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Shawn has a masters of public administration, JD, and a BA in political science.
Managers must make decisions every day, and many of these decisions have an ethical dimension. Ethical decision-making is a cognitive process where people consider ethical rules, principles or guidelines when making decisions. Ethics is a system of values and principles of right or proper conduct. For example, most ethical systems find lying to be a violation of an ethical rule of being truthful.
Let's follow a supervisor, Amanda, through a decision she must make at work. Amanda is a sales manager who supervises a team of five salespeople. Part of her job is to coach and provide training material for members of her team. She recently attended a sales seminar pitching a new sales approach and has to decide whether to use it as part of the training and support for her team.
Amanda's first step is to determine whether an ethical analysis is even needed. Not all decisions a supervisor makes require ethical analysis. For example, choosing the doughnuts for doughnut day is really of no ethical importance. However, Amanda's situation requires a more detailed analysis. She needs to determine whether the proposed new sales system violates an important ethical principle, organizational standard or policy of her company - or worse, violates the law.
After Amanda has determined that there is an ethical dimension to her decision-making, she'll need to gather all the relevant information to make an informed and ethical decision. Amanda will need to collect all the information on the sales techniques, as well as the relevant company policies, values, principles and the company's code of ethics related to selling. She should also check any relevant laws and regulations.
Once collected, the information needs to be evaluated in terms of the relevant ethical guidelines. Amanda will need to compare each component of the sales system to the company's code of ethics, policies, values and principles. She may also review the company's mission statement and vision to ensure compliance with each. Finally, she should also evaluate the sales system in terms of relevant laws and regulations.
After evaluation, the next step in ethical decision-making is consideration of each alternative. Sometimes, the alternatives are as simple as pursuing a course of action or not pursuing it. However, the world is often more complex, and you will find alternatives where answers are not black and white but rather a spectrum consisting of shades of gray. For example, Amanda's alternatives may be to adopt the sales program completely, reject the sales program completely or adopt some components of it and reject other components.
It's now time to make a decision. The decision-maker should select the choice that does not violate the ethical criteria determined in the previous steps of the process. In other words, a choice that is in harmony with the organization's ethical principles is a proper ethical decision. For example, Amanda may decide to adopt the sales system because she concludes that the proposed sales system does not violate the law, the company's code of ethics and is consistent with its values.
Of course, you should keep in mind that some choices may create an ethical conflict between two ethical principles. For example, a particular course of action may be within a company's ethical standards but contrary to the supervisor's personal code of ethics.
After the choice is made, it may be put into action. This is 'where the rubber hits the road.' In our example, Amanda implements her decision by integrating the new sales program into her training for her team.
We're not finished yet. The final step is to review the implemented decision and determine if any modifications are necessary. Sometimes, the initial decision will uphold the ethical principles of the organization, but sometimes, unforeseen consequences may create ethical problems. If there are problems, adjustments may need to be made to achieve the ethical result.
For example, Amanda may determine that one component of the new sales program is leading to ethically questionable actions by her sales team. She may decide to eliminate or modify that component to ensure more ethical behavior.
Let's review what we've learned. Ethical decision-making is a process whereby a person makes a choice among alternative actions and considers the ethical implications of the alternative actions in doing so. You can break the ethical decision-making process into a series of steps. First, you need to determine whether there is an ethical dimension to the issue or problem requiring a decision.
Then, you need to collect and evaluate relevant information in light of the organization's values, principles and code of ethics. Alternative actions are considered, and a decision is made. The decision is put into action and then reviewed to see if modification is necessary to create the best ethical result.
After you have finished with this lesson, you should be able to:
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Business 111: Principles of Supervision9 chapters | 81 lessons | 8 flashcard sets
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