Ethical Consideration that Employees Face - Term Paper Example

Ethical Consideration due: This document is meant to address the ethical challenges that employees face when they have to make critical decisions in emergency situations. The paper focuses on an employee who is expected to make a decision that is above their authority level according to the organization structure. The introduction provides the definition of ethics, the key players in ethical situations within and outside organizations and how the law relates to ethics. It explains how making ethical decisions is affected by the organization structure. The body addresses the various ethical issues that employees face today and the factors to be considered before reaching a decision concerning the matter. Some examples are provided to help the reader understand better. The conclusion gives the recommendations for organizations to develop a culture that encourages ethical decision-making by its employee. Table of Contents Abstract 2 Table of Contents 3 Introduction 4 The Significance of the Organization Structure 4 Factors to Be Considered For Ethical Decision-Making 5 Conclusion 9 References 11 Introduction Ethics are a set of rules that give guidance as to the expected standards in the society. These ethics are most often in line with the laws of the land. There are ethical values that when breached, could lead to a person being charged in a court of law. However, there are other ethical values that are not part of the law, but when breached could bring negative publicity to an organization or an individual. In the recent years, organizations have adopted ethics as part of the everyday operations in their business activities. The code of ethics now form part of the organization culture, and it determines how the public, and most importantly the consumers view an organization. Ethical issues may arise in an organization when there are dealings with the customers, government, employees and even suppliers. Employees in whichever organizations are faced with ethical dilemmas when making decisions in their everyday work. More often than not, an employee is expected to choose the hard way out of a situation to fulfill the requirements of the cord of ethics (Ferrell & Fraedrich, 2014). Observing ethics is about doing the right thing regardless of the consequences, for the greater good of the people in your surroundings. Companies, which observe ethics in their society, have a good image to the public which has a number of benefits. The organization that observes ethics is likely to attract more customers and good quality human resource which has a good impact on the productivity of the organization. The Significance of the Organization Structure Organizations are usually organized in a particular hierarchy forming an organization structure. The organization structure defines the relationship between individuals in an organization, such as who reports to whom and who does what job. The organization structure also spells out authority level of all the employees. No particular employee is expected to make decisions about the authority level provided for by the organization structure. This is meant to preserve order within the organization and a clear line of communication. In most circumstances, ethical issues are considered at an individual employee level, since employees are the ones who sell the image of the organization. A situation may arise where an employee finds himself in an emergency, and he has to make a decision that is above his authority level so as to save the situation. In this case, the employee is faced with a lot of ethical issues that he needs to resolve and make a decision before the problem escalates. Factors to Be Considered For Ethical Decision-Making There are several ethical issues that employees face every now and again in the business environment. When these ethical issues arise, the employee is often faced with the choice of making things right or staying in the comfort zone and assume nothing is going on. However, it gets more urgent when the issue at hand is an emergency. Presently, business ethics has been adopted as a trend in the business world (Arnaud & Schminke, 2012). Some of these ethical issues are as follows: 1. How an organization or its employees consider public safety, is a major topic of concern in today’s business world. Taking an example of a case where there was an emergency in a supermarket store. The real emergency was not yet known when the emergency bell rung. The management on fearing that the customers may get away with free goods from their supermarket store ordered the employees to lock the customers in until the emergency was determined. One of the employees on fearing for the safety of the customers was left in a dilemma of whether to open the door for the customers against the orders of his superiors. Ethically, the safety of the customers is more important as compared to the safety of the employer’s goods; since human life is more important. The employee was supposed to open the doors for the customers to exit from the emergency situation regardless of the loss of the employers goods. 2. Human life is to be chosen above any material things or personal interests. Employees should choose the welfare of a person over the policies of any organization in a case where the person’s life is threatened. In a hospital situation, an accident victim may be brought in without a medical insurance cover. The doctor, who happens to be an employee of the hospital, is on duty. After assessing the condition of the patient, he realizes that the patient may die if he does not receive medical attention quickly. The hospital policy is such that patients can only access medical services when they have a medical insurance cover. The doctor is put in a dilemma of treating the patient to save his life against the policy of the management, or let the patient die and preserve his job (Toren & Wagner, 2010). Ethically, the doctor needs to consider the patient’s welfare first before the policy of the hospital since the life of the patient is more important. 3. Another issue of concern is the issue of respect for intellectual property rights. Acting against the intellectual property rights law of a country is a criminal offense. In a case where an employee discovers that the organization, he works for, has breached this law and is about to release a product into the market without the knowledge of the rightful owner of the intellectual property, he needs to speak up whether this action will threaten his job position or not. Observing ethical values is about doing the right thing regardless of the consequences (Mencl & May, 2009). 4. The next issue of concern by business organizations is about the responsibility of the organization towards maintaining a healthy environment for the good of the public. Most societies have had health problems due to organizations disregard for the environmental laws put in place. For instance, an employee, who is liable for discarding waste from an industry, realizes that the waste, he is supposed to damp, is of a hazardous nature to the environment, he or she is expected to postpone the dumping of the waste, until an appropriate way of damping it is reconsidered by the management. The employee does this with the safety of the public in mind. 5. In a fire safety operation, there are several ethical concerns. The professionals operate using a strict code of conduct and follow standard procedures for serious safety consideration during their rescue operations. On many occasions, they have to choose between their well-being and that of the fire victims. There are scenarios when the members of the rescue teams have to disregard a direct order from their superiors to stop the search for victims, just to ensure the safety of the victims. This brings about an ethical dilemma, as to which is more important, your life or that of the victims. 6. Financial fraud is another ethical concern in today’s business world. When an employee discovers a case of financial fraud on the public, he or she is expected to report the matter to the necessary authority. In such a case, the fraud may be a scheme by a particular employee or the whole management. To stop further exploitation of the public, the employee is expected to report the matter to the anti-corruption authorities or the police. The challenge is that, the employee would be jobless after blowing the whistle, but it is the ethical thing to do. 7. An ethical dilemma may present itself in a case where there is a promotion in the department. Usually, the head of departments are expected to present the name of the person who qualifies for the position of the senior management. In some cases, the head of a department submits a name of an employee who was not agreed on by the department leaders, just because of their relationship, at the expense of the most qualified candidate. When the secretary to the head of a department realizes this, she is faced with an ethical dilemma of whether to report this to the senior management or to keep it to herself and preserve her relationship with her boss. Ethically she needs to report the matter to the authorities concerned. This is the right thing to do. 8. Cases of corruption may arise in the procurement departments of organizations and even in the senior management team during the budgeting process. This is very common in the government funded organizations where the tax payer’s money is used to enrich individuals in the organization. In a case where an employee discovers an irregularity in a budget just before its approval, the employee is expected to report this matter to the necessary authorities. Corruption by individuals is a costly vice against the public, as it is one of the major impediments to development. Reporting the matter may have negative consequences to the employee, but it is the ethical thing to do, for the sake of the public (Zhang, Chiu & Wei, 2009). 9. The tendering process is another avenue that presents ethical concerns to the employees of an organization. Many cases of corruption arise in the tendering process at the expense of the rightful candidate, just to benefit some individuals. This results in poor service delivery or low-quality products being provided. In such cases, an employee who discovers such a case within their organization needs to speak up to stop the process, even if they are junior employees in the organization, despite the consequences. 10. An employee working for a pharmaceutical company discovers that a product being dispatched to the market does not meet the required health standards. The organization management decides to sell the product anyway so as to avoid the losses. The employee is faced with the challenge of protecting the public or his job. In such a case, the public interest is paramount, and it is an ethical thing to report the matter to the necessary health officials before the products are sold to consumers. Usually, the employees, who find themselves in the ethical dilemmas, are torn between their loyalty to their company and the interest of the public. As much as the code of ethics supports loyalty to the organization by employees, the interest of the public should be considered over the loyalty to an organization or colleague. In many cases, an employee has to weigh out the impact of their action towards doing the right thing for the interest of the public. Some actions by employees may not yield much fruit for the interest of the public due to the employee’s position as compared to that of the public offenders. This poses another ethical dilemma to the employee (Tseng & Fan, 2011). Another concern to the employee is whether they have the facts right or not. In case the employee has made the wrong judgment, he or she is likely to lose their job and credibility in the end. This is something the employee needs to consider before making the decision concerning the matter at hand. This may delay the decision-making process leading to escalating of the situation (Zhang et al, 2009). Conclusion Organizations that do not observe the ethical standards have negative consequences for their image. This will have a number of consequences to the business organization. The customers of the organization may boycott buying goods from the company and in turn, bankrupting the company. The company loses credibility with the financial institution hence making it hard to raise funds for their operations. The company’s ability to attract good quality employees will be compromised. In some cases, the ethical issue may also be a criminal offense. This may lead to closure of the organization and some of the organization officials being put in prison. In most cases, ethical decision-making has more to do with religious values, as opposed to the laws of the land. Some actions may be legal but still be unethical; hence, legality is not the standard for ethical decision-making (Malone & Team, 2013). When making policies, all organizations should consider such cases, and put in place structures that will protect the employees against such cases. This will encourage employees to make ethical decisions when faced with any emergency situations. The culture should be such that it balances between empowering employees and controlling the decision-making process. The organization culture ought to cultivate and uphold ethics in its employees. It should give the employees the confidence to make ethical decisions regardless of their authority level (Piccolo, Greenbaum & Eissa, 2012). References Arnaud, A., & Schminke, M. (2012). The ethical climate and context of organizations: A comprehensive model. Organization Science, 23(6), 1767-1780. Ferrell, O. C., & Fraedrich, J. (2014). Business ethics: Ethical decision making & cases. Cengage Learning. Malone, T. W., & Team, L. Y. (2013). Is empowerment just a fad? Control, decision making, and IT. Sloan management review, 38(2). Mencl, J., & May, D. R. (2009). The effects of proximity and empathy on ethical decision making: An exploratory investigation. Journal of Business Ethics, 85(2), 201-226. Piccolo, R. F., Greenbaum, R. L., & Eissa, G. (2012). Ethical leadership and core job characteristics: Designing jobs for employee well-being. In Work and Quality of Life (pp. 291-305). Springer Netherlands. Toren, O., & Wagner, N. (2010). Applying an ethical decision-making tool to a nurse management dilemma. Nursing ethics, 17(3), 393-402 Tseng, F. C., & Fan, Y. J. (2011). Exploring the influence of organizational ethical climate on knowledge management. Journal of business ethics, 101(2), 325-342. Zhang, J., Chiu, R., & Wei, L. (2009). Decision-making process of internal whistleblowing behavior in China: Empirical evidence and implications. Journal of Business Ethics, 88(1), 25-41. Read More