The Practical Role of Conduct and Practices Within IS of an Organisation - Research Paper Example

Professional & Ethical Issues in Information Systems In present day context, s of conduct have gained significant interest in different organisations in the field of Information System (IS). Codes of conduct define the ethics and principles that govern the performance of employees in an organization. The IS field in an organisation is related with several ethical issues such as breach of privacy, illegal damage of information and misuse of data among others. Thus it is vital for every IS professional to handle the vital information regarding organisations, clients or other employees in such a way so that it does not cause any harm to the stakeholders. By providing the ethical business practices, codes of conduct plays vital part for organisations by making them responsible toward clients, employees, government and other major stakeholders. Codes of conduct effectively describe the liabilities of management, comprising every level of employees about the method of dealing with information. In recent days, several corporate scandals have significantly impacted on the trust of people. Due to this reason, the codes of conducts have gained must importance for organization to maintain specially in the field of IS. Furthermore, limitations of national regulations to comply with the global standards have also generated the requirement of maintaining proper codes of conduct in the area of IS. In this way, codes of ethics in IS help the management of different organisations to become responsible towards major stakeholders. Table of Contents Introduction 4 Research Aim and Objectives 4 Discussion 5 The Concept of Codes of Conduct 5 Nature of Codes of Conduct 5 Importance of Codes of Conduct in Organisation 6 Evaluation of Practical Role of Codes of Conduct and Practice to Management within IS 7 Codes of Conduct in IS 7 Ethical Issues in IS Field 8 Codes of Conduct and Practices Applicable in IS Field 10 Requirement of Codes of Conduct and Practices to Management 12 Conclusion 16 References 17 Bibliography 20 Introduction Nowadays, there has been a growing interest amid different organisations in order to adopt codes of conduct and practices within the area of Information System (IS). The existence of codes of conduct in an organisation is related with less perceived offences and misconducts in IS operations. Organisations which implement proper codes of conduct demonstrate strong value positioning that is beyond the value derived from financial performance. Codes of conduct provide certain responsibilities on behalf of organisations and employees in order to engage in ethical activities while using IS (Somers, 2001). Although codes of conduct has implemented worldwide, their role on IS have not been addressed appropriately. This research is based on assessing the practical role that played by codes of conduct and practices within IS of an organisation. The research will be undertaken by the execution of descriptive methods through analysing several secondary sources. Research Aim and Objectives The research aims to recognise the role played by codes of conduct and practice that is applicable to management in IS. With this intended aim, the objectives of the research are: To evaluate the importance of codes of conduct and practices in IS To understand different ethical issues in the field of IS and To understand how codes of conduct can affect employees’ behaviour within IS. The main research question is “What is the role of codes of conduct and practice within Information System?” Discussion The Concept of Codes of Conduct In general, codes of conduct aim to describe ethics and principles that ought to direct the behaviour of employees within a specific organisation in an effective manner. Codes of conduct are fundamentally regarded as governing instruments for different organisations. Due to enlarged level of globalisation, organisations have often faced significant challenges for effective and reasonable governance of international affairs. On one hand, the multinational characteristics of modern policy issues surpassed the regulatory abilities of national regulation; on the other hand, traditional way of international business affairs through global regulations faced intrinsic limitations for accomplishing the required political consent. The codes of conduct are basically the reaction against extensive regulatory concerns and have been developed by governments, multinationals and private organisations. Codes of conduct are generally defined as obligations made by organisations that describe criterions and principles in the workplace. Codes of conduct mean to determine the corporate practices and to define sets of interrelation between organisation and other stakeholders (Gilman, 2005). Nature of Codes of Conduct Codes of conduct are generally identified to be voluntary in nature and thus cannot be enforceable by any entity. Codes of conduct are the principles that fall into extensive jurisdiction of lenient regulation. One salient characteristic of codes of conduct is to regulate the different activities of business. Indeed, codes of conduct aim to enhance the responsibility of organisations in order to operate in the marketplace effectively (Keller, n.d.). The curiosity of management about introducing codes of conduct within the organisations occurred since 1980s. In the year 2002, “Sarbanes-Oxley Act” further bolstered the significance of codes of conduct by requiring public organisations to implement codes of conduct in the workplace. In the year 2003, New York Stock Exchange and Nasdaq necessitated stock listed organisations to implement and disclose the codes of conduct that applies to every employee. With these regulatory developments, possessing codes of conduct in workplace becomes a directive approach for every big organisation. Most recent evolution in the field of codes of conduct happened in the year 2004 with reviewed federal sentencing rules specified that organisations must encourage a working culture that inspires ethical practices and obligation towards regulation. The impact of the evolution effectively encourages organisational codes of conduct to become an essential component of workplace practices (Ethics Resource Center, 2006). Importance of Codes of Conduct in Organisation Presently, every organisation has certain codes of conduct that need to be followed by the employees. The codes of conduct and practices help to control the behaviour of employees in an organisation. Thus, it has intrinsic importance and value for organisation that helps to develop a profitable association with the society. The concern of codes of conduct has gained much attention because of certain corporate scandals that imposed negative influence on capital market and on the trust of investors. Nowadays, stakeholders expect more than just profit maximisation and transparency in business that ultimately led the organisations to concentrate more on ethics and honesty as key components of business activities. This increased concentration on ethics, honesty and responsibility has stimulated the organisations to establish codes of conduct considerably. From broader economic viewpoint, applying effective codes of conduct d constantly enhance the organisational productivity and control, resulting into fewer misdeeds as well as corporate scandals and a steady build-up of faith between organisations and stakeholders (Ferrell & et. al., 2011). Several organisations comprehended that codes of conduct and practices contribute towards attaining success in the financial market. Management theorists and organisational leaders frequently declare that codes of conduct are vital to enhance the overall performance. Absence of appropriate codes of conduct can damage the organisational status and eventually the financial performance. Enabling ethical practices in workplace help to protect the organisational status and express obligation of organisation towards liable business practices to both society and management. Doubtful business practices and distinct events for inappropriate codes of conduct reflect certain level of values, attitudes and beliefs in the mind of stakeholders. Furthermore, management can also be accused if organisation is unable to start a system that inspire and facilitate appropriate principles of conduct and practices within workplace. Recognising these aspects, codes of conduct has become quite important for the organisations in order to maintain sustainable growth (International Federation of Accountants, 2007). Evaluation of Practical Role of Codes of Conduct and Practice to Management within IS Codes of Conduct in IS Codes of conduct in the field of IS is often characterised as a new discipline that struggles to deal with the spontaneous effect between effectual practice and theory. Code of conduct in IS addresses the social and ethical contexts of information. The rise of codes of conduct in IS includes intersection of numerous routes. Codes of Conduct can be observed as a portion of professionalization strategy for emerging Information Technology (IT) profession (Adam & Bell, 2003). Code of conduct and practice in IS has been recognised as a clear illustration of social agreement. In the field of IS, much of social contract is implicit in nature and not strictly enforceable. In IS profession, majority of employees perform without reference to professional association. Thus, in this circumstance, code of conduct helps to provide the rules for the IS profession to follow. Codes of conduct has several roles to play in the field of IS, for instance to capture the principle of profession’s obligations and accountabilities as a basis of making ethical decisions and to prove the people the fact that the occupation is capable of self-regulation. Although codes of conduct assist in decision making, they are not viewed as effective treatments for lessening unacceptable practices, because in real life circumstances, different principles and duties can conflict with each other. Thus, it can be stared that in IS profession, codes of conduct describes the instructions that are not written down in advance and are subjected to explanation in each circumstance. Codes of conduct in IS is primarily based upon the contract between an occupation and society in terms of responsibility of the profession and self-assurance of the public. In IS field, codes of conduct is generally viewed as providing useful set of principles and obligations of employees (Adam & Bell, 2003). Ethical Issues in IS Field Ethical issues have been preceded in the field of IS from longer time period. Nowadays, the improvement in IT has heightened the ethical concerns and developed new prospects for rising illegal behaviour and disruption in the workplace. There are four major technological trends that are liable for increased ethical concerns for organisations with respect to IS. First, the number of computing activities has increased significantly in recent years. As a consequence, more organisations will rely on IS for performing critical business operations. Second, the data storage expenses are decreasing quickly. Thus, organisations can easily maintain detailed database of clients. Thirdly, the data analysis method has been improved significantly. As a consequence, organisations are able to evaluate huge amount of data collected on individuals. And lastly, networking has been improved with the advancement in internet, that made much easier for people to share and access private information (Davison, 2000). Ethics in the field of IS denotes the principles of proper and improper practices that are used for guiding the behaviour of employees in an organisation. IS has created new ethical problems for both management and employees in an organisation because it generates opportunities for extreme social change and thus impend the present distribution of power, rights as well as duties. Similar to other technology, IS technology is also used for accomplishing social development but it can also be used in order to commit misconducts and to threaten appreciated social values. The ethical issues in IS have generated new urgency due to the introduction of internet and e-commerce. Internet and electronic mediums has made the IS process simpler to accumulate, incorporate and share information, releasing new issues regarding proper use of information, protection of confidentiality and safeguard of intellectual property. People with expert knowledge can easily invade the entire IS process and consequently can conduct unethical activities. A few of the most vital IS related crimes include theft of money as well as services, illegal copying, damage of information and programs, mischievous access to organisational internal system, breach of privacy and violation of international regulations on commercial activities among others (Irtaimeh & Al-Hawary, 2011). Other evolving ethical issues that has been raised by IS comprise formation of accountability for management and employees, defend system that protects the information of individual as well as organisation and preservation of values which are considered most essential for improving the life quality of people. These ethical issues can determine the success of organisations in the market. Thus, it is the responsibility of management to make ethical judgement on IS related aspects. The codes of conduct therefore are essential to make management and employees to engage in ethical practices (Laudon & Laudon, 2010). Codes of Conduct and Practices Applicable in IS Field IS professionals perform several activities such as writing disclaimers for computer programs, designing of en efficient IT system, testing and authenticating of software system, reforming of back-end database, analysing networks and recommending security policies for IS among others. IS professionals are obliged to perform these activities constantly as their practices impact on the business performance which in turn would impose significant impact upon the well-being of organisation. These obligations of IS professionals are termed as professional ethics. Ethical conducts include certain activities that an individual must adopt during his or her profession. For instance, according to codes of conduct, every person must be truthful, fair, sympathetic, civil, polite and reliable. Apart from these universal duties which is common in every individual. IS professionals posses certain additional duties that originate from accountabilities of their professional work and their connections with clients, organisations, other employees as well as public (Harrington, 1994). The ethical duties of IS professionals is more than just obeying the laws and regulations, because laws frequently lag behind the progressions in IT field (Loui & Miller, 2009). In IS, there are four types of responsibilities which must be fulfilled by the professionals such as casual responsibilities, role responsibilities, legal responsibilities and moral responsibilities. Responsibilities are shared among professionals whenever there are multiple employees performing as a team such as in a software development team. The responsibilities of management of IS can be categorised in three ways that encompass responsibilities toward the clients, responsibilities toward the organisation, responsibilities to the employees and responsibilities to the public (Loui & Miller, 2009). Responsibilities to the Client The IS professional is obliged to perform the allocated tasks proficiently on the basis of professional standards. These professional standards comprise not only consideration to technical superiority but also concern for social influences of their practices on clients (Loui & Miller, 2009). Responsibilities to the Organisation The employment relationship in IS field are contractual in nature. The employees perform on behalf of the organisations in exchange of salary and other advantages. In IS field, the professionals possess the right to access towards the organisations’ proprietary information such as business secrets. Thus, it is the responsibility of IS professionals to maintain confidentiality of the sensitive organisational information. Apart from protecting business related information, IS professionals must also protect other forms of intellectual property possessed by organisations. IS professionals should not generate revenue by using organisational information without prior consent (Whitman & Mattord, 2011). Responsibilities to Other Employees IS professionals must abide by the professional standards. For instance, they must refrain from any kind of theft practices such as stealing ideas of other employees. Furthermore, IS professionals must also avoid misrepresentation of information or illegal manipulation of employees’ information that can impose negative impact on the team performance and organisational culture (Loui & Miller, 2009). Responsibilities to the Public The code of conduct in IS states that every employee must ensure public safety. Thus, the employees need to avoid those practices that can harm the regular life activities of people and should ensure safeguard the interests of public (Loui & Miller, 2009). These responsibilities of IS professionals towards the clients, organisations and public are expressed in codes of conduct. A professions code of conduct is established and updated by national and international standards. Implementing the codes of conduct can provide clear advice to the IS professionals regarding different principles and practices while handling various information (Loui & Miller, 2009). Requirement of Codes of Conduct and Practices to Management The various ethical issues along with information related crimes have ignited a vigorous debate regarding the requirement of codes of conduct to management within IS. Several information related risks such as hacking, information theft, illegal copying and infringe of confidentiality among others has impacted on the trust of people and hence put much pressure on the organisations towards ethical business practices. Nowadays, business ethics has become a fundamental subject of interest for media that generates the importance of code of conduct and practice to management within IS sector (Cabrera, 2009). The management within IS is accountable for developing, imposing and clarifying the corporate codes of conducts to the employees. Traditionally, management of different organizations laid much emphasis towards financial reliability and personnel policies rather than IS area. However, on the basis of several ethical issues described above in relation to IS, it is evident that an organisation must have codes of ethics within IS which can effectively cover critical issues such as privacy, protection of intellectual property, accountability and IS quality among others (Tiwary, 2011). Thus, it is the responsibility of management to educate the employees regarding the maintenance of code of conducts as well as practices. There are several organisations that have developed extensive codes of conduct such as IBM, FedEx and American Express among others. Nevertheless, several organisations still have not developed proper code of conducts, leaving their employees insecure regarding their expected behaviour in the workplace while using IS (Pearson Education, n.d.). Thus, in order to ensure better proficiency, the management of an organisation needs to develop IS specific set of code of conduct for five dimensions that have been described below. Use of information: The codes of conduct must address certain vital aspects such as use of e-mail, workplace practices monitoring, conduct of organisational information and strategies on using client information (Pearson Education, n.d.). Intellectual property rights: The codes of conduct must include aspects such as software authorisations, proprietorship of organisational information, ownership of applications developed by IS professionals and software copyrights. In the codes of conduct, precise guidelines should be provided regarding predetermined relations with third parties (Pearson Education, n.d.). IS quality: In the codes of conduct, there must be detailed specifications for particular IS related tasks which define the standard level of information quality and level of system error that can be accepted by the management of organisations. Codes of conduct necessitate all ISs to assess information quality and system error possibilities by a greater extent (Pearson Education, n.d.). Improvement of work quality: The code of conduct must describe that the objective of IS is to enhance the work quality in order to provide better customer services. Codes of conduct should satisfy the employees and safeguard the self-esteem of employees by applying appropriate ergonomics, workflow design and personnel improvement (Pearson Education, n.d.). Responsibilities and control: The codes of conduct must cover the responsibilities of every IS professionals and report to individual employees who are accountable for protecting the information, intellectual property and data quality. In the codes of conduct, management should describe in detail the responsibilities for system control, audits and possible obligations of IS officers in a separate document (Pearson Education, n.d.). Code of conduct can help to develop a supportive environment in an organisation that comprises honesty of management. Code of conduct encourages ethical behaviour among employees and help to gain several important benefits such as committing fewer offenses and revealing higher level of employee obligation (Somers, 2001). The codes of conducts and its practices are planned to serve as the basis for management to make ethical decision for employees. However, all codes of conducts applicable to management are dependent on the employees and practitioners who are actually bound to obey the codes. Several researchers found that codes of conduct have low impact on the behaviour of IS personnel. The impact of codes of conduct is limited and is not capable to address every major issue of IS. However, codes of conduct are effective in circumstances where responsibility is viewed as a vital aspect of work (Peslak, 2007). Conclusion The role played by codes of conduct and practices to management within the IS is to explain the responsibilities, behaviour and personalities of each employee. It facilitates disciplinary practices within organisation with respect to utilisation and control of information. Nowadays, the improvement of technology has generated numerous ethical concerns for management in the field of IS. Several cases of IS security breaches and misconducts generated the requirements of written declarations regarding the practices that must be abided by the organisations. The management of different organisations possess certain responsibilities and require valuable guidance in order to fulfil them. In this context, it can be stated that codes of conduct help to define the standards and principles that is supposed to direct the behaviours of employees and make them responsible. As a consequence, it can reduce the level of ethical problems in the field of IS by a significant level. 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