The Ethics of Doing Business

 A firm should observe the business ethics before doing business and marketing. The concept of ‘business ethics’ is generally related to the ethical or unethical, right or wrongness of a company’s business operations.  It can also be associated with the stakeholders, employee, product, services and many others. According to Hair et al. 2015, it has been found that business ethics are crucial and necessary in a company when the comp any is going through certain fundamental changes or crisis. Nowadays, the rules of business ethics re not being followed by most of the organizations. The consequence is that there is no standard or moral compass to guide the leaders of the company or the management too regarding what is right and what is wrong. In order to gain the competitive advantage over the market competitors, companies often take help of unlawful or unethical means. The present report will deal with one such case study related to this issue.  The ethical dilemma that Michael Vasquez has faced will be analyzed and the solution will also be provided. The report will conclude by giving an overview of the entire report and highlight the important aspects.

The ethical issue in the scenario 

 The ethical issue in the present case study that is regarding the theft of the strategic documents from the competitor’s server which are supposed to be ‘private and confidential’. Michael Vasquez is the new product manager of a technology start-up. Michael himself loved challenges, crisis moments and also courageously handled them. The new company where he has been appointed is a well running company but one day an incident happens that leaves him bewildered Weber (2001). One fine morning, his boss surprises him by handing him a pile of documents. These documents included the product plans, pricing strategies, partnership agreements and other documents. his boss told him with a touch of pride that he had taken them right off the competing firm’s server. He had obtained ‘electronic accesses via a colleague. The point is, there is nothing as unethical as the competitive intelligence. A company must not use the shortcut way to success by stealing a competitor ‘s firm’s confidential documents, their strategic plans. It can negatively malign the company’s reputation and lead them towards sheer destruction. It is a federal crime to acquire other companies’ success materials. It is the best option to work with honesty following the business ethics in order to run for a longer time.

The Issue in the Case Study

Since, Michael himself does not support the unethical traits his boss has displayed, he must dump the documents in the dustbin and must not apply it to the business. He must not use the documents for two reason. First of all, according to the virtue ethical theory, a person should not hold the characteristics of a fraud, unethical person, wrong intentioned person.  The virtue ethical theories are divided into three parts – the individual character ethics, work character ethics and professional character ethics as suggested by Spence (2016).

This theory supports that the noble human rights, honesty, loyalty, trustworthiness, civility, self –discipline, wisdom must be maintained (Mason 2017). Hence Michael should not use the document as using it would be going against the business ethical theories. Another is the utilitarian theory which is a normative ethical theory which focuses on the consequences of the right or wrong conduct. The theory suggests that an action or policy must be chosen in such a way that it does not exceed the personal interests and harm the interests of others. The secret documents of the competitor company that Michael’s boss has acquired thinking it to be a ‘gold mine’ can prove false and come up as ‘fool’s gold. Its application can result in a wrong way and cause the company a great loss.

I do not consider Michael’s boss as an ethical person because first of all he has violated the rules of ethics. Secondly, he is pursuing another respectable executive of the company that is the product manager to follow his unethical behavior and do the same proudly. It is equal to a criminal offense.  In the race of gaining competitive advantage for the company in the highly competitive industry, he has degraded to the level of a thief. Since, in his reply to Michael’s suspicious questions, he is ambiguous to a greater extent signifying that the process of acquiring those documents might have been more serious and illegal.  He defends himself saying he had obtained ‘electronic accesses’ via a colleague and had not personally broken any passwords. However, the point is he has put his and the company’s reputation at stake.

It is completely against the leadership theories. The boss of Michael is not a responsible and suitable leader too as a leader always considers what can harm the company’s wellbeing.  As a consequence of the action, the company can be accused by laws of going beyond the laws of business and citizenship as supported by Quarshie, Salmi and Leuschner (2016). The employees who are working in the company for a long time and depends financially on the company might face a stroke at their job and even might have to leave the company. The shareholders of the company who have invested a good deal here might be affected and claim for their investment returns. Hence, from every aspect, the unethical action of the boss is highly risky for the company.

The Importance of Adhering to Business Ethics

Whistleblowing is a term applied to the people who are dedicated to the reporting if the illegal activities happening in an organization. The person who blows the whistle has all the insider knowledge regarding the unethical activities (Schaltegger and Burritt 2018). The employees, executives, contractors, suppliers, customers and anyone can be the whistleblowers who have the entire knowledge. Whistle blowing is necessary to be encouraged in all types of fields to reduce the corruption and unethical operations. There are many governmental and non-governmental acts that protects the whistleblowers from retaliation. The Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA), Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), Sarbanes Oxley and others are there to provide safety to the whistleblowers (Quinlan et al. 2018). The Whistleblower Protection Act 1989, protects the federal employees. Hence, since Michael has all the knowledge of the unethical activities of his boss occurring in the organization which might take a broader form in future, should think about blowing the whistle.

 The only one attribute that is needed to be in the whistleblower is the internal sense of justice and integrity. The person who wants to stop the wrongdoing in the organization is considered as motivated towards whistleblowing. The person who does not have the fear to say the truth and reveal it in front of others has the motivation of truth and honesty within himself / herself.  It can also happen that the person who is whistleblowing has the intention of self-preservation.  He wants to come to the highlight and wants to be focused by everyone around.  Financial gain can be also considered as the motivating factor for whistleblowing.  Apart from considering whatever the motif behind whistleblowing would have been, there are instances of people getting mistreated fir whistleblowing.  It is suggested that the organizations must endorse them instead of ostracizing them, appreciate their initiatives seriously and acknowledge their courage to do it.

 There are so many circumstances where whistleblowing is justified. These are as follows:

1. It is justified when a policy or product will cause serious harm to the public.
2. It is justified when an employee recognizes a serious threat that will harm the consumers, stakeholders, employees and state going beyond the morality.
3. When the higher authority of the organization does not act and no action has been taken against the misdeed.
4. When the person who is about to blow the whistle has all the necessary evidences and also has the remedy to the situation.  The risk of blowing the whistle is equal to the succeeding chances, still the person blows the whistle (Weiss 2016).
5. When there are valid reasons behind the revelation of the deed that will surely distort the   public interests and increase the situation.

Therefore, it can be seen that Michael’s possesses all the justification of blowing the whistle regarding the misdeed of the boss because the action can surely harm the organization one way or the other. Michael also has concrete evidence of the unethical activities of the boss. He must raise his voice for the sake of virtue, law and the reputation of the organization along with the people associated.

 The ethical concern is necessary not only for an organization but it is also needed for an individual as it determines the moral judgement of that person.  It is moral to behave in an ethical manner.  The employees and every member of the organization must decide and act according to what is right. The adherence to what is right might lead to leaving the so called ‘short –term’ and easy route to success (Michaelson et al.2014).  The ethical concerns are necessary as these can bring considerable benefits to the company and in the present case the company in which Michael is the product manager is a start-up company. It means that the company is in its initial stages where they must focus on building the reputation and avoid any kind of fraud or unethical short term ways which can lead them to destruction. The company especially the boss who is the top most authority of the company must concentrate on the ethical responsibilities. There are many organizational benefits of adhering to the business ethics.

1. It can attract more customers boosting the profits and sales of the company.
2. The strong reputation and the honest image of the company can surely retain the employees reducing the turnover rates.
3. Attract new and talented employees to work with the organization due to its stainless reputation.
4. It can also engage new and potential investors to invest in the organization.

Conclusion

Therefore, from the above discussion it can be said that ethics are highly related to the business of a particular organization. A single wrong action can malign and destroy the future of the entire organization as well as harm the other associates. In the case of Michael Vasquez, his boss has conducted one of the most unethical mistakes which might take heavy toll on the organization. Since, Michael does not support the unethical action and has all the evidences must blow the whistle and report against the wrong doing in order to save the organization from the aftermath of this mistake and fulfill his responsibility as a manger.   

References 

Hair Jr, J.F., Wolfinbarger, M., Money, A.H., Samouel, P. and Page, M.J., 2015. Essentials of business research methods. Routledge.

Mason, R.O., 2017. Four ethical issues of the information age. In Computer Ethics (pp. 41-48). Routledge.

Michaelson, C., Pratt, M.G., Grant, A.M. and Dunn, C.P., 2014. Meaningful work: Connecting business ethics and organization studies. Journal of Business Ethics, 121(1), pp.77-90.

Quarshie, A.M., Salmi, A. and Leuschner, R., 2016. Sustainability and corporate social responsibility in supply chains: The state of research in supply chain management and business ethics journals. Journal of Purchasing and Supply Management, 22(2), pp.82-97.

Quinlan, C., Babin, B., Carr, J. and Griffin, M., 2018. Business research methods. South Western Cengage.

Schaltegger, S. and Burritt, R., 2018. Business cases and corporate engagement with sustainability: Differentiating ethical motivations. Journal of Business Ethics, 147(2), pp.241-259.

Spence, L.J., 2016. Small business social responsibility: Expanding core CSR theory. Business & Society, 55(1), pp.23-55.

Trevino, L.K. and Nelson, K.A., 2016. Managing business ethics: Straight talk about how to do it right. John Wiley & Sons.

Weber, K., 2001. What Would You Do?: Gold Mine or Fool’s Gold?. Business Ethics: The Magazine of Corporate Responsibility, 15(1), pp.18-18.

Weiss, J.W., 2016. Business Ethics: A Stakeholder & Issues Management Approach, 2014. Cyrus Chronicle Journal, 1(1), pp.66-69.