[5] The IBE originated out of CABE in response to Cooper being tasked by Sir Terence Beckett, the director-general of CBI, with propagating written codes of ethical conduct in British corporate practice.

[9] The IBE has been credited with seeking to uphold the London Stock Exchange's motto "My Word Is My Bond" under the changed conditions in which short-term financial transactions prevailed.

[8][9] Originally, the IBE operated as a fund within the CABE, which is a registered charity established in 1937 (as Catholic Industrialists' Conference,[10][11] under the aegis of UNIAPAC[12]) to promote the study and application of Christian moral principles in the conduct of business.

[8] In 2000, the IBE obtained separate charitable status;[13] its charitable goals being "to advance public education in business ethics and related subjects with particular reference to the study and application of ethical standards in the management and conduct of industry and business generally in the United Kingdom and elsewhere".

The Anglican economist Simon Webley – who had pioneered business ethics surveys for the free market corporate lobby group[15] Aims of Industry in 1966,[16] and later served as the British director of the British-North American Committee from 1969 to 1998[17] and as a board member of the Centre for Policy Studies until 1989[18] – joined as a consultant at the IBE's inception in 1986 and assumed the post of Research Director in 1998.