Chapter 2: Business Ethics
ABC Clothing Manufacturer, Inc., an American clothing manufacturer, chooses to use manufacturing plants in countries that do not prohibit child labor. Though this practice not illegal, many view this decision as unethical because of opposition to child labor in the United States. Identify the likely costs for the company associated with such unethical decisions.
- loss of sales - loss of contracts - loss of partnerships
Ethical dilemma
A question about how a person should behave that requires the person to reflect about the advantages and disadvantages of the optional choices for various stakeholders
WH process (of ethical decision making)
A set of ethical guidelines that urges us to consider whom an action affects, the purpose of the action, and how we view its morality (whether by utilitarian ethics, deontology, etc.)
Ethical guideline
A simple tool to help determine whether an action is moral
Identify the character traits that virtue ethics focuses on developing.
- Justice - Courage
______ utilitarianism urges managers to take those actions that provide the greatest pleasure after having subtracted the pain or harm associated with the action in question.
Act
______ is the application of ethics to the special problems and opportunities experienced by businesspeople.
Business ethics
The ______ Rule is the idea that we should interact with other people in a manner consistent with the way we would like them to interact with us.
Golden
Which philosopher proposed the categorical imperative to determine whether an action is right?
Immanuel Kant
The most famous of the deontological approaches to business ethics is referred to as ______ ethics.
Kantian
John is considering completing a commission-based sale to a regular customer of his co-worker, Lily. Lily stepped out of the office for an hour in order to have lunch with her mother, who is visiting from out of state. If John's decision-making were driven by the situational ethics theory, he should consider the effect of this decision on
Lily
social responsibility of business
The responsibility of firms doing business within a community to meet expectations that the community imposes on them
Business Ethics
The use of ethics and ethical principles to solve business dilemmas
After comparing the manufacturing costs in the United States and in offshore locations, Alpha Manufacturing has decided to move its operations offshore to increase its profits by reducing manufacturing costs. In the given scenario, Alpha Manufacturing has most likely conducted a ______ analysis, a form of utilitarianism commonly applied by firms and government.
cost-benefit
When a business makes decisions based on ______ analysis, it is comparing the pleasure and pain of its optional choices, as that pleasure and pain are measured in monetary terms.
cost-benefit
Abigail is starting a new business venture and she desires that all her employees subscribe to a consistent set of company values. To achieve this, Abigail should consider:
drafting a statement of core values
Abigail has to decide whether to terminate a long-time employee whose productivity has failed to meet minimum guidelines over a period of time. One of the values that would impact Abigail's decision is:
efficiency
Since opening almost 30 years ago, Abigail's Restaurant has always closed on Christmas Day. This year, the new owner of the restaurant is considering opening on Christmas. The restaurant would not be violating any local or state laws in remaining open. In considering the decision, the stakeholders who would be most affected by the decision to remain open are the :
employees
A(n) ______ dilemma is one in which the right answer is not always clearcut.
ethical
The Golden Rule is an example of a(n):
ethical guideline
Questions of morality cannot be judged on an objective basis under the theory of
ethical relativism
______ is the study and practice of decisions about what is good or right.
ethics
Absolutism is also referred to as ethical _____
fundamentalism
Applying the categorical ______ would lead you to conclude that you should not cheat on a drug test, because if everyone acted in the same way, the drug test would be meaningless.
imperative
A co-worker who has to leave work early to deal with a personal matter asks that you complete some time-sensitive paperwork and turn it into your supervisor before leaving at the end of the day. You agree and urge your co-worker to leave in order to address his personal matter, assuring him it will be addressed. At the end of the day, you neglect to carry through on your promise and do not complete the paperwork. The next day, your supervisor chastises your co-worker, indicating that a reprimand will be placed in their personnel file because of the failure. Your co-worker does not disclose that you had promised to complete the work. Using the Golden Rule as a guideline, you should:
intervene and tell the supervisor you had assumed responsibility for the paperwork and forgot
Regardless of whether a particular course of action is ethical, at a bare minimum, a business decision should be:
legal
Ethical ______ is a theory of ethics that denies the existence of objective moral standards.
relativism
Labor laws that prohibit employers from hiring children are founded on the ______ form of consequentialism.
rule utilitarianism
The business ethics theory of ______ requires that when we evaluate whether an action is ethical, we imagine ourselves in the position of the person facing the ethical dilemma.
situational ethics
In addition to employees, shareholders, and customers, businesses should also consider the effect decisions have on the community where the business is located. When the business considers the impact of its decisions on the community, it is being
socially responsible
A crucial consideration of all ethical guidelines or approaches is considering the effect of a particular decision on:
stakeholders
The WPH process of ethical decision-making requires a business manager to focus on the "whom", also known as the _______, that may be affected by a decision
stakeholders
The ______ of a firm are the many groups of people affected by the firm's decisions.
stakeholders
Business ethics refers to ______ business conduct.
standards of
______ ethics holds that once we put ourselves in another person's "shoes," we can evaluate whether that person's action was ethical.
Situational
deontology
The ethical theory which states that an action can be determined as ethical on the basis of right and wrong, regardless of its conseguences
categorical imperative
The principle that an act is ethical if we want all people to act according to its dictates
principle of rights
The principle that judges the morality of a decision on the basis of how it affects the rights of all those involved
Mr. Jacobs, a salesperson for Micro Corp., is considering padding his expense accounts slightly this month to cover a slight commission loss. Mr. Jacobs rationalizes this decision as acceptable because he has always been honest in his expense reports in the past, so he believes that the financial impact to his employer would be small. If Mr. Jacobs were to re-visit this decision by considering what the impact would be if all the salespeople took the same approach, he would be applying an ethical guideline known as the ______ Test
Universalization
The ______ test asks us to consider what the world would be like were our decision copied by everyone else.
Universalization
The morality or ethics of a decision to terminate an employee, when considered under the theory of absolutism, considers only whether the termination
conforms to a set of ethical rules
The deontological approach to ethics recognizes that certain actions are considered either right or wrong regardless of the:
consequences
Micro Corp. has been the national sponsor of a well-known charitable organization for years. Because Micro Corp. is having a particularly slow year, it is considering pulling its sponsorship from that charity. If considered against the Public Disclosure Test, Micro Corp. should
continue its sponsorship
Ethical principles of honesty and dependability have long shaped the legal framework associated with the law of:
contracts
values
positive abstractions that capture our sense of what is good and desirable
The premise behind the ______ test is that ethics is hard work - labor that we might avoid if we did not have frequent reminders that we live in a community.
public disclosure
The ultimate goal of virtue ethics as an ethical system is the achievement of
the good life
stakeholders
the groups of people affected by a firm's decisions
Ethics
the study and practice of decisions about what is good or right
Future business professionals ought to consider not just the moral and monetary costs of engaging in unethical business practices, but also the cost of lost business.
true
True or false: The principle of rights is foundational to Western culture.
true
In some countries, bribery of local officials is essential to complete a business transaction. Although these countries may not prohibit this practice, bribing local officials may still be considered: _______.
unethical
Business decisions are typically driven by a particular purpose. The WPH framework suggests that the purpose or end result of a particular decision often reflects the business's
values
The ethics of care presumes that when an individual cares for another, they are, in fact, caring for all individuals who fall within a(n):
web of care
A large construction company has purchased a piece of property in a small suburban community that values historic preservation. The piece of property contains buildings that have significant historic value to the town, however, the law does not provide any protection that requires preservation of the buildings. A socially responsible construction company would probably:
work with community leaders to find a compromise for use of the buildings, while preserving historic features.
When a company executive is considering engaging in profitable, yet dishonest, behavior, it is always wise to consider how that behavior
would be viewed if covered on the evening news