Quoting Michael Bayles, Wueste (1994) identifies three necessary features of a profession: (i) extensive training that (ii) involves a significant intellectual component and (iii) puts one in a position to provide an important service to society.

Professionals have special knowledge which may be used or misused, used for personal gains, for organizational gains or to serve the general interests of mankind. To follow Guha, professional ethics is about ways of empowering people and professionals to be pro-people and pro-dialogue and pro-analysis. For this he suggests that there is a need to develop an intersubjective corroboration method of value based management (Guha, 2008). A term similar to professional ethics would be workplace spirituality. It has been hypothesized that workplace spirituality not only provides meaning to workers but it also affects the productivity of work organizations. Ashmos and Duchon (2000) define workplace spirituality as the “recognition that employees have an inner life that nourishes and is nourished by meaningful work that takes place in the context of community”. The reason why workplace spirituality matters is that the people want to feel connected to work as well as to each other. This is especially true in the modern context when meaningful family and neighborhood relations are on decline. However, workplace spirituality is closer to meaning of work and applies to all workers while professional ethics is about the valued outcomes of work and applies to professionals (managers, decision makers, and experts). Ethical practices are associated with Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR), meaning thereby the compliance of social and ecological responsibility of the companies or organizations.