Own Experience of Ethics in Organisations - Report Example

ETHICS IN ORGANISATIONS Name Institution Professor Course Date 2.1 Self Reflection Getting my first internship job is the best thing that could happen to university or college students because one would learn and get some money for maintenance. I landed my first internship job in an ice-cream firm. I joined the organisation as a customer service representative. It was a busy firm all through. In one occasion, some of the people responsible for packaging were absent. Therefore, the manager requested me to join others in the packaging unit. One of the people in the packaging demonstrated to me how to pack the ice to ensure that clients were not left waiting for long. The person scraped plentiful looking ice cream that was definitely hollow in the middle. At first, I thought it was not intentional. I watched him for the second time and the ball came out flawlessly fine on top but the hole remained in the middle. I did not hesitate and asked him why he was leaving the ice cream hollow. He told me what I needed is to package the ice cream as he did to maximise profits and serve many clients. He added that the strategy has kept the business growing and mine was just to follow their policy rather than questioning. While I needed to follow what is right, I also needed to remain silent to retain in the job. Any action I would have chosen to take would have jeopardised my job or tarnish the image of the firm leading to its closure. I needed to be careful about my moves. Customers were being exploited so that employees like me could get paid. I kept quiet about the incidence to safeguard my job and the image of the firm. More so, I never wanted to jeopardise the business to prevent frustration of clients who trusted the firm’s brand. The decision I took was for the common good. It was for the benefits or interests of the parties involved that included the firm owner, the employees and the customers. Common good entails that which benefits the society as a whole. My decision was based on utilitarianism theory. According to Beckerman (2010, p.85), utilitarianism hold that the superlative ethical action is the one that maximizes utility. With respect to utilitarianism, the morality of any act is determined by it upshots in terms of society’s utility. Actions or decisions are right if they tend to enhance happiness. It was in the interest and happiness of the customers who needed enough supply of ice cream, the owner who needed to maximise profits and the employees who needed to be paid out of the firm’s profits, that my decision was made. 2.2 Literature Review: Whistleblowing The fall of Enron in 2002 among other cases stimulated public interest and support for whistleblowing. Enron’s questionable business activities were front-page news and so were the reports of public cynicism and disillusionment about corporate conduct. Enron vice president Sherron S. Watkins was the whistleblower (Johnson 2010, p.18). Her testimony was the centrepiece of well-publicised congressional hearings. It was the public constituent anger and outrage over Enron that motivated scores of Congress members to start considering the whistleblower protection legislation for workers of publicly traded firms. The Enron case among other cases such as the Worldcom demonstrates the importance of whistleblowing and whistleblower protection. 2.2.1 Special Features of Whistleblowing Whistleblowing is an incalculable tool in any firm’s corporate governance strategy. It empowers workers to act on occurrences of misconduct besides aiding in maintaining a safe workplace while protecting reputation and profits. Arszulowicz and Gasparski (2010) assert that whisteblowing occur when a worker or former work conveys information regarding a crucial moral problem to someone in a position to take action on the issue, and does so outside accepted organisational channels. Whistleblowing hold several special characteristics and it can be anonymous or open. Anonymous whisteblowing takes place when someone takes whistleblowing action devoid of disclosing his/her identity. Firstly, the whistleblower is usually a former employee or current employee of an organisation. Being familiar with the organisation gives whistleblowers greater prospects to share pertinent information. Andrade (2015, p.321) supports this assertion and claim that the whistleblower is strongly part of the firm. A whistleblower should be viewed as someone whose conducts constitute the very boundary of the firm, the ethical margin. Secondly, when an individual encounters serious ethical problems in which she/he believes are unjust, unethical or criminal conduct or issues threatening the public or individual safety, wellbeing, she/he will embark on an act of whistleblowing. Thirdly, there are two means for whistleblower to chose from one being that the whistleblower can transmit the pertinent information to a person outside or inside his/her organisation. The whistleblower is confronted with great pressures and dangers, for instance, being transferred to another post, dismissed from the organisation or receive salary cut. Therefore, there enormous costs that come with whistleblowing. According to Andrade (2012, p.321), a whistleblower risks reprisals and retaliation by the organisation whose wrongdoing the whistleblower seeks to expose. Typically, the whistleblower has either been praised or scorned. The final characteristic involves that the recipient of whistleblowing is a group or person in a place to take action on the issues (MacGregor & Jason 2014, p.322). The whistleblower expects the recipient to resolve or affect the serious moral issues put forward. According to Andrade (2015, p.322), one of the major aspects of whisteblowing process is to specify the person eligible as a recipient of a wrongdoing disclosure. Disclosure to an internal recipient is not usually perceived as being disloyal to the organisation. Apparently, internal disclosure allows the organisation to rectify its harmful deeds, policies or procedures before being charged in public. Nevertheless, if a firm does nothing to rectify the harms emanating from its actions, the whistleblower may feel the need to disclose the wrongdoings to a recipient outside the firm because of public interest. Archambeault and Webber (2015, p.61) assert that there are programs aimed at encouraging external whistleblowing. These programs may be in the form protection from retaliation, monetary rewards or both 2.2.2 Factors that Influence Whistleblowing A great amount of research has centred on aspects that affect individual’s intent to blow the whistle. It has been recorded that persons in a firm are more likely to report illegal or unethical issues if they hold better job performance reviews, superior position and better education compared to the wrongdoer and higher scores in ethical judgement tests (Gao, Greenberg & Wing 2015, p.87). The demographic information of whistleblowers such as gender may as well play a role in the decision-making procedure. Kaplan et al.(2008, p. 16) asserts that when an anonymous reporting channel is accessible, females and males differ in the judgment concerning the reduction in personal costs of anonymous channel of reporting compared to a non-anonymous reporting channel. Based on organisational and contextual attributes of a firm workers’ willingness to whistleblow, perceived organisational justice, support from supervisors and a firm’s predisposition to promote whistleblowing and public industry type play a crucial role in the whistleblowing process. These aspects are positively and powerfully linked to employees’ intent to report fraud. Additionally, employees are more willing to whistlebow when whistleblowing is motivated by the general climate of the organisation. A moral firm’s culture comprises of many factors that include incorporating ethics in decision-making procedures, developing a compensation systems aimed at rewarding ethical conduct and setting a tone that permits workers to question the authority’s obedience (Rothwell & Baldwin 2006, p.220). Whistleblowers tend to report externally when the firm’s context appears to be unfavourable. External whistleblowing is positively linked to the supervisors’ support besides formal and informal firm policies that promote external whistleblowing (Gao, Greenberg & Wing 2015, p.87). In contrast to internal whistleblowers, external whistleblowers tend to offer more convincing proof with which to support their wrongdoing allegations. Therefore, convincing evidence of wrongdoing considerably promotes external disclosure. However, the power status of wrongdoer can discourage whistleblowing intentions. Rehg et al. (2008, p.223) asserts that retaliation is more probable from persons whose power status are high. Given the higher probability of retaliation, the whistleblowing intention can be anticipated to be lower when the wrongdoers are high-level employees (Robinson, Robertson & Curtis 2012, p.214) Another aspect that may hinder whistleblowing is the bystander effect. The presence of other persons inhibits one’s intent to help. Compared to an occurrence where a single individual observes some wrongdoing and a situation where more than one person observes the wrongdoing, every individual will be less probable to whistleblow because perceived individual responsibility is lowered. According to a study carried out by (Gao, Greenberg and Wing (2015), low-level employees’ reporting intent is higher when the channel of reporting is administered externally by a third-party rather than when it administered internally (87). The externally administered channel of reporting moderates the spectator effect. Hoffman and Schwartz (2015, p.771) assert that the topic of whistleblowing continues to be an essential and challenging business ethics issue for society. It is one of the classic issues in business ethics. Arszulowiz and Gasparski (2010, p.85) confirm that some people hold whistleblowing as an act of betrayal on the part of the employees to their employers and an immoral act while others hold that whistleblowing protects pubic interests and represent heroic conduct. The cause lies in the fact that whistleblowing entails a series of moral conflicts, particularly conflicts amid loyalty to employers, the profession and the public (Agalgatti & Krishina 2007 p.148). With this understanding, people can choose to whistleblow or not. Defenders of whistleblowing as ethically justifiable claim scores of benefits to the employees and the organisation. Employees acting on their ethical concerns find that their internal conflicts amid organisational role and their personal values are resolved constructively. Whistleblowers undertake a crucial monitoring function in a firm to prevent incompetence and malfeasance. When an atmosphere is established where each employee is ethically free and inspired to report potentially harmful situations, the firm experiences fewer perilous situations. This subsequently protects all the stakeholders from serious harms that organisations can inflict. 2.3 Application Exercise Ethics is a momentous part of all professionals and plays a foremost role in organisations. Neglect of ethics in the workplace can lead to critical consequences to people and organizations. The consequences range from tarnished reputation to civil and criminal legal responsibility. The chicken industry and firms dealing with fast food have been making enormous profits. Perhaps, it is not a good idea to mention specific firms in the chicken industry for purpose of not tarnishing their names herein. However, firms like McDonalds have been on the limelight with ethical issues and neglect of the customers and other stakeholders. Based on a survey of the chicken industry, it has been noted that those delicious and juicy chicken breasts at local supermarkets and fast food joints like McDonalds are hiding dirty secrets. The chicken meat comprises a whole lot more than just chicken (Blythman, 2013). The chicken is plumped up with chicken stock, texture-enhancing chemicals, flavour and brine or salt water to make them appear fatter and tastier. All sort of chemicals and liquid fillers are injected into the meat before packaging and labelled as ‘natural’. According to Cherry and associates (2015, p.1), people are willing to pay for meat labelled with different public good attributes. The aim of adding chemicals into the chicken meat is to make poor quality meat look and taste superior. McDonalds has been accused of using synthetic pink pliable serve-like material to fill on the Chicken Nuggets besides using expired chicken meat (McDonalds 2015).This trend is deceptive to customers as it tricks them into thinking that they get more chicken. The chicken nuggets at McDonalds are made of poultry meat that is filled with chemicals that are detrimental to human health. The activities by these firms rise ethical issues. Ethical issues entails situations or problems that call for a person or group to choose between options that must be assessed as right or wrong. The ethical issues involved in the McDonalds and the Chicken Industry relates to concepts of trust and integrity. The companies use chemicals to make the meat appear fatter, tastier and attractive to the customers in effort of ensuring business sustainability. While the companies benefits from their heinous deeds, the society suffers health impacts. These ethical issues hold legal and health implications. Cherry et al. (2015, p.1) confirms that the foods people eat are changing thereby requiring them to make right decisions. According to Bennie and Mladenovic (2015, p.189), the several corporate collapses and scandals in Australia, USA and Europe have triggered augmented public scrutiny of business with a particular focus on professional ethics. The companies can argue their side of the story based on the utilitarianism theory. From the utilitarian perspective, McDonalds and the Chicken Industry can justify their deeds in terms of the social and individual benefit derived from their actions (Brady & Bunn 1995, p.390). For instance, the companies’ activities are critical to the economy and society. They could argue that through their activities they are able to attain enormous profits that keep many people employed. More so, the customers want to purchase appealing products to attain their happiness. Apparently, utilitarianism still enjoys extensive acceptance and appeal as a resourceful approach to society and business issues (Brady 1988, p.163). Even though the activities of the Chicken Industry and McDonalds are beneficial to the firms given that they maximise their utility. The consequences of these unethical actions are detrimental to human health and society as a whole. In this regard, those working in these companies or those who have spotted these undesirable actions should not keep quiet. Evidently, the health of people is at risk and the best thing is to come forward and report the matter to authority if the firm’s management appears reluctant to address the issues. This will entail whistleblowing, which can be done either internally or externally. According to Enderle, Almond and Argandona (2010, p.1), a formal internal whistleblowing will not be effectual if it is extensively perceived as a fraud. Some outsiders or employees may be suspicious of any novel internal whistleblowing attempt that may be viewed as a public relations manoeuvre instead of a sincere attempt to allow for genuine input about corporate issues. In this respect, those involved in the business against their own values, will, and out of public interest should employ external disclosure. Mansbach and Bachner (2010, p.483) claim that the objective of whistleblowing is to prevent harmful conducts. In the event that one fears victimisation and reprisal such as pay cut or dismissal, seclusion or suspension, anonymous disclosure is effective ( Gao, Greenberg & Wing 2015, p.87) . Such people should seek for whistleblower protection. The whistleblowers should be rewarded through protection or monetary rewards (Archambeault & Webber 2015, p.61).According to Brinkley (2015, p. 63), it takes courage to report potential serious contraventions by an individual’ co-workers or senior management. Through whistleblowing, the society will be saved from health illnesses linked to consuming products filled with chemicals that can cause major diseases such as cancer. References Brady, N & Dunn, C 1995, ‘Business meta-ethics: An analysis of two theories’, Business Ethics Quartely, vol.5, no.3, pp.385-398. Reference Beckerman, W 2012, Economics as applied ethics: Value judgements in welfare economics. UK: Palgrave Macmillan. References Agalgatt, B & Krishna, S 2007, Business Ethics, India, Nirali Prakashan. Andrade, J 2015, ‘ Reconceptualising whistleblowing in a complex world’, Journal of Business Ethics, vol.128, no.2, 321-335. Archambeault, D & Webber, S 2015, ‘ Whistleblowing 101’, The CPA Journal, vol.85, no.7, pp.60-64. Arszulowicz, M & Gasparski, W 2011, Whistleblowing: In defense of proper action, USA, Transaction Publishers. Gao, J, Greenberg, R & Wing, B 2015, ‘ Whistleblowing intentions of lower-level employees: The effect of reporting channel, bystanders, and wrongdoer power status’, Journal of Business Ethics, vol.126, no.1, 85-99. Hoffman, S & Schwartz, M 2015, ‘ The morality of whistleblowing: A commentary on Richard T. De George’, Journal of Business Ethics, vol.127, no.4, pp.771-781. Johnson, R 2003. Whistleblowing. USA: Lynne Rienner Publishers. Kaplan, S. E., Pany, K., Samuels, J. A., & Zhang, J 2008, ‘ An examination of the association between gender and reporting intentions for fraudulent financial reporting’, Journal of Business Ethics, vol.87, pp.15–30. MacGregor, J & Jason, S 2014, ‘ Whistle while you work: Whistleblowing in the presence of competing incentives and pressures’, Accounting perspectives, vol.13, no.4, pp.309-324. Rehg, M. T., Near, J. P., Miceli, M. P., & Van Scotter, J. R 2008, ‘Antecedents and outcomes of retaliation against whistleblowers: Gender difference and power relationships’, Organization Science,vol.19, no.3, pp. 221–240. Robinson, S. N., Robertson, J. C., & Curtis, M. B 2012, ‘The effects of contextual and wrongdoing attributes on organizational employees’ whistleblowing intentions following fraud’, Journal of Business Ethics, vol.106, pp.213–227. Rothwell, G. R., & Baldwin, J. N 2006, ‘Ethical climates and contextual predictors of whistle-blowing’, Review of Public Personnel Administration, vol. 26 no.3, 216–244. Brinkley, M 2015, ‘The serious tone of whistleblowing’, Internal Auditor, vol.72, no.2, pp. 62-63. Bradly, N 1988, ‘ Practical formalism: A new methodological proposal for business ethics’, Journal of Business Ethics, vol.7, no.3, pp.163-170. Enderle, G, Almond, B & Argandona, A 2012, People in corporations: Ethical responsibilities and corporate effectiveness, UK, Springer Science & Business Media. Mansbach, A & Bacher, Y 2010, ‘Internal or external whistleblowing: Nurses’ willingness to report wrongdoing’, Nursing Ethics, vol.17, no.4, pp.483-490. Gao, J, Greenberg, R & Wing, B 2015, ‘ Whistleblowing intentions of lower-level employees: The effect of reporting channel, bystanders, and wrongdoer power status’, Journal of Business Ethics, vol.126, no.1, 85-99. Archambeault, D & Webber, S 2015, ‘ Whistleblowing 101’, The CPA Journal, vol.85, no.7, pp.60-64. Blythman, J 2013, What's really in supermarket poultry: Chemical sludge. 'Meat glue'. Pig skin. If only water was ALL they pumped into your chicken, Daily Mail. Retrieved from http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2521119/Chemical-sludge-Meat-glue-Pig-skin-If-water-ALL-pumped-chicken.html [30th September, 2015). McDonalds 2015, Ethics of McDonalds, McDonalds. Retrieved from http://mcdonaldsethics.weebly.com/mcdonalds-ethical-issues.html Read More

It was in the interest and happiness of the customers who needed enough supply of ice cream, the owner who needed to maximise profits and the employees who needed to be paid out of the firm’s profits, that my decision was made. 2.2 Literature Review: Whistleblowing The fall of Enron in 2002 among other cases stimulated public interest and support for whistleblowing. Enron’s questionable business activities were front-page news and so were the reports of public cynicism and disillusionment about corporate conduct.

Enron vice president Sherron S. Watkins was the whistleblower (Johnson 2010, p.18). Her testimony was the centrepiece of well-publicised congressional hearings. It was the public constituent anger and outrage over Enron that motivated scores of Congress members to start considering the whistleblower protection legislation for workers of publicly traded firms. The Enron case among other cases such as the Worldcom demonstrates the importance of whistleblowing and whistleblower protection. 2.2.

1 Special Features of Whistleblowing Whistleblowing is an incalculable tool in any firm’s corporate governance strategy. It empowers workers to act on occurrences of misconduct besides aiding in maintaining a safe workplace while protecting reputation and profits. Arszulowicz and Gasparski (2010) assert that whisteblowing occur when a worker or former work conveys information regarding a crucial moral problem to someone in a position to take action on the issue, and does so outside accepted organisational channels.

Whistleblowing hold several special characteristics and it can be anonymous or open. Anonymous whisteblowing takes place when someone takes whistleblowing action devoid of disclosing his/her identity. Firstly, the whistleblower is usually a former employee or current employee of an organisation. Being familiar with the organisation gives whistleblowers greater prospects to share pertinent information. Andrade (2015, p.321) supports this assertion and claim that the whistleblower is strongly part of the firm.

A whistleblower should be viewed as someone whose conducts constitute the very boundary of the firm, the ethical margin. Secondly, when an individual encounters serious ethical problems in which she/he believes are unjust, unethical or criminal conduct or issues threatening the public or individual safety, wellbeing, she/he will embark on an act of whistleblowing. Thirdly, there are two means for whistleblower to chose from one being that the whistleblower can transmit the pertinent information to a person outside or inside his/her organisation.

The whistleblower is confronted with great pressures and dangers, for instance, being transferred to another post, dismissed from the organisation or receive salary cut. Therefore, there enormous costs that come with whistleblowing. According to Andrade (2012, p.321), a whistleblower risks reprisals and retaliation by the organisation whose wrongdoing the whistleblower seeks to expose. Typically, the whistleblower has either been praised or scorned. The final characteristic involves that the recipient of whistleblowing is a group or person in a place to take action on the issues (MacGregor & Jason 2014, p.322). The whistleblower expects the recipient to resolve or affect the serious moral issues put forward.

According to Andrade (2015, p.322), one of the major aspects of whisteblowing process is to specify the person eligible as a recipient of a wrongdoing disclosure. Disclosure to an internal recipient is not usually perceived as being disloyal to the organisation. Apparently, internal disclosure allows the organisation to rectify its harmful deeds, policies or procedures before being charged in public. Nevertheless, if a firm does nothing to rectify the harms emanating from its actions, the whistleblower may feel the need to disclose the wrongdoings to a recipient outside the firm because of public interest.

Archambeault and Webber (2015, p.61) assert that there are programs aimed at encouraging external whistleblowing.

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