ASSIGNMENT INSTRUCTIONS

Your instructor will provide two vignettes for ethical reasoning After reading each vignette, you must identify all relevant stakeholders and determine how they could be impacted by the decision that will be made, identify and apply at least one principle for ethical reasoning, and then consider alternative courses of action and choose the best course of action based on stakeholder impacts and the outcome of the application of the ethical principle.

Your textbook defines stakeholders as an entity that is benefitted or burdened by the actions of a corporation or whose actions may benefit or burden the corporation. Some common examples of stakeholders would include customers, employees, suppliers, stockholders, and the community.

Businesses will almost always have multiple stakeholders, and many times their interests will conflict. This means that a business decision-maker will frequently have to make a decision in the face of competing claims from different stakeholders. The question of whose interests should be prioritized requires the exercise of judgment. This skill—examining competing claims and deciding which one is the strongest—is called evaluation. You will want to consider the power, urgency, and legitimacy that each stakeholder presents.

You should put yourselves in each stakeholder’s position—Why do they care about the outcome of the decision? How will they be affected? What outcome would they prefer? What are their arguments in support of their preferred outcome? You will want to consider the power, urgency, and legitimacy that each stakeholder presents. Two of the videos below will give you a brief review of stakeholder theory and give you an idea of what skills you will be expected to demonstrate when you complete this assignment. Additionally, writing mechanics and grammar are graded as part of this assignment. A video on improving mechanics in business writing is provided below to help refresh your memory. Viewing statistics will be collected and counted as part of the assignment’s grade.

As a reminder, for each incident, be sure to identify all relevant stakeholders and determine how they could be impacted by the decision that will be made, identify and apply at least one principle for ethical reasoning, and then consider alternative courses of action and choose the best course of action based on stakeholder impacts and the outcome of the application of the ethical principle.

Cases:

Troubled Promotion

As Executive Director, you are seeking to promote one of your staff to the position of Associate Director. After the selection process was completed, you decided to promote Eva, a hardworking employee with excellent reviews. Upon announcing the promotion, information comes to light that Eva’s resume included several damaging misrepresentations including: previous employment history which stated that she’d been an assistant director for another organization when in reality, she had only ever covered for the assistant director when he’d been on vacation; she’d “managed” high performing teams when she’d really only been the secretary taking notes; and finally that she had an MBA when in reality, she had begun, but failed to complete an MBA program. Word has gotten out about these misrepresentations and spread to subordinates. What do you, the Executive Director, do? Do you proceed with the promotion, retain Eva but not promote her, or fire Eva?

Loud Lay-off

Susan and Ray have both been laid off from their middle-management positions. Both are very upset and nervous about finding new opportunities in the current job market. Ray is very inarticulate and docile. He accepts the severance package offered by the company: four weeks’ pay and benefit continuation. Susan, also anxious, complains about the inadequate severance. She starts accusing the company of disparate treatment and threatens a lawsuit. In an effort to negotiate with Susan, the company offers her a six-month severance page with pay and benefit continuation. Has the company been fair in its treatment of these employees? What possible consequences could arise?