There are three main camps of ethics:
virtue ethics, which I think you're describing,
consequentialism (which is exclusively about the outcome of actions),
and deontology, which are the moral objectivists.

Deontologists argue that virtues and outcomes don't matter- that there are universal underlying rules determining what is good or bad.

I believe the answer to 'what that would actually mean' is something along the lines of "it just is"