Organizations and Ethics Developing a Culture

Exxon Valdez and Ethics Regarding the Exxon Valdez oil spill, the organizational culture of the National Park Services (NPS) influence ethical decision making in the disaster because the leaders in the NPS had a "can-do" spirit infused in them over generations of story-telling about how they were the leaders of the campaign to protect the parks and they did not want to cede control to other organizations that might have more effective strategies for helping to prevent an oil spill form spreading (Kurtz, 2003, p. 310).

The problem was that the organizational culture did not reflect the reality of the situation -- the NPS was not able to properly address the situation and required help; the egoistic mentality its leaders had cultivated in the organizational prevented it from adequately preventing the oil spread. The ethical issues involved in this situation stemmed from a lack of communication, as the Incident Command System (ICS) felt left "out of the loop" by the NPS, which viewed itself as the ring-leader and commander.

It did not cooperate with the other group leaders seeking to help, and as a result the disaster was made all the worse. The issues facing the decision makers in this case were how to address the spill. The decision makers in the NPS addressed the spill as though it were like a forest fire (Kurtz, 2003) -- which was a major tactical error; fires are contained much differently than oil spills, and the "can-do" mentality fostered by the NPS did not serve it well in this capacity.

The organizational culture influenced decision making in this case by laying the groundwork for this mode of thought and action. Since its inception, the NPS had served to cultivate a sense of self-worth within the organization that made its leaders feel superior in terms of their role of protecting parks and the natural environment. They saw themselves at the front line -- yet their vision of themselves was not supported by any actual competency in terms of knowing what to do in particular disasters such as the Exxon spill.

What I learned from this case that I can use as a public administrator is that when leading organizations and attempting to instill a "spirit of mission" (Samaan, Verneuil, 2009), it is important to have an accurate and humble assessment of oneself and one's organization. The abilities of the team members have to match the projection that the group gives of itself -- an organization that imagines it is more capable of handling situations than it really is an organizational set up to fail.

It is thus an ethical imperative of a public administrator to always maintain an honest reflection of self and of organization, and to use this to help develop the organizational culture by showing the team where it is and where it needs to be, which is a kind of goal-setting that helps to transform organizations and individuals into top-notch performers.

In terms of what the Exxon case has in common with the IRS scandal, it shows that any organization that does not know itself will eventually be exposed in the end; hubris catches up with one and all, and just as it did for the NPS, so too did it with the IRS when it imagined it was above the law and could target oppositional voices for auditing. The attention of the American public media is helpful in putting pressure on organizations.