Week 4 Ethical issues and Leadership

Ethics is about the way we treat others. Many issues about the way we treat others. Video Clips from office space. Is this Ethical or not, if so why or why not.

Relationships with subordinates Hiring Performance appraisal Terminations. Discipline Harassment Family and personal issues. Employment Law.

Ethical Issues Information, communication, and expectations (discuss later). Confidentiality of information. What do you share with others? Co-workers. Can you discuss performance issues of others behind their backs. Access to records. References?

Ethics and Justice Book does not raise this issue. Ethics relates to treating employees fairly rather than treating them arbitrarily. Managers who treat employees unfairly could readily be PERCEIVED to be unethical by others. Office Space was he ethical or not to Milton.

Justice Distributive Justice Are the rewards/punishments given out similarly for similar consequences? Lets go through some cases. Would similar people be treated similarly. P. 142 case. When is it ok to treat people dissimilarly. Much harder question. Example, when would it be OK to treat Milton like he got treated.

Procedural Justice Follow certain guidelines consistently for everyone. Examples—in recruiting is everyone treated similarly—asked similar types of questions. Performance appraisal—are sources used the same for everyone.

Procedural Justice Includes Grievance system If have problems, perhaps due to bias, someone has a chance to correct the problem. Do you see a procedural problem with Sexual harassment and complain to supervisor?

Justice perspective will be revisited throughout the course. Procedural (process) Distributive (outcome). Usually employees. But procedural can apply to consumer, shareholder, business alliance, community etc as stakeholders.

Conflicts of interest Conflict of interest occurs when your self interests compromise your ability to make objective decisions. Appearance of a conflict of interest vs actual. CEO and corporate foundation Enron and conflicts of interest. Includes bribes/kickback Influence peddling Privileged information (insider trading). Can a CEO have too many stock options?

Conflicts of interest abound Can you supervise your friends? Is it a conflict of interest? When does it lead to an appearance of conflict of interest? What problems occur with conflicts of interest?

How does one deal with Conflicts of interest First, minimize exposure. Blow the whistle on people who try kickbacks. When transparent conflict, have someone else make decision. Accounting and approval of expenditures for self.

Al Dunlap and Ethics Case

Ethics and work force diversity. Case P.147 How do you manage people who are different. Does this create problems with Distributive justice? A positive approach to diversity.

Video’s and Managing this well.

Managers as a Role model/shaper of behavior. Managers are responsible for the behavior of their employees. If employees are harassing other employees and manager does nothing then what does this communicate to those doing the harassing? Back Stabbing. What about office space?

Managers need to set standards Make them clear and unequivocal. Performance appraisal. Many employees try to figure out what supervisor wants. Be careful about what you say. Continually communicate standards. Publicly and privately. Staff meetings. Monitor progress on standards. Report that progress. (Al Dunlap did this OK).

Managers as a role model. What you do, others are likely to imitate. If you act with respect to all, then others are likely to do. If disrespect, then disrespect. Open communication.

Book says Communication is key to ethics and management. Book says honesty is rule #1. Case p 156. Is it that simple? Case p. 159.

Case Chapter 15