Chapter Five: Personal Values Influence Ethical Choices

Chapter Five
Personal Values
Influence Ethical
Choices
Chapter Preview: Personal Values
Influence Ethical Choices
• Developing a strong sense of character
• How values are formed
• Value conflicts and how to resolve them
• Making ethical decisions based on
personal values
• Corporate crime and steps to eliminate
it
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Character, Integrity and Moral Development
• Character is composed of your personal

standards of behavior including:
– Honesty
– Integrity
– Moral strength

Integrity: A Dimension of Character
• Integrity is congruence between what

you
– know
– say
– do
• Practicing what you believe
demonstrates integrity
• Critical to successful relationships

A Valued Character Trait
• People with integrity do what they say

they will do
• Are clear about what they stand for
• Think hard about what is right and
wrong

The Corrosion of Character
• Richard Sennett believes decline of

character can be traced to:
– economic conditions
• fast-paced, high stress
• information-driven
– limited connections
• past
• neighbors
• selves

Character Development
• Integrity can be developed

• Make and keep promises to self and
others
• Many organizations and educational
institutions believe in character training

Six Pillars of Character
• According to the Josephson Institute of

Ethics:
– Trustworthiness Respect
– Responsibility Fairness
– Caring Citizenship

Total Person Insight
People working together with integrity

and authenticity and collective
intelligence are profoundly more
effective as a business than people
living together based on politics, game
playing, and narrow self-interest.
Peter Senge
Author, The Fifth Discipline

Personal Values
• Values are personal beliefs and

preferences that influence one’s
behavior
• Deep-seated in personality
• Exist at different levels of awareness
• Awareness of values enhances integrity
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Five-Part Valuing Process to Clarify and
Develop Values
• Thinking
– critical thinking
– distinguishing fact from opinion
• Feeling
– listening to “gut level”
• Communicating
– listening closely
– interacting with others

Five-Part Valuing Process to Clarify and
Develop Values
• Choosing
– being well informed
• Acting
– repeatedly and consistently

Identifying Your Core Values
• Core values are those that consistently

rank higher than others
• General principles and beliefs that guide
intermediate and long-term goals
• Influence the behavior of individuals and
organizations

Values and Job Selection
• We often must choose among core

values
– High salary
– Security
– Meaningful work
– Lots of time off
• Most choices require compromising at
least one

Values Shaping Influences
• Major influences that shape our values

are:
– People
– Events
– Family
– Religious groups
– Schools
– The media

Family
• Parents assume many roles

• Most important role is moral teacher
• Challenges to families:
– single-parent households
– two parents working outside the home
– care for elderly parents
– financial pressures

Religious Groups
• Value priorities often developed through

religious training
– Religious doctrine
– Role models
• Many now seeking spiritual and moral
anchors in both personal lives and work

Schools
• Some see character education as

fundamental aspect of education
• Values clarification common part of
curriculum in 70s
• Objections and fears about imposing
values, so much was eliminated
• Resurgence in the movement today

Media
• Viewers often see

– people abusing and degrading each other
without consequences
– violence and antisocial behavior
• Research connecting television viewing
and
– depression
– desensitization of children

People We Admire
• Modeling is shaping behavior to be like

people you admire
• Important for children and adults
• Leaders in the workplace are important
models for adults

Avoiding Values Drift
• Values drift is the slow erosion of core

values over time
– exposure to conflicting situations
– pressure to compromise
• Reflect on core values when making
decisions at work
• Choose appropriate ethical behavior to
maintain integrity

Avoiding Values Drift
• Organizations must constantly ask the

following questions:
– What do we stand for?
– Why do we exist?
• Successful companies, through
constant monitoring, adapt to a
changing environment without losing
sight of core values

Values Conflicts
• Differences between individual’s

personal values is major cause of
values conflict
• Problems may be due to conflicts
between worker’s and the manager’s
value systems

Values Conflicts
• Organizations should look for value

conflicts when addressing
organizational problems
– Declining quality
– Absenteeism
– Poor customer service

If you want young people to take

notions like right and wrong
seriously, there is an indispensable
condition: they must be in the
presence of adults who take right
and wrong seriously.
William J. Bennett
Author, The Book of Virtues
Internal Values Conflicts
• Internal values conflict occurs when a

person is caught between two or more
strongly held values.
• Value clarification minimizes conflicts
• Value ranking makes decisions easier

Values Conflicts with Others
• Interpersonal conflicts may arise

between workers of different:
– Ages
– Races
– Cultures
– Ethnic backgrounds
– Gender

Values Conflicts with Others
• Can be highly emotional issues that

disrupt friendships, work teams, and
productivity
• Often based on
– Interpretations of work ethics
– Priorities of work life and personal life
• Responses to situations can be difficult
and may require compromise

Personal Values and Ethical Choices
• Ethics are principles that define

behavior as
– right
– good
– proper
• Provides means of evaluating and
deciding among options
• Rules that direct your conduct and
moral judgments

Personal Values and Ethical Choices
• Jobs often present ethical dilemmas

• Each organization has different ethical
standards
• Some feel pressure to violate ethical
standards to meet business objectives
• Often faced with multiple options
– Rarely just one right and one wrong
answer

The Right Choices
• Learn to distinguish between right and

wrong
– Seek your employer’s code of ethics or the
ethical code of your professional
organization
– Ask an experienced or trusted colleague
– Restrain from choosing wrong path

The Right Choices
• Make sure your values are in harmony

with those of your employer
– Leads to success for individuals and
organizations
– Provides a strong bond among all
members of a work force

The Right Choices
• Don’t let your life be driven by the desire

for immediate gratification
– People are often under pressure to show
the trappings of success
– Progress and prosperity have same
meaning to many
– Often means compromising values

Nothing is more powerful for employees

than seeing their managers behave
according to their expressed values and
standards: nothing is more devastating
to the development of an ethical
environment than a manager who
violates the organization’s ethical
standards.
Dan Rice and Craig Dreilinger
Authors, Rights and Wrongs of Ethics
Corporate Values and Ethical Choices
• Good corporate citizens consistently

make ethical decisions in the best
interest of
– Employees
– Customers
– Stockholders
– The community

Corporate Values and Ethical Choices
• Organizations get into serious trouble

by ignoring ethical principles
• “Gray-area” situations cause difficulty in
choosing the right, ethical course of
action
• Even when right choice is clear,
competitive pressure can lead to poor
managerial decisions

How to Prevent Corporate Crime
• Establish and support a strong code of

ethics
– Written statement of ethical expectations
can be a powerful force in preventing
unethical or criminal behavior
– Research suggests that companies also
need to create an “ethical climate”

• Hire with care

– Priority in hiring process
– Identify a guiding set of values
– Hire people who share values and can
work together
– Screening and integrity tests

• Provide ethics training

– Ethics codes developed and posted for
employees to read
– Provide opportunities for discussion of
ethical decisions
– Offer formal training sessions

• Develop Support for Whistle-Blowing

– Revealing wrongdoing within an
organization
– Three choices:
• Keep quiet and keep working
• Leave the situation
• Report the situation

All that is necessary for evil to

triumph is for good men to do
nothing
Edmund Burke
Nineteenth-century English political
philosopher
Not Easy!
• Whistle-blowing is not an easy path to

take
• You may be right, win your case, and
still lose friends and/or job
• Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002
– Illegal for employers at publicly held
companies to retaliate
– Criminal liability of executives

Whistleblower Checklist
• Is this the only way?

• Do I have the goods?
• Why am I doing this?
• Am I ready?

Values and Ethics in International Business
• Values and ethical choices are more

complicated at the international level
• All parties must recognize and attend to
value differences
• Encourage mutual understanding and
respect

Values and Ethics in International Business
• Common ethical problems

– Bribery used to secure foreign contacts
– Human rights violations
– Lack of sensitivity to foreign customs

Summary
• Strong sense of character grows from

personal standards of behavior
• Behaving according to values allows
you to maintain integrity

Summary
• Values are the foundation for

– attitudes
– preferences
– opinions
– behavior

Summary
• Values formed in early life and are

influenced by
– family
– religious beliefs
– schools
– the media
– role models

Summary
• Internal conflicts arise when we must

choose between strongly held personal
values
• Conflicts with others are often based on
age, racial, religious, gender, or ethnic
differences

Summary
• Value conflicts with others require

skilled interventions before they can be
resolved
• Clarified personal values make ethical
decisions easier

Summary
• Shared values unifies employees by

providing guidelines for behavior and
decisions
• Corporate values and ethics are
receiving increased attention

Summary
• Many organizations
– have ethics codes to help guide
employees’ behavior
– hire those who share their corporate values
and offer ethics training opportunities
• Growing international business presents
new ethical challenges

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Chapter Five

Copyright © Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved. 5-2

• Character is composed of your personal

Copyright © Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved. 5-3

• Integrity is congruence between what

Copyright © Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved. 5-4

• People with integrity do what they say

Copyright © Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved. 5-5

• Richard Sennett believes decline of

Copyright © Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved. 5-6

• Integrity can be developed

Copyright © Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved. 5-7

• According to the Josephson Institute of

Copyright © Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved. 5-8

People working together with integrity

Copyright © Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved. 5-9

• Values are personal beliefs and

Copyright © Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved. 5 - 10

Copyright © Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved. 5 - 11

Copyright © Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved. 5 - 12

• Core values are those that consistently

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• We often must choose among core

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• Major influences that shape our values

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• Parents assume many roles

Copyright © Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved. 5 - 17

• Value priorities often developed through

Copyright © Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved. 5 - 18

• Some see character education as

Copyright © Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved. 5 - 19

• Viewers often see

Copyright © Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved. 5 - 20

• Modeling is shaping behavior to be like

Copyright © Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved. 5 - 21

• Values drift is the slow erosion of core

Copyright © Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved. 5 - 22

• Organizations must constantly ask the

Copyright © Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved. 5 - 23

• Differences between individual’s

Copyright © Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved. 5 - 24

• Organizations should look for value

Copyright © Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved. 5 - 25

If you want young people to take

• Internal values conflict occurs when a

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• Interpersonal conflicts may arise

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• Can be highly emotional issues that

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• Ethics are principles that define

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• Jobs often present ethical dilemmas

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• Learn to distinguish between right and

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• Make sure your values are in harmony

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