Comillas and Bankinter Consumer Finance award a research project on ethics and compliance

Esperanza Hernández, associate lecturer who teaches Business Ethics to students at Comillas ICADE and Comillas ICAI, won first prize in the 8th edition of the Business Ethics Research Awards for her doctoral thesis "Ethics and Compliance Programs in a Changing Business Paradigm", directed by Comillas ICADE lecturer José Luis Fernández. The jury highlighted its research depth and practical relevance in the analysis of the internal legitimacy of Ethics and Compliance programmes, especially in a business context that is increasingly demanding ethics, sustainability and the creation of value for stakeholders.

"It is the perfect culmination of all these years of doctoral studies, something I did not expect because all the works are of exceptional quality," confessed the winner, who was entering the competition for the second time.

For her thesis supervisor, who is also director of the Chair in Business Ethics, the papers presented were of a very high academic level and international focus, which confirms the growing prestige of the competition and the interest in approaching business ethics from a rigorous and global perspective. "Rewarding research means recognising that the mission of the university involves creating knowledge transfer to society. This requires a rigorous and systematic intellectual effort, aimed at discovering new realities and understanding others".

The rest of the finalists' works address topics as diverse as human rights legislation, organisational resilience, the use of AI in home care services, prosocial behaviour through meditation and gender diversity on boards of directors.

Alfonso Sáez Alonso-Muñumer, chairman of the jury, managing director of Bankinter and head of Bankinter Consumer Finance, said that "these awards reinforce a fundamental alliance between universities and business, which promotes critical thinking, ethical innovation and purposeful leadership". For the Rector of Comillas, Antonio Allende SJ, "unethical companies can do a lot of harm. All the works presented highlight the value of ethics as something that leads society to be better". In addition, "we need to continue improving, to continue adapting to new situations, and surely the works that come in the future will have to deal with artificial intelligence and other issues that are worrying us now, but always looking at this human component of ethics," he said.