioned executives.

"It's not a grassroots effort," Andrews said. "It starts at the top."

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