LIB235 Week 4 Ethical Dilemmas

1. ETHICAL
DILEMMAS
Week 4
Dr. Russell Rodrigo

2. What is dilemma?
It is a situation requiring a choice
between equally undesirable
alternatives or any difficult or
perplexing situation or problem.
Source: Dictionary.com (n.d.)
http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/dilemma?s=t

3. Who should stay
alive?

5. Ethical Perspectives
Moral Rules: Groups may choose a rule such as “every life counts” in which case a
certain set of people get chosen according to these rules, for example, by lottery.
Virtues Based: Groups may hold “achievement” or “justice” as their priority,
in which case a certain set of people gets chosen according to who demonstrates
the greatest possession of these virtues. In the interest of time, have the group
choose one virtue as their priority.
Outcomes Based: Groups may weigh how much benefit saving each person
has on the person, other people, or society, in which case the most “beneficially
effective” people get chosen.
Principles Based: Groups may try to weigh and balance all four central principles,
in which case a certain set of people gets chosen according to the group consensus on
this process. This group tends to have the most difficulty in deciding on the survivors
(especially due to the time limitations).
Care Based: Groups may decide to serve the typically underserved or honour the
most equitable relationships, in which case a certain group get chosen according to
these criteria.

6. Ethical Perspectives Application
Which of the ethical perspectives did
your group apply in your discussion?

7. What are examples of
ethical dilemmas?

8. The Types Of Ethical Dilemmas: From
Truth To Honesty Conflicts
1. Taking things that don’t belong to you
2. Saying Things you know are not true
3. Giving or allowing false impressions
4. Buying influence or engaging in conflict interest
5. Hiding or divulging information
6. Taking unfair advantage
7. Committing Acts of personal decadence
8. Perpetrating interpersonal abuse
9. Permitting organizational abuse
10. Violating Rules
11. Condoning unethical actions
12. Balancing ethical dilemmas

9. 9
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How We Avoid Ethical Dilemmas:
CALLING IT BY A DIFFERENT NAME
“Peer-to-Peer File Sharing” vs. “Copyright
Infringement”
“Smoothing Earnings” vs. “Cooking the Books”
“Financial Engineering” vs. “Fraud”
“Aggressive Accounting” vs. “Earnings
Manipulation” “Lying?”
“Aggressive Legal Opinion” vs. “Illegal”

10. Watch the Language!
“Cooking the books”
“Copyright
infringement”
“Manipulated
appraisal”
“Changed the
numbers”
“Backdating Options”
“You lied”
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10
“Financial engineering”
“Managing earnings”
“Smoothing earnings”
“Getting results”
“Peer-to-Peer file sharing”
“Pro forma adjustment”
“Deseasonalized the data”
“Periodic look-backs [sic]”
“No, I misremembered.”
“No, I misspoke.”
“No, I managed expectations.”

11. Watch the Language!
11
The employee stole from
inventory.
“The employee showed
poor judgment.”
“He was accepting cash
for political favors.” “He was just accessible.”
“Bribes” “Useful expenditures” (Siemens)
“Suspended from school” “Restricted”
“Conflict of interest”
“It wasn’t so much a conflict of interest as it
was a confluence of
conflicting motives.”
“That’s creative thinking!”“That’s cheating!”
“The employee showed
poor judgment.”
“He was just accessible.”
“Useful expenditures” (Siemens)
“Restricted”
“It wasn’t so much a conflict of interest
as it was a confluence of
conflicting motives.”
“That’s creative thinking!”

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How We Avoid Ethical Dilemmas:
RATIONALIZING
“Everybody else does it.”
“If we don’t do it, someone else will.”
“That’s the way it has always been done.”
“We’ll wait until the lawyers tell us it’s wrong.”
“It doesn’t really hurt anyone.”
“The system is unfair.”
“It’s a gray area.”
“I was just following orders.”
“We all don’t share the same ethics.”
“If you think this is bad, you should have seen .
. . “

13. Résumé Puffing – Marilee
Jones
• The three degrees that did not exist
• The time elapsed between when she “puffed” the
résumé and when the information emerged
• The fall-out was the loss of a career
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13

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Background Check Expert’s
Thoughts
Peter Crist, a background check expert, said, “You can’t
live in my world and cover stuff up. At some point in
time, you will be found out if you don’t come clean. It
doesn’t matter if it was 2 days ago or 20 years ago.”
Source: Lublin. J. S. (2007). “No Easy Solution for Lies on a Resume,” Wall
Street Journal, p. B2

15. 15
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Resolving Ethical Dilemmas
Kant and the Categorical Imperative
Am I willing to live in a world that is subject to my rules or
would I resent those who behave by my rules?
What if the world behaved according to my rules? Would
I be comfortable or would I be nervous?

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Resolving Ethical Dilemmas
The Golden Rule
–Treat others as you want to be treated.
–How would you feel if you were on the
receiving end of your conduct?

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publicly accessible website, in whole or in part.
Steps In Ethical Analysis
1. Make sure you have a grasp of all of the facts available.
2. List any information you would like to have but don’t and
what assumptions you would have to make, if any, in
resolving the dilemma.
3. Take each person involved in the dilemma and list the
concerns they face or might have. Be sure to consider the
impact on those not specifically mentioned in the case.
4. Develop a list of resolutions for the problem. Apply the
various models for reaching this resolution.
5. Evaluate the resolutions for costs, legalities and impact.
6. Make a recommendation on the actions that should be
taken.

18. Practice

19. Classical Ethical Dilemmas

20. Classical Ethical Dilemmas
The Old Woman in the Airport
You are in the airport, trying to catch a flight that is
about to leave. As you run down the crowded
corridor, an elderly woman suddenly slips in front of
you and falls to the ground with a cry. Do you stop
to help, if you know you will miss your flight
because of it?

21. Classical Ethical Dilemmas
Trolley Scenario 1
A trolley is running out of control down a track.
In its path are 5 people who have been tied to
the track by a mad philosopher. Fortunately, you
can flip a switch which will lead the trolley down
a different track. Unfortunately, there is a single
person tied to that track. Should you flip the
switch? Why?

22. Classical Ethical Dilemmas
Trolley Scenario 2
As before, a trolley is hurtling down a track towards five
people. You are on a bridge under which it will
pass, and you can stop it by dropping a heavy weight in
front of it. As it happens, there is a man next to
you - your only way to stop the trolley is to push him over
the bridge and onto the track, killing him to
save five. Should you proceed? Why? How is this case
different from the first?

23. 23
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On Plagiarism
• Clarify the distinctions between plagiarism, paraphrasing, and direct citation.
From The Random House Handbook, 6th ed., by Frederick Crews (New York:
McGraw-Hill, 1992, pp. 181-183): From the Center for Academic Integrity
• Source: The joker in the European pack was Italy. For a time hopes were entertained
of her as a force against Germany, but these disappeared under Mussolini. In 1935
Italy made a belated attempt to participate in the scramble for Africa by invading
Ethiopia. It was clearly a breach of the covenant of the League of Nations for one of
its members to attack another. France and Great Britain, as great powers,
Mediterranean powers, and African colonial powers, were bound to take the lead
against Italy at the league. But they did so feebly and half-heartedly because they
did not want to alienate a possible ally against Germany. The result was the worst
possible: the league failed to check aggression, Ethiopia lost her independence, and
Italy was alienated after all. (J. M. Roberts, History of the World (New York: Knopf,
1976), p. 845.)

24. 24
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What Students Gain Through
Plagiarism
• Paper or assignment is done more quickly
• They get a higher grade
• They don’t have to do as much work
• Their time is freed up for other activities, including activities
such as volunteer work
• They don’t have to learn subject matter they see as peripheral
to their success

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accessible website, in whole or in part.
What Students Forego By Not
Plagiarizing
• Lose extra time to devote to other courses and activities
• Better grade because professional writing is better than their
writing
• Higher grades in other courses because of time commitment
to original work in courses

26. Usual Suspects For Explaining
Unethical Conduct
• Enormous amounts of corporate executive compensation.
• Lack of oversight of corporate executive decisions.
• Significant distance between decision makers and those they
impact.
• Financial challenges.
• Set of ethical values that has not yet caught up to
technological advances.

27. The most serious challenge we
all face…..
Making ethically responsible
decisions throughout one’s life.

28. Ethical Decision-making In
Managerial Roles

29. MANAGERIAL ROLES
• Personal integrity lies at the heart of such individual decision-making:
What kind of person am I?
What are my values?
What do I stand for?

30. MANAGERIAL ROLES
personal professional decision
making
SOCIAL ROLES friend, sondaughter, spouse, citizen, neighbor
INSTITUTIONA
L ROLES
manager, teacher, student body president.
PROFESSIONAL
ROLES
attorneys, accountants, auditors, financial
analysts

31. ROLES &
RESPONSIBILITIES
Decision-making in these contexts
raises broader questions of social
responsibilities and social
justice.

32. Roles & Responsibilities:
Application
• Consider how different roles might impact your judgment
about the discovery of the iPod.
• Your judgment about the iPod might differ greatly if:
You knew that your friend had lost it.
You were a teacher in the class.
You were a member of the campus judicial
board.

33. Roles & Responsibilities In
Business
individuals
managers
senior executives
board members can create and
shape the
organizational
context in
which all
employees
make decisions
Hence, they have a responsibility to promote organizational
arrangement that encourage ethical behavior and
discourage unethical behavior.