MEMBERS' MORAL INTEGRITY AS A DRIVER OF ORGANIZATIONAL SUCCESS AND SUSTAINABILITY: A CONCEPTUAL REVIEW

Abstract

Organizations are increasingly expected to achieve sustainable performance while maintaining high ethical standards amid rapid technological advancement, globalization, and growing stakeholder expectations. Although ethical leadership and corporate governance have received considerable scholarly attention, the role of members' moral integrity as a collective organizational capability remains underexplored. This study aims to examine the concept of members' moral integrity within organizational contexts, analyze the theoretical perspectives explaining its influence on organizational success and sustainability, identify key antecedents that strengthen moral integrity, and develop an integrated conceptual framework for future research. This study employed a qualitative conceptual review using a systematic literature review approach. Secondary data were collected from peer-reviewed journal articles, academic books, and seminal literature on organizational ethics, strategic management, stakeholder management, and organizational sustainability. The selected literature was synthesized through qualitative content analysis to identify recurring themes, theoretical relationships, and conceptual patterns. The findings indicate that members' moral integrity represents an important intangible organizational resource that enhances ethical decision-making, stakeholder trust, organizational commitment, innovation, and long-term organizational resilience. The review further identifies ethical leadership, organizational values, and ethical climate as key antecedents that foster members' moral integrity and strengthen organizational sustainability. By integrating the Resource-Based View, Stakeholder Theory, Social Exchange Theory, Ethical Climate Theory, the Triple Bottom Line framework, and the Balanced Scorecard perspective, this study proposes a comprehensive conceptual framework explaining how moral integrity contributes to sustainable organizational success. The proposed framework extends the existing organizational ethics literature by positioning members' moral integrity as a strategic organizational capability rather than merely an individual characteristic. The study also provides practical implications for managers and policymakers seeking to cultivate integrity-based organizational cultures that support sustainable performance and long-term competitive advantage.