Ethical Issues in Management
ANDREW BOERENS
MGT/216 ORGANIZATIONAL ETHICS AND SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY
ETHICALS ISSUES IN MANAGEMENT
JOHN BRAEGER
Ethics and ethical decisions are necessary to be a successful supervisor, manager or leader. Business ethics is essentially always doing right in all aspects of the workplace. But like anything else in life, there is always ambiguity to what is right.
I was recently promoted to a supervisor with a self-directed brokerage firm. This has made business ethics more apparent and made me realize the importance it plays on a daily basis. As a self-directed brokerage firm, one of the services provided is to place trades for clients over the phone system. My colleagues take these orders verbally and then manually enter them into a trading platform. With these trades being manually entered, there is always the risk of human error and trades being incorrectly placed. In a perfect world our firm would make money when fixing these trade errors, but roughly 75% of the time a loss occurs resulting from invalid trades. Part of my role is to fix the error that was caused and then record and document the incident and the loss. My role also includes providing any coaching that is needed to the employee that placed the incorrect trade. Everyone makes mistakes - so the first few times this happens it’s not a problem. However, if these mistakes become common they can lead to termination. By working with some of these employees for a long time, I have developed stronger friendships with some. The first time I had to fix a trade for a co-worker I was a good friend with, it really tested my ethics. I have to follow my routine and treat every employee the same and assign errors and provide coaching. It would be highly unethical for me to treat someone different because of my personal relationship with them. I think that one positive thing that a recession can provide is exposing unethical organizations. The consumer becomes very aware,
MGT/216 ORGANIZATIONAL ETHICS AND SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY
ETHICALS ISSUES IN MANAGEMENT
JOHN BRAEGER
Ethics and ethical decisions are necessary to be a successful supervisor, manager or leader. Business ethics is essentially always doing right in all aspects of the workplace. But like anything else in life, there is always ambiguity to what is right.
I was recently promoted to a supervisor with a self-directed brokerage firm. This has made business ethics more apparent and made me realize the importance it plays on a daily basis. As a self-directed brokerage firm, one of the services provided is to place trades for clients over the phone system. My colleagues take these orders verbally and then manually enter them into a trading platform. With these trades being manually entered, there is always the risk of human error and trades being incorrectly placed. In a perfect world our firm would make money when fixing these trade errors, but roughly 75% of the time a loss occurs resulting from invalid trades. Part of my role is to fix the error that was caused and then record and document the incident and the loss. My role also includes providing any coaching that is needed to the employee that placed the incorrect trade. Everyone makes mistakes - so the first few times this happens it’s not a problem. However, if these mistakes become common they can lead to termination. By working with some of these employees for a long time, I have developed stronger friendships with some. The first time I had to fix a trade for a co-worker I was a good friend with, it really tested my ethics. I have to follow my routine and treat every employee the same and assign errors and provide coaching. It would be highly unethical for me to treat someone different because of my personal relationship with them. I think that one positive thing that a recession can provide is exposing unethical organizations. The consumer becomes very aware,
References: Trevino, K & Nelson K(2007). Ethical Problems of Organizations, John Wiley &Sons