Essay on Introduction to Business Ethics
Q1. Responsibilities depend on the role of one person in relation to another person; for example, the responsibilities of a parent are different from the responsibilities of an employee. Therefore, responsibilities of person A to person or entity B can be viewed as a function of the relationship between person A and person B.
Q2. The relationship between a person and his/her lawyer or real estate agent is similar to the relationship between an employer and employee in the sense that both employer and the person can be viewed as principals in this relationship while the lawyer/real estate agent and employee act as agents. However, there are notable differences – in the level of control of the principal over the terms of employment and nature, in the regime of working, in the level of responsibility and discretion.
Q3. The narrow view of employee responsibilities can be defended from the perspective of the roles that employees play in the whole economic system (that override other ethical considerations) and from the perspective of property rights of employers that should be protected. However, such ethical considerations have notable shortcomings as they disregard other responsibilities of employees and might even suppress their rights.
Q4. Conflicts of interests emerge when ethical responsibilities emerging from different relationships come into conflict. If the interests and ethical duties fall within the scope of one set of responsibilities, there is no ethical conflict. However, when personal interests influence professional actions, it is a sign of the conflict of interest. Dual roles also represent a conflict of interests since the responsibilities in these roles most often are conflicting.
Q5. Trust to someone means that there is confidence with regard to the judgments of this person and it is possible to rely on this person in important decisions. Loyalty can be defined as the “willingness to make personal sacrifices in the interest of the firm” (DesJardins, 2013). Employees do have a responsibility to be trustworthy, but it is questionable whether they are ethically obliged to be loyal. According to Duska, loyalty in the workplace is not appropriate because loyalty applies to the projects with mutual benefit of parties while employer-employee relationship is a contractual agreement in which the employee receives a compensation for time “sold” to the employer.
Q6. Business is like poker in the sense that both business and poker have particular rules and the participants have to follow these rules. However, business is not like poker in ethical sense since bluffing, lying and deception are acceptable in poker but are unacceptable in business as such actions undermine decision-making and business reputation in the long-term perspective.
Q7. According to DeGeorge, whistle-blowing is ethically permissible only when a) there is a significant threat of harm (that can be addressed by whistle-blowing), b) the whistle-blower should first of all use internal channels for reporting the issue, and c) the whistle-blower should exhaust all internal options for preventing the harm before turning to external options (DesJardins, 2013). Furthermore, whistle-blowing is ethically required when a) there is documental evidence of the harm or probability of causing the harm and b) whistle-blower should be confident that whistle-blowing will prevent the harm (DesJardins, 2013).
Q8. First of all, insider trading leads to injustice regarding external participants of trade since the information is distributed in an unfair way. Secondly, managers who practice insider trading violate their ethical professional responsibilities related to representing the interests of their clients (investors). In the case of Enron’s stock, insiders defrauded investors and shareholders in order to increase own profits and did that at the expense of people whose interests they were representing.
Do you like this essay?
Our writers can write a paper like this for you!
(1 votes, average: 1.00 out of 5)
Loading...