Ethics Consulting

Of all the fields on this site, this one is closest to academic philosophy in daily content. You analyse real cases, structure trade-offs, and write recommendations, except the audience is boards and regulators rather than journals. A PhD is common here and, unusually for the non-academic world, counts in your favour at face value.

The lay of the land

#

The work has three homes. Dedicated ethics consultancies, like Principia Advisory, sell ethical judgement as their whole product. University-based centres, like the IDEA Centre at Leeds, consult outward from academia. And large consultancies have growing digital-ethics practices inside them, like the one Kevin Macnish runs at Sopra Steria (see the Management Consulting guide for that world). Day to day it’s client workshops, written frameworks and a lot of turning “it depends” into something a board can act on. Roles are advertised as ethics consultant, research governance adviser, digital ethics analyst or responsible business consultant. The teams are small and openings are rare, so following the handful of firms directly works better than job boards.

Philosophers who’ve done it

#

Christine Jakobson

Associate Principal, Principia Advisory

PhD in Philosophy, University of Cambridge

Jim Baxter

Ethics Consultancy Lead, IDEA Centre, University of Leeds

PhD in Philosophy, University of Leeds

• Dr Kevin Macnish — digital-ethics consulting senior manager at Sopra Steria, former GCHQ analyst, author of The Ethics of Surveillance; spoke at our October 2022 workshop

From our events

#

• From Philosophy to Ethics Consulting with Dr Kevin Macnish (October 2022)
• Ethics Consulting with Christine Jakobson (October 2021)
• Professional Ethics Consultancy with Jim Baxter (July 2021)

Start here

#

• Follow the firms directly: Principia Advisory and the IDEA Centre hire philosophers; larger consultancies have digital-ethics practices
• Philosophy Means Business — on philosophers building the value frameworks (ESG, EDI, CSR) that companies commit to
• The opportunities board — ethics consultancies appear there as they hire