Ethical decision-making in workplace conflict situations

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Ethical Analysis
Ethics is a major issue in the modern society since people face numerous situations that require ethical decision making. The need for ethical decision making is also attributable to the many ethical dilemmas we face in our everyday lives. Ethical decision making is considered as a critical component towards promoting good co-existence between people in a specific setting like a school or workplace. The use of ethical principles when making decisions is more important in conflict situations in order to generate amicable solutions to the parties involved in the conflict. In the past week, observations have been made on situations at the workplace in which decision making was or was not based on the use of ethical principles. This paper provides an analysis of these situations, implications of the situations on coworkers, and a plan for personal growth in responding to such situations.
Ethical Decision-making Situations at the Workplace
The working environment comprises of people from different backgrounds and professions who work together towards accomplishing the established organizational objectives. As these individuals carry out their various roles and responsibilities, they are face with different situations that require effective decision making. Effective decision making is not only crucial towards creating a safe working environment for all workers, but also necessary towards promoting teamwork and unity towards accomplishing organizational objectives. In this regard, I have made observations at my workplace on situations at the workplace in which decision making was or was not based on ethical principles.
On Monday at 10:00am, one of the employees at the workplace complained to some of his coworkers of alleged harassment by one of the supervisors. He stated that the supervisor was constantly harassing him and seemed to have a personal vendetta against him despite his commitment to his work. His coworkers advised him to report to the departmental head who will in turn consult the management for appropriate actions. After he filed his complaint to the departmental head, the supervisor was summoned and notified of the allegations of harassment. The supervisor was warned against further harassment of any of the employees and notified of probable disciplinary actions as stated in the organization’s workplace policies.
The second situation occurred on Thursday at 15:00pm when one of the employees was summoned by the departmental head for conducting personal business on company time. The management had received credible information that the employee was constantly involved in carrying out his personal business during working hours. The employee would constantly take long to complete his respective tasks because he was carrying out his personal business. As a result, the management decided to fire the employee because they were angered by the employee’s actions though he had never received any warnings before.
Analysis of the Responses to the Situations
As shown in the anecdotal information, the situations in the organization required different responses because they were dealing with different issue that could affect workplace productivity. The situation involving employee harassment by one of the supervisors had numerous impacts on the employee’s morale and productivity, which in turn affected the productivity of the overall workplace. When dealing with this situation, the management needed to make a decision that would dissuade the supervisor from further harassment of the victim or any other employee. Since the victim had already notified some of his colleagues, the management’s response had significant impacts on how employees perceive organizational policy and practices on workplace harassment. A suitable response that discourages such behavior would create a safe working environment in which the management caters for employees’ needs and desires. In contrast, an unsuitable response would imply that the management seemingly encourages employee harassment and affected employee morale and productivity. In my opinion, the issue was handled correctly since the management considered the established measures for dealing with such issues based on organizational policies. This is primarily because the management utilized ethical principles when making the decision to warn the supervisor against involvement in workplace bullying or harassment.
First, the management utilized the principle of privacy and confidentiality when making the decision since they did not disclose the identity of the harassed/bullied victim. Secondly, the management utilized the ethical principle of respect for people’s dignity and rights through ensuring that the decision does not condone bias or promote mistreatment of others in the workplace (Process Work Institute, n.d.). The other ethical principles that demonstrate the suitability of the decision by the organization’s management include professional responsibility, social responsibility, and integrity and competence.
With regards to the second situation, the management did not make the correct decision since it was seemingly influenced by anger. While the employee was involved in some wrongdoing, the decision to fire him was seemingly harsh and not based on organizational policies for handling such situations. In my opinion, this decision was also harsh and incorrect because it was not based on ethical principles. Unlike in the first situation involving a supervisor, the management did not seemingly considered the various possible approaches for dealing with the employee’s workplace malpractice. Therefore, the situation could have been handled in a different way to promote the good of both the company and the employee. The need for a different or alternative approach in handling this situation is evident in the fact that the employee had not received any prior warning or disciplinary actions for this behavior. In this case, the use of the ultimate punishment of terminating employment was harsh and inconsiderate of the good of the employee. Actually, the management ignored the ethical principle of utilitarianism, which postulates that actions or decisions that generate the greatest benefit to the most people are the ethically correct ones (Chonko, 2012). In addition, the management seemingly ignored the principles of virtue ethics and justice.
Plan of Action for the Future
While the management provided different responses to the ethical situations in the workplace, there is more that can be done in the future. There is need to established a suitable plan of action for handling the various situations in the future, especially given the seemingly ethically incorrect decision in the second situation. One of the first steps towards enhancing how ethical situations in the workplace are handled in the future is to establish an organizational code of ethics. A Code of Ethics provides guidelines on the expected behaviors of employees, the management, supervisors and other stakeholders in the organization as they carry out their respective roles and responsibilities. This helps in ensuring that the organization’s internal stakeholders know what is expected of them and the potential consequences of failure to meet the expectations or misbehavior.
The second course of action is establishing a guideline that provides specific steps for handling ethical situations or issues in the workplace. This would help enhance future decision-making by ensuring that appropriate steps are undertaken when dealing with every situation that emerges in the workplace. The use of these steps will also help ensure that decisions are not based on anger, but proper and thorough consideration of the underlying issues. In this regard, the first step in the guideline is for the management to be sensitive to the ethical signposts in the specific situation. Ethical signposts help in pointing the decision makers towards an ethically correct decision through evaluation of how it benefits and/or harm the involved parties. This is an important step because ethical decision making requires consideration of the impact of the decision on others before it is made (Mintz, 2011).
The second step will involve identification of the various courses of action to deal with the situation once the ethical issues have been identified.