Individual Factors (Final Post)

In this blog, I have tried to emphasize the important topics that belong to the subject of individual factors of the ethical decision making process. In order to provide the reader consistency, I have followed subtopics of the Chapter 6 of the Business Ethics Text Book (Ferrel, Fraedrich, Ferrel).

The following subjects were presented to you in the previous posts.

·      Framework for Understanding Ethical Decision Making in Business

·      Model of the Ethical Decision Making Process

·      INDIVIDUAL FACTORS: MORAL PHILOSOPHIES AND VALUES

·      Individual Factors: Moral Philosophy

·      Philosophies Used in Business Decisions

·      Virtues that Support Business Transactions

·      Three types of Justice provide a framework for evaluating different situations

·      KOHLBERG 's Model of Cognitive Moral Development

·      White-Collar Crime

·      Common Justifications for White-Collar Crime

As a summary, moral philosophies and individual factors that provide principles and rules to the people were briefly presented. People mostly decide what is right or wrong with the help of these factors mentioned above. Religion, moral intensity and person’s affiliations are considered the major individual factors that affect and influence workers ethical decision-making process.

References

Ferrell, O.C., Fraedrich, J. and Ferrell, L. (2013). Business Ethics. Ethical Decision Making and Cases. 9^th Edition.

Common Justifications for White-Collar Crime

White-Collar Crime

White-Collar Crime (WCC)

According to US Department of Justice a WCC is a " non-violent criminal act involving deceit, concealment, subterfuge and other fraudulent activity." These unfortunate white-collar crimes cause more damage in both financial and emotional than regular crimes.

REF:

http://www.frankmungoattorney.com/federal/criminal-law-attorney.html

KOHLBERG 's Model of Cognitive Moral Development

Three types of Justice provide a framework for evaluating different situations

Virtues that Support Business Transactions

Philosophies Used in Business Decisions

Teleology: Assumes that final causes exist in nature and stipulate that acts are morally right or acceptable if they create some anticipated result.

Egoism: Concentrates on the individuals and try to maximize a particular person’s self-interest.

Utilitarianism:  Defines right or acceptable behavior that maximizes greatest good for everybody.

Deontology: Concentrates on intentions rather that on its consequences.

Relativist: Focuses on the basis of individual and group experiences subjectively.

Virtue ethics:  Characterizes an acquired disposition that is valued as part of individual’s personality.

Justice: Assesses ethicalness on the foundation of fairness.

Individual Factors: Moral Philosophy

In business ethics, when people decide what is right or wrong they use their own values and principals which is called moral philosophy. This philosophy is person – specific. There is no fits - all single moral philosophy but still the philosophy present guidelines for guidelines for determining human conflicts and optimization of people living together in the workplace as groups.

Critical thinking is considered one of the best methods for problem solving. There are some sources and external factors that feed persons own critical thinking and values such as family, social groups, religion, education etc.

INDIVIDUAL FACTORS: MORAL PHILOSOPHIES AND VALUES

In this and the next several posts, we will discuss the role of individual in ethical decision making. First of all, the moral Philosophy and some other concepts such as economics idealism and relativism will be defined and discussed. Secondly, we will continue with the comparison of the philosophies used in business decisions. Later on virtues that support business transactions will be reviewed.

In the additional posts, types of justice will be evaluated briefly. Lastly, cognitive moral development and white-collar crime will be discussed. I plan to conclude this blog by summarizing the topics that we have discussed from the beginning.

Model of the Ethical Decision Making Process

In the previous post, I have presented the general Framework for Understanding Ethical Decision Making in Business and the Ethical issue intensity. See the model below.

We will continue with the organizational factors. According to the statistics, organization's values often have greater influence on decisions than person's own values. Research has further showed that corporate culture is one of the most important key factor in ethical decision making in Business.
Corporate Culture is known as set of norms, values and ways of solving problems that employees of an organization share.

Another factor that shapes the ethical decision making is the Opportunity. Opportunity represents the situation that limit ethical or unethical behavior in an organization.Opportunity relates to individual’s immediate job context, which includes the motivational carrots and sticks. I have briefly introduced the other factors and starting from the next posting, we will discuss our main topic: Individual factors in ethical decision making.