Ethical diversity and decision-making in modern marketing practices

Marketing Ethics

It is an unavoidable part of business to experience moments of unethical behavior and any corporation that doesn\'t acknowledge this is unwise. Taking into account the different traditions, upbringing and beliefs, people have created certain opinions that direct their daily work. Frequently, these opinions clash. For example, a manager of an enterprise might judge recruiting his/her relatives as ethical because they have prior knowledge of his personality, a move which a number of his employees might find improper and see the manager as biased. In this situation, there exists a gap in their ethical understanding. These situations could affect the business negatively.

In this situation, there exists a gap in their ethical understanding. Every party involved defends their ethical standards, a condition that every institution faces and must have strategies to handle them, in a way that works best for the company. This is to avoid the adverse impact the misunderstanding would bring to the business. In the contemporary society, the diversity of ethical reasoning has been escalating among stakeholders (consumers, employees, suppliers and local community). People are becoming more dynamic; their philosophy is being influenced as the world globalized. It is therefore becoming more difficult for firms to create universal ethical standards. Therefore, companies must be highly conscious of their ethical decision-making process. This does ensure inclusiveness of all the stakeholders involved which ease through consideration of their needs.

Marketing Ethics Concerns

Marketing ethics talks about the ethical actions that are judged just or criminal for application in a company. Although certain actions are judged as right or wrong, some cannot be correctly categorized. Procedures that are judged ethical are based on their effect on those concerned. For example, a buyer would feel cheated when a supplier lies about the advantages of a commodity simply to make sales and is less concerned about the needs of the customers. Telling the truth, however, about the true gains of a commodity will make the customers who really need it to acquire it. Over the long-term, the truthful supplier will make more profit than the first because of his sincerity.

Most of the reported cases of unethical conduct in business range from deceit and price hikes to dishonest sales processes, etc. Large corporations have a higher tendency of experiencing unethical conduct than smaller businesses. This is due to the higher number of people in the company hence higher diversity of ethical beliefs. Hence, it is important for the company to have their own ethical standards that should be followed by all. Nonetheless, development of such standards could be quite difficult as it needs to be all-encompassing (Ferrel et al. 1985).

Companies are applying a variety of strategies to deal with ethical diversity. Kotler (1997) suggests marketing practices that are not only long-term, but consumer and society oriented. Most approaches by firms entail setting up of an organizational culture that ought to be shared by the firms for consistency in making ethical decisions. Nonetheless, there are some ethical standards that are viewed as universal hence each firm must have, such as trustworthiness, transparency and personal responsibility.

Theories that have been applied to handle ethical issues are the deontological theories and consequential theories. Deontological theories are concerned with the rules viewed as universal and the accepted way of behavior. Consequential theories claim that actions ought to be judged based on the outcomes. The most commonly applied teleological theory is utilitarianism which insists that actions must offer the greatest benefit to the largest number of people with the least damage.

These theories are useful to managers in making ethical-based decisions. To come up with the best decision, there must be honest efforts to understand ethical challenges the entity faces through the eye of the stakeholders and determine how a particular decision impacts on them. Organizational leaders must be able to foresee how alternative actions will affect the stakeholders and make a rational and reasonable decision based on the action that leads to greatest good of all stakeholders with the least consequences. During implementation, the most appropriate actions must be monitored to give room for modification of the set actions based on outcome. Since an ethical decision that is fully satisfactory to all stakeholders can hardly be made, it is advisable for enterprises to make ethical decisions based on a satisfactory profit range rather than pursuit for maximum profits.

Purpose of Marketing Ethics

Stain a company\'s name and that business is ruined. Operating policies that are unethical could swiftly bring about this damage as the people lose their confidence in the company. All companies should be quick to spot unethical practices that could bring them down (Sixsigmaonline.org, n.d). Most times, reports of unethical dealings are overheard among distributors who apply seemingly legitimate procedures which backfire in the long run, causing the company legal problems and avoidable humiliation.

Systems should be introduced to spot these wrong behaviors quickly so as to ensure the firm\'s progress via adequate strategizing and physical structure development, and these detected wrong actions should be immediately acted on (Parliti et al., 2014). Instances of companies well-known for unethical conduct are Walmart, the China Company and Coca-Cola.

According to Andy S. in 2005, Walmart is a regular offender on the subject of ethics with their common unethical practices being low commodity costing in order to frustrate whatever competing businesses and retain their monopoly. Also, Walmart has been accused of poor employee treatment as their workers are forced to stay longer hours with no added benefits as well as health packages, not to forget the allegations of gender segregation and many others. All these unethical conducts had a significant effect on the company, according to the CEO, Lee Scott (Parilti et al., 2014).

The Coca-Cola Company had a similar experience between the years of 1999 and 2006. It was accused of adulteration of products in Belgium, racial segregation, irregularities with their \"Dasani\" water as well as corporate scam. These allegations had a huge impact on the enterprise and they lost their market dominance to Pepsi during that time. Even though they made a comeback, it took them quite some time and a great deal of work, including the introduction of as much as a 1000 new products (Felicity L. 2004).

While attempting to bring down the unit price of the Barbie doll toy, Mattel gained an unwanted reputation. The company gave out its mass manufacture contract to a Chinese company and when the final products were shipped, it was discovered that they contained lead 180 times the legal amount and poorly fixed magnets (Nayab, 2014).

It is therefore important that companies maintain good business ethics so as to enjoy continuity as no company is invincible to damage of reputation as a result of improper ethical practices.

The Ethical Relativism Challenge

Every firm, stakeholder and individual considers their morality standards as right. These standards are not the same due to different cultural backgrounds and experiences that the groups and individuals have undergone. There is need for respect for each ethical belief as basis to which ethical relativism is built upon. As the world becomes more globalized, exposure to worldviews where nonexistent become a reality, the result is culture shock. The capacity for business to invest time in market research in order to understand different worldviews of its stakeholders is becoming a necessity (Robin et al., 1996).

Moreover, an internal firm\'s ethical decision needs to consider individual philosophy of its employees and integrate them in its decision to ensure inclusiveness. Due to dynamic ideologies, this may not be possible; hence an organization can organize training for its employees so that they are aware of operational standards of the firm and adjust to them. The training must sensitive individual morality and hence use methods that do not appear discriminatory to particular individual(s) (Ferrel et. al 1985). Despite this, it is commonplace to still experience cases of ethical misconduct under appropriate leadership performance.

A firm can make sure daily tasks are carried out in an organized manner, be it official or unofficial. It is very crucial for companies to have a reward system for both appropriate and inappropriate ethical conduct. For example, those who practice unethical actions such as overpricing of products or services should be sacked or downgraded, while those who portray excellent ethical behaviors should be openly commended and upgraded (Ferrel et. al 1985) How Can Unethical Issues in Marketing Be Dealt With?

Defining ethical standards in a company should be done by leaders of integrity who value standards as an important feature of strategic decisions (Sixsigmaonline.org, n.d). These decisions are only taken after adequate consultation of people with different ethical views as a way of acknowledging their perception. Strategic leadership is fundamental for proper handling of ethical concerns. There should be leadership that respects ethical diversity and is considerate of their needs. At the same time, decision-makers must understand that they cannot fully satisfy the ethical concern of all the stakeholders. Therefore, decisions made must be based on that which results to the common good of all.

Communication is a key factor that can assure an understanding of a decided upon action. According to Pitta D. et al. (1999), the best communication strategy involves negotiation and compromise focused on problem-solving. Often, the strategy is collaborated. Although all the parties involved may not fully accept the agreed upon strategy, there is an understanding of the reason for a decision. In some cases, full compromise of a party could be the best option, for instance, a foreign company may choose to comply with ethical codes of another for the sake of its business survival in that alien market. The aim is to come up with a strategy that leads to the most benefit to all stakeholders with minimum damages.