Stereotyping as a Major Workplace Ethical Dilemma - Case Study Example

Ethics in Business Ethical Dilemma Stereotyping is a major workplace ethical dilemma facing every employee in almost all organizations. Stereotyping refers to as a tendency to attach individuals with certain characteristics commonly found in a particular group of people (Williams, 2007). More broadly, “stereotyping refers to the process of grouping objects into simplistic categories based on one’s generalised perceptions of those people” (Clegg et al., 2011. p.52). And these perceptions are, most of the time, are negative labels which are commonly placed with individuals working in a particular workplace (Gray, 2009). Such negative labels represent personal views of people holding or supporting them whereas people, who directly face such behaviours, do not disagree with such perceptions; consequently, such situations raise ethical issues in which ethical dilemmas take place and stereotyping becomes an ethical dilemma (Karen and Gibson, 2010). For example, gender stereotyping becomes a problematic issue when innate personal qualities are overlooked and undermined because of stereotype thinking (Cook and Cusack, 2010). And females are the prime targets as they directly face the problem of stereotyping in organizations where males outnumber them. From a moral perspective, calling someone as a member of minority community or holding prejudice against people based on race, religion, cast, colour, traits, qualities and personal shortcomings are some of the common forms of stereotyping that clearly violate the ethical values essential for keeping the workplace serene and conducive. Ethical dilemma and stereotyping Ethical dilemma refers to a situation in which one is required to select from alternative options, each with an ethical dilemma; and this is mainly influenced by mindset which is developed over a period of time (Zikmund et al., 2013). For example, if a boss is required to carry out an annual performance appraisal of employees and she prefers females over males and gives positive appraisal and negative appraisal to females and males respectively. This situation constitutes stereotyping in which the boss has not used the standard appraisal instead she is has used stereotyping to preserve and protect her personal interest at the cost of the organisational interests. Justification Causes of stereotyping Personal bias Personal bias is one of the major causes behind stereotyping. Personal bias refers to an inclination for interpreting an action or word by keeping in view a personal importance attached to the action or action; and it also reflects personal opinion about others that directly or indirectly influence on the interpretations of actions or situations (Purtilo et al., 2014). In other words, personal bias is a complete deviation from the general meaning and understanding given to any action or word which is commonly uttered and taken in a particular way. For example, if a department manager has developed an opinion that subordinates under the age of 35 are hard working and thereby they should be given priority to those who are above the age of 35. Under this situation, this personal bias has created stereotypic thinking which has divided subordinated based on the age discrimination. Discrimination Racial thinking also causes stereotyping. One type of stereotyping is profiling in which a group of people are singled out based on sex, race or ethnicity (Robbins, 2009). In almost all organisations, people from different social, economic, cultural, racial backgrounds work under one roof. Consequently, employees with the similar background prefer to talk and share their ideas whereas this diversity also separates them into different race, nationality and ethnicity. More recently, in the United States, killing of a black person has sparked violence in the streets of Ferguson and parts of the country; and subsequently, the verdict allowing the alleged policemen has further infuriated the problem. Even in this problem, race and stereotyping go hand in hand. For example, the black perceive that the white judges do not and will not punish the culprit; and this creates the problem of stereotyping which fragments the social fabric of the society. Similarly, the same discrimination is also found in the workplace environment where race-based discrimination is also common which is totally unethical and intolerable from an ethical perspective. Effects of stereotyping Division Stereotypic thinking divides and erects the Chinese wall among employees. For example, America and Russia have unfriendly relations for the last many decades. Under this situation, if a Russian and an American happen to work in a similar organization, there are strong chances that both would avoid talk freely and instead prefer to downgrade each other in an attempt to earn respect at the cost of other. Under this situation, the main price will be paid by the organisation as both individuals (the American and the Russia) are not performing their intended organisational role instead they use political animosity for achieving their organisational goals and such attempt only hurts organisational objectives. Diminished performance Stereotyping decreases both personal and organisational performance as well. Mello (2011) contends that when stereotype threat take place, performance become irrelevant and disputed as well. Based on this notion, it can be deduced that employee performance and overall organizational performance in all departments become invisible as the workplace environment is filled with animosity in which rivalry and office politics are observed at the cost of organizational objectives. Moreover, under this situation, the role of ethical leadership becomes highly relevant and required as well as the employees have failed to comply with the general workplace norms in which moral values and code of ethics have been completely violated by all and only negative attitudes and feelings are displayed by all employees. Ethical solutions Valuing people Organisations should enable and encourage employees to value others (Fielding, 2006). It means that those ethical and moral values that are heart of humanity and human values should only be promoted by the senior management of organizations. In this regard, it is important to highlight that the role of ethical leadership needs to play its part by highlighting the importance of such values which give mutual benefit and advantages to all those interact with each other by keeping in view the moral code and ethical behaviours. Ethical training and development programmes should also be conducted by the organizations. Ethics and business ethical values have become important for all organizations as they facilitate constructive and conductive workplace environment in which all employees interact positively. For this objective, it is highly essential that regular ethics training and development programmes should be held by the organizations in which emphasis should be given to those ethical norms which are highly relevant and required by the workplace environment. In this regard, the major role should be played by the department head as they have prime responsibility for leading and managing the affairs of the department. They should come forward and ensure that the ethical values will be given the highest priority in the department. Moreover, the role of department head is of crucial importance for promoting and implementing ethical values in the department. As every department is mainly headed by the department head, it will be considerably easy for the department head to ensure compliance with the ethical code of conduct. For example, Valuing diversity Providing support and respect will decrease stereotyping (Dovidio et al., 2010). Diversity is a natural gift to humanity as it promotes the message that even nature enjoys diversity as it has all types of colours in the sunlight and in the weather seasons. Due to this diversity, the natural cycle is soundly and smoothly working. If the same rule of diversity is applied to the workplace, it will have chances that the workplace environment and interaction will smoothly and soundly run and this process will enable the employees and organizations to achieve their objectives as well. Zero tolerance for stereotyping Zero tolerance for age bias and stereotyping should be practically put in place in organisations (Bell, 2012; Guffey et al., 2011; Muchinsky, 2006). This is very important for fully complying with the ethical code of conduct. Zero tolerance means that those who found guilty of promoting and supporting the stereotypic thinking and actions will not be tolerated under any condition. If anyone found guilty of such actions, disciplinary action will be taken against them. This policy will have strong impact on the workplace environment and it will also promote ethical thinking and actions in the workplace. Moreover, this policy will discourage stereotyping thinking and if anyone still resists to this policy will not will find it difficult to survive in the workplace because he or she has to choose between two options: ethical thinking or stereotypic thinking. Any decision will have subsequent ramifications. Objective measures instead of subjective ones should be used for measuring the performance of employees (Kreitner and Kinicki, 2008). In order to reduce bias and actions caused by stereotypic thinking, the organizations should reduce the level of subjectivity in which biased managers give positive feedback and performance appraisal to their ‘loved one’ at the cost of merit and deserving employees. This can only be curtailed by introducing and implementing the objective measures in which limited subjective judgement are provided and more quantitative measures will bring better and professional assessment of employees and their performance. References Bell, M.P. (2012). Diversity in Organisations. 2nd ed. Ohio: South-Western. Clegg, S., Kornberger, M., & Pitsis, T. (2011). Managing and Organizations: An Introduction to Theory and Practice. 3rd ed. London: Sage. Cook, J.R., Cusack, S. (2010). Gender Stereotyping: Transnational Legal Perspectives. Pennsylvania: University of Pennsylvania. Dovidio, J.F., Hewstone, M., Glick, P., & Esses, V.M. (Eds.). (2010). The SAGE Handbook of Prejudice, Stereotyping and Discrimination. London: SAGE. Fielding, M. (2006). Preparing messages that communicate. 3rd ed. Cape Town: Juta & Co. Gary, N.A. (2009). The Relationship Between Student’s Attitudes and Mathematics Achievement. Miami: ProQuest. Guffey, M.E., Almonte, R., & Karka, A. (2011). Essentials of Business Communication for English Language Learners. Toronto: Cengage Learning. Karen, S., & Gibson, D. (2010). Designing Games for Ethics: Models, Techniques and Frameworks. New York: Information Science Reference. Kreitner, R. & Kinicki, A. (2008). Organisation Behaviour. 8th ed. New Delhi: Tata McGraw Hill. Mello, J.A. (2011). Strategic Human Resource Management. 4th ed. Connecticut: Cengage Learning. Muchinsky, P.M. (2006). Psychology Applied to Work. 8th ed. California: Thomson. Purtilo, R., Haddad, A., & Doherty, R. (2014). Health Professional and Patient Interaction. 8th ed. Missouri: Elsevier. Robbins, S.P., Judge, T.A., Odendall, A., & Roodt, G. (2009). Organisational Behaviour: Global and Southern African Perspectives. 2nd ed. Cape Town: Pearson. Williams, A.C. (2007). A Concise Summary of Human Resource Management. Nebraska: iUniverse. Zikmund, W.G., Babin, B.J., Carr, J.C., & Griffin, M. (2013). Business Research Methods. 9th ed. Ohio: South-Western Cengage. Appendix A: The Ethical Leadership Debate Ethical leadership debate highlighted both aspects of ethical leadership. Before going to evaluate and give opinion about the characters represented the aspects of ethical leadership, it is essential to define the ethical leadership. Ethical leadership is composed of two words: ethics and leadership. Leader is anyone who leads or guides others through personal examples and suggestions and ethics represents a set of moral code which is based on the moral values relating to right and wrong approach. In short, any leader personally applying ethics and leading others is one who qualifies for ethical leadership. Ethical leadership for and against evaluation and opinion Ethical leadership positive side Ethical leadership improves not only individual’s professional performance but also organizational performance as well. One character specifically emphasized on this point and contended that it is the impact of the ethical leadership that improves employee’s performance in which employee experience a constructive and positive change in his or her attitude which increases performance. However, there are certain individuals who have inbuilt tendency to remain negative and do whatever they want to do; for them, ethics, moral values and ethical leadership and their role are meaningless as they do not want to follow others but are obstinate to use and apply their own thinking for satisfying their ego and their personal and organizational objectives. Under this situation, the ethical leadership will find it hard to change the attitude and mindset of such stubborn employees. Consequently, if the ethical leadership fails to change such employees and does not put across their message, the organization would not be in a position to claim that the ethical leadership has improved the organizational performance. At the same time, leadership qualities are difficult to obtain and retain. Some believe that leaders are borne while others claim that leaders are created. However, politically speaking, some leaders have charisma which attracts people to listen and follow the guidelines of the leader. However, after the information age and rise of economic and financial interests, political leadership has decreased and increase in financial leadership has been observed. In other words, it is not easy for organizations to attract individuals with the leadership qualities. Even if they hire considerably talented and competent person, they still require additional expenses for equipping the person to have those leadership qualities and ethical framework that is only related to the organization and it must be sufficient enough to satisfy the organizational requirements. Moreover, Ethical leadership is difficult to retain and maintain the consistency of ethical values. This is a major drawback mentioned one of the characters in the seminar. Ethical leadership is required to ensure that they fully understand the ethical values besides enabling the employees to follow them. I do not disagree with this perspective as the concept of ethics is considerably new and complex as well. for example, there are various ethics concepts, such as virtue ethics, utilitarianism, normative and descriptive styles and frameworks, are some of those concepts which make it hard for the ethical leadership to carry out them. In this regard, it is important to mention that many employees are not fully aware of such ethics and their value and significance for organizational environment and performance as well. Consequently, many would be unwilling to take them seriously and implement them as they are needed to be. Appendix B: Ethical Dilemmas Borries’ Ethical Dilemma Borries has to choose one from two options either to avail holiday or put his job in danger. The manager has indirectly highlighted that the client is very important for the company and it is highly essential that the client should be given priority as they are facing stiff competition in the industry. At the same time, Borries’ girl friend is also insisting that they should meet in the planned holiday because she may not have any such future opportunity. Manager’s dilemma The manager was under pressure from both situations. First, if the manager allows Borries to avail the planned holiday, this would create problems for the company as the client may discontinue doing business with the company. On the other hand, if the manager did not allow Borries, the manager would be doing unethically as the holiday was pre-planned and it was the right of Borries to avail this option. The manager has adopted the concept of utilitarianism. Under this concept, an act becomes morally correct if the act creates more utility and diminishes sufferings or troubles. If this is applied to the decision of the manager, it looks considerably relevant. For example, from the perspective of manager, it is highly essential that the objectives of organizations should always receive top priority and they should always be preferred to personal objectives. Within this context, the manager correctly did when he indirectly realised that the meeting with the client was important and Borries should cancel the planned holiday. First, this action proves that the manager has protected the organizational objectives which are of higher importance when they ar compared with the personal objectives. And there is a simple and understandable reason which is that it is smooth and successful functioning of the organization for generating profit through satisfying the requirements of the clients. If the organization continues to complete all projects on time and meet the expectations of the clients, this would increase organizational outlook and improve the financial and operational performance as well. Consequently, the employees would also be rewarded as well as their financial interests are closely attached with the organizational interest. If the organization exists and functions smoothly, the employees would also be rewarded and would be getting salaries and other fringe benefits. The manager’s decision has indirectly preserved the interests of all employees working in the organization but at the cost of one employee (Borries). If this situation is independently analyzed, the subsequent evaluation would highlight that manager’s decision was correct as it has enabled the organization not to lose a crucial contact or client who was in a desperate need of their support. Under such circumstances, clients understand the value of the business relationship with the organizations. If the organizations live up to their expectations and satisfy their business needs, this would increase their business trust on the organizations and they would prefer to retain and preserve such business relationship. On the other hand, had the manager allowed Borries to avail the planned holiday, the situation would have a drastic impact on organization. First, the organization would have lost an important client who was in a desperate need of their support and such decision would have put negative effect on the market reputation of the organization as such situations do not remain hidden but are commonly shared in the business corridors. Second, such decision could have decreased the revenue as well. The organization generates profit by providing services to clients. A decreasing number of clients indicate that the organization is failing to satisfy the client’s requirement which will be visible in the shape of decreased profit. And the decreased profit means reduced bonus and other allowances for the employees. Appendix C: Interpersonal and team-working skills in module For a successful completion of teamwork, it is highly essential that team members work closely and provide their effective coordination and cooperation. Teams are build on the concept of collective working towards a particular goal; a goal which has common significance for all team members. However, my experience with other team members was not positive as some team members were unwilling to actively participate in the teamwork. For example, they did not realise the importance of this project instead they preferred to complete a formality by ensuring their presence in the team meetings. Due to this lack of coordination and cooperation, the team did not perform as it should have. First, it is highly essential that each team member should fully and consciously understand the significance of the task. In this regard, if some team members are not willing to actively participate in the task, they should communicate this to the team leader. And after knowing their response, it is the responsibility of the team leader to needed action. The action of team leader is highly essential because the cost of inaction would be paid by all team members which would affect the individual performance as well. At the same time, team without a strong leader will be not effective. Our team leader was very effective as he led the team through motivating and encouraging them to play their part in the teamwork. Motivation is of crucial importance for leading team members in the most constructive way as it encourages the team members to find a reason behind their part in the team work. In our team, some members were inactive and de-motivated. Later on, the team leader discussed this issue with them separately and tried to figure out the reason behind their dormant role in the team. This attempt considerably improved the overall teamwork as the dormant team members found their motivation which enabled them to effectively participate and coordinate with team members. Read More