Ethics for Managers Assignment September 2014

ETHICS FOR MANAGERSBMEM5103

SEPTEMBER SEMESTER 2014

NAME: SAMYATA TIMILSINA MATRIX NO: CGS00864819

INSTRUCTOR: PROFESSOR. DOCTOR.RUHANA BUSU

ETHICS FOR MANAGERS (BMEM5103), Open University Malaysia 1

OUM BUSINESS SCHOOL

ASSIGNMENT SUBMISSION AND ASSESSMENT

_________________________________________________________________________

BMEM5103

ETHICS FOR MANAGERS

SEPTEMBER 2014

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INSTRUCTIONS TO STUDENTS

1. This assignment contains question that is set in English.

2. Answer in English only.

3. Your assignment should be typed using 12 point Times New Roman font and 1.5 line spacing.

4. You must submit your hardcopy assignment to your Fasilitator and ON-LINE via the MyVLE. Refer to the portal

for instructions on the procedures to submit your assignment on-line. You are advised to keep a copy of

your submitted assignment and proof of the submission for personal reference. Your assignment must be

submitted on 14 – 16 November 2014.

5. Your assignment should be prepared individually. You should not copy another person’s assignment. You

should also not plagiarise another person’s work as your own.

EVALUATION

This assignment accounts for 60% of the total marks for the course.


PURPOSE:

The purpose of this assignment is to enable you to analyze challenging business ethical issues linked to social networking issues and to propose and implement countermeasures to overcome these problems.

REQUIREMENT:

Social media is a definition used to describe social interaction which utilizes a range of technology based tools. The most dynamic and commonly used tools are internet forums, networking sites such as Face book, Twitter, LinkedIn ,Google Plus, webcasts, and blogs

The ethical and legal challenges surrounding the use of social media and its consequences in the workplace affects the business industry as a whole because employers across the nation are setting policies regarding employee use of these websites while working and even what these workers can say after working hours.

Furthermore when an employee uses social media in an irresponsible way either on behalf of the company or through their personal social media account, it can undermine the company’s commitment to ethical practice and expose it to integrity risk. In summary, the current business environment has seen many ethical dilemmas arising from social networking issues.

Select ONE well known organization which had committed an unethical issue related to a social networking issues as stated above. Elaborate the problem in detail. Analyze and discuss how this type of problem could be prevented in the future using models and concepts of ethics.

TASK

1.) Select a well known organization and provide a description of the organization. (10%)2.) Research an unethical issue related to a social networking committed by the organization.

You are expected to elaborate the problem in detail and also discuss the impact of the problem on the organization. (25%)

3.) Analyse and discuss the root cause of the problem. You are expected to investigate, analyse and

discuss all contributing causes to the problem. (25%)4.) Propose what moral principles will you use to decide on a particular course of action. What

ethical theory or combination of theories would you use ? Recommendations ( 3 suggestions) on how the organisation can avoid this problem in the future. Include benefits and consequences of each. (35%)

5.) Conclusion (5%)[TOTAL: 100 MARKS]


Assignment Format:

a. Use double space and 12-point of Times New Roman font.b. The assignment should contain about 4000 – 5000 words (15 – 20 pages)c. Provide reference using the American Psychological Association (APA) formatd. References should be latest (year 2009 onwards)

Notes:

Assignments should be submitted according to the due date. (Seminar 4) You are to submit a softcopy of your assignment online through myVLE and a hardcopy to

your facilitator. Plagiarism is not acceptable. If you are not sure what is meant by plagiarism, refer to the

various websites which discuss this matter, e.g. owl.english.purdue.edu/handouts.


Table of Contents:

1. Abstract......................................................................6

2. Introduction................................................................6

3. Introduction to Organisation(Task 1).........................9

4. Task 2.........................................................................11

5. Task 3.........................................................................13

6. Task 4.........................................................................16

7. Recommendation.......................................................20

8. Conclusion.................................................................22

9. References.................................................................24


Abstract:

Ethics is the most vital and common issue faced by most of the organizations today. Social network,

which has become very popular, has infiltrated the work place and most employees are utilizing social

networking in the work place. Social networking involves the use of the online platform which enables

individuals to communicate usually for a social purpose, most of which are web based and provides

opportunity for individuals to interact. Social Networking has grown tremendously over the last

decades and the use of these technologies for work related activities has been a major part of that. The

use of social networking has increased significantly but still social networking has unethical issues

especially at organizations (work places).

Social networking has the potential to allow the employees to form the communities and collaboration

for knowledge creation and sharing, better channel of communication which helps to enhance the

employee productivity but it’s obvious that the excessive use of the social networking creates the

addiction that distracts the performance which leads to the unethical issues. This paper will take into

account the unethical issues created by the social networking, the impacts and the moral principles to

brand the loyalty of organization through ethics.

Keywords: ethics, social networking, work place, unethical issues, moral principles

Introduction:

Ethics is very difficult to define in the work place. Generally “being ethical” involves conducting

oneself in accordance with accepted principles of right and wrong. Ethics is the matter of using

integrity – based decisions making procedures to guide in decisions and actions.


In the work place being ethical involves acting morally right, being honest, not cheating to the

employer, sub ordinates, customers. Other ethical situation may involve inappropriate use of internet at

work place, harassment etc. Different types of unethical behavior in work place include:

Inappropriate Computer Use

Employees may use company computers to engage in unethical behavior. For example, an employee

who is not permitted to use the Internet for personal reasons commits an unethical act by shopping

online while at work. Random Internet surfing takes away from the time she spends on work-related

activities. Employees sometimes use company email to spread inappropriate websites or videos to co-

workers, some of which could be deemed offensive by the recipients.

Time Misuse

Unethical behavior can include "stealing" time from the company, as the company is compensating

employees and receiving no productivity in return. In addition to time spent on aimless Internet

surfing, time misuse can consist of extending breaks beyond the allotted time, congregating around the

water cooler or engaging in lengthy gossip sessions during working time, falsifying time sheets,

coming into work late or leaving early and running personal errands while traveling on company

business.

Sexual Harassment and Bullying

An employee could commit unethical behavior by sexually harassing co-workers. This could involve

making lewd comments, touching inappropriately or making unwanted sexual advances. Bullying

typically involves attempting to intimidate a co-worker by making demeaning comments about him,

spreading gossip or even making verbal or physical threats. In general, a bully attempts to make the


workplace as uncomfortable as possible for a co-worker. In some cases, ongoing bullying can escalate

into violence in the workplace.

Illegal Acts

Some unethical acts can also be illegal. For example, an employee who has access to a company's

financial records, such as a bookkeeper or accountant, could use her access and expertise to embezzle

company funds. An employee having access to personnel files, such as a human resources

representative, could commit identity theft and use employees' Social Security numbers to raid bank

accounts or fraudulently obtain credit cards. In cases such as the 2001 Enron scandal, top company

executives used questionable accounting practices to manipulate the company's stock price for their

own financial gain

Ethics today means the principles of conduct which has influences today’s most of the organizations.

It’s important for managers to know the legal and ethical responsibility to maintain privacy and

confidentiality being in the social media. In an effort to avoid the occurrence of ethical behavior in the

work place, because of social networking manager needs to play significant role. A manager should

have the highest moral standards and ethical conduct in the everyday actions and decision making.

They must know the standards and expectations relative to competencies for privacy and

confidentiality. They have to set themselves as a good example that is followed by the employees.

All the employees in the organization must know about the organizations policy, ethical code of

conduct and procedures on social networking. The ethical climate of the organization also has

important influence on the ethical behavior of employees which improves relationship with the

organization, employee’s attitudes and behaviors which helps to enhance the organizations


performance. Ethical behavior is a critical social problem for all the organizations which is very

complex and requires an in depth understanding of the factors which helps in the decision-making of

the employers to behave ethically. Both ethics and social media are important in the work place. The

important thing here is to find out the best way to manage them. So, it’s important to in co operate

ethics into the social medial policy, by setting the expectations conducting training and holding people

accountable.

Managers are the key personnel to implement ethical culture making strict social networking policies

in the organization which shows the impact in the whole organization. Ethics must begin at the top of

the organization.

Introduction to an Organization:

Blending the serenity of a state rich in cultural heritage and well known as the home of the olde4st

rainforest in the world, ABC Resort is idyllic Malaysian Resort located on the luxury stretch of

Kuantan, on the east coast of Malaysian Peninsula. This 5 Star Hotel Resort is 20 minutes drive from

Kuantan Airport and mere five minutes way from cultural attractions, the culinary science and the

central business district of Kuantan city.

With 330 rooms, including luxury Club rooms and suites housed in the cluster style low rise building,

this hotel in Kuantan is surrounded by beautifully land scaped lawns and two outdoor swimming pools

with swimming vista of South China Sea.

Various Kinds of Services are available in this Resort. There is 3 restaurants, Bistro, 4 Banquet Halls,2

Ballrooms, Business Center ,easy Reception, the Concierge and free Wi-Fi services .

Resort includes The Regency Club Rooms for the VIP Guests. This Resort have well designed spa.gym

on the ground level and 3 swimming pool in just close to the beach taking concentration of good views

of sea as well as relaxation.

The total number of employees in ABC Resort is 228.This hotel represents the quote “we offer careers

not jobs.” It is not just a business its calling evidence in the thousands of decisions and interaction

made every day by passionate employees through the company. Here the employees experience with


the same degree of hospitality that the hotel guests experience so this Hotel celebrates “Celebrate Our

People” every year for one week by recognizing and acknowledging the employees as the most

important assets to the organization. The caring and rewarding environment of hotel fosters a fully

engaged work place.

This Hotel has the long history of developing leaders through the commitment to hire and develop the

best service focused employees in the industry and invest their future. This organization is focused on

the development and support individual career paths and the curiosity to learn and grow which helps

the employees to have the quality of good leaders through good moral principles as leadership ca exist

at all the levels. The vision of this organization is to ensure the development, motivation and retention

of the valuable assets (hotel’s employees) ethically.

ETHICS FOR MANAGERS (BMEM5103), Open University Malaysia

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Unethical Issue Related To Social Networking Committed By The Organisation:

“An Unethical issue is a situation or opportunity or problem which requires individuals or

organisations to choose among several actions that must be evaluated as right or wrong, ethical or

unethical.”(Ferrell & Fraedrich, 1991).Ethical issues are equivocal which can be interpreted in more

than one way and are uncertain with regard to the future (Sonens Lein, 2007).social media has become

part of life to all the individuals and also the organisations.The use of social networking is creating

challenges for managing risks to individuals and organisations reputation globally. Employees are

spending more time on social media engaging in non related activities.

ABC Resort provides an access of internet at all the levels of the organisation. Some workers have

internet access as part of their jobs like front office staffs, business centre staffs; they have the internet

access at the working time while others have the internet access as consequences of hotels policy of

making internet access available to all the hotel staffs. Hotel has the policy that allows employees to

use the internet including social networking sites in the working time but limits this to a acceptable use

by which the policy means that the types of sites that employees can access need to be acceptable

rather than the time spent on the internet. The hotel also had carried out once the research on the use of

the use of the internet among its employees at the working time and found that use of internet was low.

This hotel allows employees to use the internet at the non work time like before starting the shift, break

time, after completion of work shift .Staffs are able to access social network sites such as Face book,


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Twitter, Viber, Whatsapp. Hotel has the policy on acceptable use of the internet, and blocking certain

web sites. Hotel employees are not prohibited from using the social network but the policy states that

they should use at their own time. As this hotel is the international chain hotel, it controls the type of

sites that employees can access from the hotels IT System as data security is also very important and

sensitive.

ABC Resort provides free internet access to all employees. It is very common to find the employees

busy with the smart phones updating statues in face book, twitter, sending instant messages. The hotel

has received several complains from the guests because the employees ignored the guests just because

they were busy making a viber calls, chatting with the colleagues, taking videos etc. Recently one case

when the guest tried to order some food at the hotel restaurant and the staffs busy within themselves on

the phones and food order was taken by the Food and Beverage Manager.

The most unethical issue occurred in the hotel when one of the staff write bad about the hotels services

and the guests behaviour, on the hotels face book fan page. The employee who had been working in the

hotel for almost 3 year, but had bad working attitude and frequently on smart phone. He was advised

on several occasions and also been given letter of causation. Lately he was given final warning when

the guest complain the Food and Beverage Manager about this employees attitudes for not attending

the guest even though the guest had called him several times to make a food order. The guest happened

to be a long staying guest and he had hardly made comments about workers behaviour .The employee

was called up by the manager to investigate the case and was asked to give the justification for not

attending that particular guest.

The employee admitted that he was on the phone .With that the manager issued a warning letter for his

negligence by which the employee was not happy and demonstrate his unhappiness by tearing the

warning letter and shouting back at the manager. The employee posted negative comments about the

hotels services and guests behaviours that went viral. The comments about the hotel services being

poorly managed, bad upkeep including unhygienic food prepared and served, treating employees badly

and guest’s unethical behaviour to the employees were included in the comment. The comments

reflects as if the hotel as a whole is a bad place, Being an employee and to make such serious negative

comments gives a bad impressions to the public including the visitors ,guests to rethink their stay.

Lastly he was fired from the job because of violating the organisation reputation in the public site.ABC ETHICS FOR MANAGERS (BMEM5103), Open University Malaysia

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Resort is constantly concerned with the threat posed by leak of confidential information, negative

comments by the employees on social media. In regard to social networking the negatively used of

social media causes the loss of the staff productivity, data leakage, damages the business reputation

and looses valuable customers and even more.

Within a short period of time there were many queries and comments .If the remarks posted on the

social media by an employee is true, the organisation has to justify and explain each and every queries

and comments to the public. There were comments from some guests that if the food that was served to

them was unhygienic and some guests also commented that if all the comments are true they want to

take legal action against the hotel.

Posting on social networking sites is vulnerable criminal activity by disseminating wrong information

which can cause embarrassment to the organisation concerned. The employee’s behaviour can damage

a company’s reputation. Employers have the right to hold the employees responsible for such conduct

if the posting are used to attack the company or harass co workers (Breslin, 2009). In the case of 13

cabin crew of Virgin Atlantic Airplane were fired after they posted disrepute message about the safety

standards of the airplane and insulting passenger using social networking (Quinn, 2008).

The ABC Resort had spent a lot of time and professionals to handle and manage the situation.

Subsequently the business too dwindled. The hotel was losing its regular guests. The food and

beverage revenue was the biggest hit losing close to 60% of the average revenue. By spreading the bad

comments on the face book fan page, this has violated the customer trust, organisations

reputations.There is a real risk of employees inadvertently disclosing bad comments about the

organisation to the public, by risking the myriad legal implications. Proper supervision and

performance policies are the real solution for social networking issues in the organisations.

Analyse And Discuss The Root Causes To The Problem:

Social networking at work place can cause confidentiality issues. If the employee is not satisfied with

his/her employer, they can use the social media sites to leak the sensitive information. Sensitive

information may also be leaked unintentionally to public causing financial and credibility loss for the


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organisation. Social networking at work place can cause strain between employees. For example

employees of one department may comment about low level work of another department leading to

tensions between them. Employees are can show anger to the organisation on the public sites which

tarnishes the image of the company. This will spoil whole environment of the company as

organisations image gets compromised because of the negative comments made by the employees in

the social networking sites. As to days world all the business transactions are updated through social

networking, the negative image of the company can hurt the business prospects. Social media has

brought to the world a common medium and thoughts, words and expressions. Correct and efficient

usage of social network is completely dependent on how it is managed. Being aware of the risks and

vulnerabilities that we exposed to through these media only empowers further to use them in the ethical

manner. It is up to the individuals including organisations to make sure that social networking doesn’t

turn into social dysfunction.

ABC Resort rules and regulations, though stated in brief to each and every employee upon signing in

contract, the enforcement of the rules and regulations was not consistent. As we can see the staffs were

not supposed to use the smart phones during the work hours but they were constantly using. There was

no immediate action taken by the managers that allowed the workers to abuse the usage of social

networking sites at the work.

The action taken against the worker though several warnings were given, there was no proper

investigation into the misconduct but with just the managers investigation subsequently termination

resulted in such a reaction from the worker. Firing employees is not the best solution to prevent

negative feedback on web and cause more damage to the atmosphere in workplace. When the

organisation encounters negative comments on the web, it should first access the problem. In case of

termination there must be proper investigation. It includes the department heads, human resource

manager going into the fact and only after that the employee must be terminated only after

investigation. But ABC Resort terminated the employee before the employee was found guilty and

there was no participation of department heads.

This Resort doesn’t provide the regular ethical training and even the employee involvement in the

training is less. There is no briefing on the work ethics and even the organisation lacks monitoring on

ethical behaviours.ABC Resort doesn’t strongly follow the ethics policy, though it’s stated. The staffs ETHICS FOR MANAGERS (BMEM5103), Open University Malaysia

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are seen must of the time busy with the smart phones rather than performing works and maintaining the

ethical codes of conduct. Blogging on the social networking like face book, twitter at the hotel (work

place) may help the organisation to get rid of negative comments that is spread through social

networking. It is important to remember that consequences on norms of behaviour in new social

networking is only just emerging, meaning that codification of the acceptable and unacceptable

practices has not yet taken. So, if the ABC Resort has the strong policy in place, will ensure more

clarity in the area of social networking.

ABC Resort doesn’t have the clear social networking policy to meet the organisations expectations,

which has created different unethical activities in the organisation which has violated the organisations

reputation to some extent. This Resort has many complaints from the guests regarding the employees

in the excessive use of phones during work hours. Disciplinary actions against the employees were not

taken even if the employees were unethical at work. So, there should be the consistent in taking

disciplinary actions if there is violation of the organisation ethical values and norms. The policy should

include with general guides on the code of conduct and amalgamated with the organisations policy on

data security and email. The policy should also contain the statement that the employers have the rights

to take the disciplinary actions against employees in case of unethical behaviour.

The policy on the social networking use was not communicated in the ABC Resort. Some of the staffs

working this Resort, they even don’t know that the organisation have the policy regarding social

networking and they don’t know whether the organisation will take disciplinary actions against them.

Here we can see the gap between the policies and communication. Managers need to ensure that all the

staffs understand the policy and need o think carefully on how they explain and justify it.

ABC Resort was also not reviewing the policies on the social media use on the regular basis. As the

social networking is fast moving worlds and employers need to ensure that policies are kept up to date.

Ignorance of the unethical act is another cause of the problem. Ethical conflicts or violations are not

always transparent and it’s easy for an employee to perform an unethical act without knowing it. For

this reason, it is important for ABC Resort to make employees aware both of the company’s general

ethics policy and specific examples of ethical and unethical behaviour.


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Sometimes a person acts unethically in the organisation because the manager condenses the behaviour.

As the behaviour was so common in this Resort for the inappropriate use of social networking, which

was never questioned. The consequences for breaking the rules of the organisation, there should be a

consistent policy dealing with the problem.

Privacy and security of the organisations confidential information is another cause. From a policy

perspective according to Schement and Curtis (1994), privacy is seen “as security against intrusion by

government”. According to Garfinkel (2000) “privacy isn’t just about hiding things. It’s about self

possession, autonomy and integrity. Privacy is the biggest issue at the organisation s today when

customer and employee data are at stake. Security concerns must be addressed prior to embarking upon

creation of an organisations social network.

Applying Ethical Theories to Solve the Problem:

Ethical theories are used to help us determined the ethical cases and ethical problems. A moral theory

defines terms in uniform ways and links ideas and problem together in consistent ways (Harris,

Pritchard & Robins) which can provide the approaches which can solve the ethical issues. The different

types of ethical theories are:

Virtue ethics

Deontology (duty) ethics

Rights ethics

Utilitarianism

Others (divine command ethics, ethical egoism, ethical relativism ethical pluralism)


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Duty ethics theory is defined as the system of ethics that judges based on whether they adhere to a rule

or set of rules. Do the right things, because its right to do, don’t does wrong things, avoid them because

they are wrong. This theory helps to emphasis the value of human beings and focuses on the giving

equal respect to all the individuals. Kant is responsible for the most prominent and well known form of

deontological ethics. Kant’s moral theory is based on his view of the human being as having the unique

capacity for rationality. No other animal possesses such a propensity for reasoned thought and action,

and it is exactly this ability which obliges us to act according to the moral law/duty. Kant’s moral

theory emphasizes acting in accordance with and for the sake of duty. Kant believed that inclinations,

emotions and consequences should play no role in moral action.

This means that the motivation for action must be based on obligation. Morality

should provide us with a framework of rational principles (rules) that guide and restrict action -

independent of personal intentions and desires. Finally the most important part in his finding is the

categorical Imperative. Emmanuel Kant conceived his categorical imperative concept of deontology in

which the individual should make decisions suitable for all parties faced with the same dilemma. If the


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rationale of a single decision can be applied equally by others in similar situations, then it meets the

requirement of a categorical imperative.

Deontological theories of ethics focus on (1) the rights of all individuals and (2) the intentions of the

person(s) performing an action. Deontological theories differ substantially from utilitarian views on

ethics and would not allow, for example, the harming of some individuals in order to help others. To

the deontologist, each person must be treated with the same level of respect and no one should be

treated as a means to an end.

Deontology proposes that the principles of ethics are permanent and unchanging—and that adherence

to these principles is at the heart of ethical behavior. Many deontologists believe that the rights of

individuals are grounded in "natural law."

There are three formulations of Kant’s categorical imperative.

The First Formulation of the Imperative states“Act only according to that maxim whereby you can at

the same time will that it should become a universal law without contradiction.” – Immanuel Kant,

Groundwork of Metaphysic of Morals

Kant states that a true moral proposition must not be tied to any particular conditions, including the

identity of the person making the decision. A moral maxim must be disconnected from the particular

physical details surrounding its proposition and should be applicable to any rational being. According

to Kant, we first have a perfect duty not to act by maxims that result in logical contradictions.

Second, we have imperfect duties, which are still based on pure reason but allow for interpretation

regarding how they are performed. Because these duties depend loosely on the subjective preferences

of mankind, they are not as strong as perfect duties but are still morally binding. The first formulation

of the categorical imperative appears similar to the Golden Rule: “Do not impose on others what you

do not wish for yourself.”

The Second Formulation of the Imperative says “Act in such a way that you treat humanity, whether in

your own person or in the person of any other, never merely as a means to an end but always at the

same time as an end.” – Immanuel Kant, Groundwork of Metaphysic of Morals


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http://www.referenceforbusiness.com/knowledge/Deontological_ethics.html

This imperative states that every rational action must be considered not only a principle, but also an

end. Most ends are subjective in nature because they need only be pursued if they are in line with a

hypothetical imperative.

For an end to be objective, it would need to be pursued categorically. The free will is the source of all

rational action. Because the autonomous will is the one and only source of moral action, it contradicts

the first formulation of the categorical imperative to claim that a person is merely a means to some

other end instead of an end in him or herself. Based on this, Kant derives the second formulation from

the first. A person has a perfect duty not to use themselves or others merely as a means to some other

end.

The Third Formulation of the Imperative says “Therefore, every rational being must so act as if he

were through his maxim always a legislating member in the universal kingdom of ends.” – Immanuel

Kant, Groundwork of Metaphysic of Morals. A truly autonomous will is not subjugated to any interest;

it is subject to those laws it makes for itself, but the will must also regard those laws as if others are

bound by the laws. If the laws are not universal, they are not laws of conduct at all. Kant suggests that

people treat themselves and others always as ends and never merely as means. People ought to act only

by maxims that harmonize with a possible kingdom of ends. We have a perfect duty not to act by

maxims that create incoherent or impossible states of natural affairs when we attempt to universalize

them, and we have an imperfect duty not to act by maxims that lead to unstable or greatly undesirable

states of affairs for all parties involved. Using reasoned judgment we can apply this formula to any

maxim and discover whether it is morally permissible under deontological ethics.

Employees who exhibit a duty based ethics usually justify their behavior in terms of honoring

company’s policies or satisfying their customers. The duty based theory emphasis the satisfaction of

expectations as the major contributor to their behavior. As the employee of the organization who

strongly believes to duty based ethics usually presents as an “inside the box”. He will do what the

managers ask him to do because he is required to honor his boss at it’s his duty and that’s what the

organization ask him to do. In any case of unethical behavior, by not following the rules and

regulations is the major cause of disruption to an organization as the employee is not following his/her

duty.


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In ABC Resort the employee went against the organizations polices by being disloyal towards his

profession.So, its necessary that all the individuals in the organization are committed to ethical policies

and responsibility stated in the organizations policy which is the moral ethics of all the employees. The

organization should make clear statements regarding rules, regulations, job scope, and work ethics. The

organization also must carry out the disciplinary matters seriously and spontaneously. In any case if the

disciplinary actions are not taken sponteneously, that allows room for laxed behavior. Organisation

must ensure that perceived ethical violations are adequately investigated and that the wrong doing is

punished because as the employee, they most give first priority to the duty. The employees must

uphold the organisations reputations and culture. In this case, abuse of social media which are major

concerns for all organisations being misused by employees at work, disrupting moral duties and work

place ethics should be handled by the managers. The organisation should carry out code of conduct at

ethics at work with disciplinary action at time of misconduct .any delay or holding back disciplinary

action would only allow workers to take advantage. Managers can practice social networking to

maintain strong customer relation, increasing organisations reputation, increasing employee

productivity.

The organisations must have ethical code of conduct in the organisation. As the manager it’s necessary

to access areas of ethical risks such as guidance on the ethical issues, monitoring the organisations

adherence to ethical codes, monitoring organisations ethics policy and overseeing ethics training

programs. The manager also must ensure the strong ethical culture in the organisation. Organisation

should strive to hire ethical people. They should focus on ethical skills along with other technical

skills. The organisation also must ensure that all the employees participate in the ethics training

programs which will serve as an opportunity for employees to learn and evaluate the impacts of ethics

in individual and organisational performance. Organisation should reward ethical conduct and

discipline unethical conducts.

Recommendation:

Employer need to draw a line between slander that can be harmful for the company and statements that

are made against co-workers, seniors or customers. Many organisations take drastic actions like firing

the employees for bad mouthing in social networking sites. Companies have the full right to restrict the


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employees from any negative online interaction, which is not in their favour, during work hours.

Employers have right to intervene if they find any employee s online interactions placing the company

at any form of legal risk revealing confidential information about the organisation, violating the rules.

The recommendation includes:

Policy clarity:

A good and clear policy on the use of social media on the organization will help both the

employer and the employees to understand where the boundaries between acceptable and non

acceptable lie. The involvement of all the members is very important. This will make the policy

stronger and more widely acceptable.

Regular review of the policies is also important .The posting of negative comments on the

social networking sites can travel far and the difficulties of removing it ,is also tough.

Education and reminders to staff on these types of issues should be the key part of any policy

and guidance on the use of social networking. Guidance needs to be regularly reviewed and

effectively communicated, more so than with other policy areas because of rapid development

of social networking sites. Engaging in dialogue with employees can also help to ensure the

policies content is fair and understood and acceptable. If an organization has clear ethical

values, which are communicated, well at all the levels of the organization, it can be confident

that it is future proofing against further technological developments. A written code of conduct

provides employees and managers with all types of conduct and behaviors the company

expects. It outlines what behaviors are not acceptable and what measures are taken if an

employee violates the code of conduct. Employers must hold their employees accountable

when they act unethically. Loyal employees should be given appreciation for work well done to

encourage loyalty. Rather than putting related responsibilities in the hands of one employee, it’s


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necessary to create the system that checks and balances to minimize the opportunities for

unethical behavior.

Educate and train staffs:

This is very important. Most employees are not aware how their actions online can cause the

security issues for the organization. As a manager, it’s necessary to tell them in a language they

understand how a simple click on link they receive or an application they download can result

in malware infecting the network. It’s important to make the employees aware not to click on

the suspicious links. Employers must follow the policy and code of conduct and also must be

vigilant in watching out for ethical violations for creating and maintaining and ethical work

place. Organization can minimize ethical risk by encouraging employees to recognize that, just

as with any form of communication, they should apply the company’s ethical values when

using social media. Failure to do so can have security consequences.

Building a collaborative culture:

Organizations top management level knows that achieving success at major business

transformation requires more than simply telling everyone about the new ways things are going

to be done. Acceptance of change processes, services, working relationships, policies, ethics

and more can be accelerated across the organization through the real time sharing of

experiences. Social networking and collaboration applications are extremely effective ways to

bring employees together to perform and to share experiences. Social media can help in

creating a more collaborative culture which is one of the objectives of the organization for the

change initiative. The organization should focus on improving employee involvement and

engagement which leads to effective communication between the employer and employees

which will reduce the ethical risks. The organization must help the employees to feel ownership

in the initiative and tapping into their energy to resolve issues by solving ethical problems.

The best way to prevent negative feedback of the employees toward the company is by establishing

good internal communication system. Creating an internal feedback system that can let employers to

communicate with their employees can prevent bad feedback being posted on the public platforms such

as social networking sites.


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Conclusion:

This assignment highlights the importance of ethical behavior in the organization including employees.

Ethical organizational culture has received growing interest in the business industry. It has been

recognized that besides getting the job done, it’s also important how it gets done and that valuing

ethical practices can be a significant asset to the organization. It is also important to acknowledge any

employees or member of organization can make unethical choices if the environment doesn’t emphasis

ethical values and pressures them to fulfill short term financial goals at any cost. When ethical values

and practices are implemented in the organization ,employees feel engaged and committed to the

organizations standards(Ethics Resource Center 2010;Huntala, 2010).Ethical culture plays important

role in directing organizational behavior (Trevini et al. 1998), and can influence employees self

aspirations with work goals..Organization should have the strong ethical code of conduct which helps

to create better work environment. If the organization doesn’t have ethical code of conduct, social

networking may lead to the loss of organization. Although social networking offers a myriad of

potential advantages for today’s organizations ,its ability to draw interest in an era of organization

failings and also can lead to the reduce work place satisfaction, employer susceptible to the dark side of

the social networking satisfaction that may lead to abuse, addiction and misuse of productive time. All

the organizations must have to monitor the social network participation of the employees to avoid the

misuse without infringing or privacy or creating mistrust. So, the organizations must create ethically

friendly work environment for all the employees, communicate ethical issues, serve as a role model

and put mechanism in place for the development of the harmonic work environment. There must be

proper utilization of social networking at work place. As with implementation of new information

system, identifying and reducing the challenges related to its adoption and use are of critical

importance to make its goal successful. The organization must adopt the social networking with

guidelines careful planning. Also the employees need to know the guidelines on the expectations of the

organization regarding the use of social networking at work place.

Managers themselves need to talk the talk and walk the walk by being honest, reliable, lining up to the

promised commitments by setting good example in the terms of ethical behavior which can support


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goals that are advantageous both for employees and also organization. In summary practicing ethical

behavior within an organization can support well being at work by reducing ethical strain and by

promoting the positive ethical practices which benefits all the members of the organization.

References:

Andrea Broughton, Tom Higgins, Ben Hicks and Annette Cox (The Institute for Employment Studies) Research Paper Workplaces and Social Networking The Implications for Employment Relations

Ref: 11/11

Thomas A. Gilligan, Jr.,Murnane Brandt,30 East Seventh Street, Suite 3200,Saint Paul, MN 55101,Social Networking Sites and the Ethical Issues They Create


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Denis G. Arnold, Robert Audi, and Matt Zwolinski, Recent Work in Ethical Theory and

ItsImplications for Business Ethics

Gundars Kaupins & Susan Park, Published online: 2 June 2010.# Springer Science+Business Media, LLC 2010, Legal and Ethical Implications of Corporate Social Networks, Employ Response Rights J (2011) 23:83–99, DOI 10.1007/s10672-010-9149-8

Sigalit Pasternak, PhD student ,The Faculty of Management ,Tel Aviv University ,Supervisor: Dr.Ishak Saporta ,The role of ethical theories in ethical reasoning and behaviour within organizations - Research proposal

Wendy Lim, University of Nevada, Las Vegas, The Effects of social media networks in the hospitality industry, 9-2010

Assist. Prof. Dr. Nur Yeliz GÜLCAN ,Kastamonu University Faculty of Arts And Sciences Department of Philosophy ,Kastamonu- Turkey, SOME ETHICAL APPROACHES IN BUSINESS

Mahmoud Eid ,University of Ottawa, Canada ,Stephen J. A. Ward, University of Wisconsin-Madison, United States,Ethics, New Media, and Social Networks © 2009, Global Media Journal -- Canadian Edition ISSN: 1918-5901 (English) -- ISSN: 1918-591X (Français), Volume 2, Issue 1, pp. 1-4

http://www.scu.edu/ethics/practicing/decision/calculating.html#sthash.m9LASLBh.dpuf

Jason Lunday,July 21, 2010,Jason Lunday Codes Of Conduct Column, Managing the Workplace Ethics of Social Media


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http://www.corporatecomplianceinsights.com/category/jason-lunday-codes-of-conduct-column/

http://www.corporatecomplianceinsights.com/cci-authors/jason-lunday/

http://www.scu.edu/ethics/practicing/decision/calculating.html#sthash.m9LASLBh.dpuf

Documents

Ethics for Managers Assignment September 2014