Doing business with individuals whose views on privacy are vastly different from one’s own requires finding common ground from which the two parties can reach an agreement. When handling confidential material, one should honor the privacy preferences of whoever owns the material. If it is owned by more than one company, the strictest privacy standards should be adhered to. If one is more relaxed than the other on one form of confidentiality but stricter on another, both should adhere to the more strict policies to ensure everyone is comfortable with how their material is being handled. This relates to the ideas presented in the article on Business ethics – it is always best to respect the ethical restrictions of whatever country you are doing business with, not for the more ethical party to degrade to the less ethical in order to show cultural respect.

It is important for a company’s business ethics to have a backbone in a good core philosophy so that the ethics are not simply adhered to for public image or cultural appropriateness. This relates to the Chinese views of Ren and Li. A company, like an individual, has no business practicing Li, or the polite behavior or ritual, if they do not possess Ren, the underlying good character from which the polite behavior emerges. In African culture, good character is just as important as good ethics, and such a philosophy must be applied to a corportation if they are to avoid corruption.