Pre-course assignment –Ethical journey 0

Title: - Pre-course Assignment

Module Name - Tackling Global local challenging in

ethics responsibility and sustainability.

(CRKC7025)

Student ID: - 1552546

Professor Name: - Dr Grace Hurford

Date: - 28/05/2019
Pre-course assignment –Ethical journey 1

Contents

Introduction ................................................................................................................................................... 2

General Ethics ............................................................................................................................................... 3

Business ethics .............................................................................................................................................. 3

Bibliography ................................................................................................................................................. 5
Pre-course assignment –Ethical journey 2

Introduction

Modern era is of an extreme competitive market; a never-ending and unyielding competition has managed

to cross the ethical borders (krishna, et al., 2011). Professional people constantly face ethical dilemma in

the day to day life over ethical decision making process. The main reason is desire for higher profits

among competitors had derived them to do wrong and an unethical practice which is creating harm to

societal values and morals. In this paper we will put limelight on personal experience of ethical

challenges encountered either positively or negatively.

general ethics and business ethics

From literature perspective there are two principles of general ethics and business ethics that need a

business to maximize profit and be accountable towards the society by obeying the rules are the major

focus in this writings. Business ethics is the idea of utilitarianism, which advocates Business ethics is a

form of practical ethics that studies ethical behaviors and problems that rise in the business environment

(Maheshwari & Ganesh, 2006). According to (Carroll, 2016) every company’s primary objective is to

gain a long run maximum profit which is resting at foundation of CSR pyramid. In addition legal

responsibility come next which is core of pyramid structure which insist to strictly obey the laws and

followed by ethical responsibility to do what is right beyond rules and regulations. Finally at top of the

pyramid is philanthropic responsibility to be good co-operate citizen and do what is good for society. The

CEO and top management has to lead this charge to adopt sustainable development business model which

bind cooperate social responsibility (Bhattacharya & Polman, 2017).

Pre-course assignment –Ethical journey 3

General Ethics

From general ethical point of view honest and ethical behavior begins with money and financial

management. Any person who in charge handles money and financial transactions must perform duties

ethically. Person involves in corruptions, falsify bill and tenders to own gain is not acting ethically, or

lawfully gives bad reputation for himself and company.

In 2019 most recent case in south Korea I was shopping mall with my family, in parking lot

generally space are narrow, so accidentally I hit somebody car found minor scratches on front

bumper but nobody sees you but still I left your name card and phone number for claiming the

penalty. I manage to control situation in front of my family members and next day on call I went to

service pay small amount of service fee.

Business ethics

Profit in business becomes vital elements necessary to maintain social and economic balance which will

benefit all stakeholders. In search of maximum profit company may perform better but it is equally

important they work in ethical manner which can agree policies and operate within a legal and regulatory

environment. Leadership which does not follow agreed policy might affect negatively the entire firm. For

shipping companies its is utmost necessary to adopt sustainable model of development to build concerte

reputation for environment protection and contributing to sustainable society (Bhattacharya & Polman,

2017). However, Sustainability in the shipping industry plays an important role in preserving

environment by reducing harmful gases emissions and preventing the alienating microbiological marine

animal during ballast and de-ballast operation.

Pre-course assignment –Ethical journey 4

CASE 1

In 2009 during sailing in South China Sea when I was given orders by my senior engineers to simply

ignore the IMO regulations and go head to deballast atlantics sea water in open South China Sea without

any proper treatment just to improve ship fuel economy. In general it is not as strict to discharge ballast in

Chinese water as compare to American and Australian water territories. I denied the order of second

engineer and inform wrong doing to chief engineer which result in immediate signing off of second

engineer. Even though I work on my ethics but I felt I could have handle situation more maturely.

Case 2

In 2013 during our tenure in ship conversion supervision project in china we found my Chinese colleague

and ship superintendent often involves in malpractices by ignoring basic procedures and making easy

money by accepting shabby weld quality and favoring shipyard. This lead to weld quality comprised,

incomplete paperwork and careless errors that result in the recreate completed work. Lack of ethics has

overall negative impact on site team as others members who working hard and we feel we are

motivationally down. On the day ship supposed to undock by floating water inside dockyard. During final

ship survey we found she weld found number of crack on bottom weld plate and which will alarming and

dangerous situation which will compromise ship safety. But ship superintendent pressure us to sign

acceptable condition report to go ahead with undocking plan on term and condition of shipyard

suggestion. Since inspection continues till mid night I along classification survey strongly insist halt the

docking and carry out X-Ray test repair weld joints. After arriving in office from site I send official email

to site team manager and ship lead superintendent. My role is conveying my inspection report finding to

my senior. Next morning when I arrive in office, I was abusive by ship superintendent for neglecting his

orders. My ethics not allowed me to comprise on safety and basic rule of constructions. Site manager

upon order of ship owners raise inquiry of welded joint and ask for 100% X-RAY checkup and finally

ship welded joint was repair again at defected areas.

Pre-course assignment –Ethical journey 5

CASE 3

In addition in year 2002 during my college day I was carrying out part time delivery food job in goa

India. I was caught an occupational disease, manager of this costa food delivery very abusive and often

make fun of another employee. Workplace of working hours and that there was no compensation or no

salary on time for our hardships. Moreover, they stated that there were excessive restrictions on

employees’ behavior, including the need to obtain permission before getting a drink or a snack, and strict

limitations on toilet time. Finally former employee wrote to higher authorities for unprofessional behavior

of manager of costa food delivery. Ethical standards must be met to prevent misuse of power, potential

bullying and discrimination, which leads to high turnover, high anxiety and low productivity.

Conclusion:-

General Ethical behavior requires good level communications with colleagues, clients and leaders. In

addition it requires professional attitude more than wearing fancy suits. Being ethical is also performing

duties responsibly even when someone is not watching you. The most difficult task is building the

employees team to realize the business values and to make the employees formulate them into their

regular practices. According to (krishna, et al., 2011) argue that “laws are for youngsters and ethics are

for moral adults” but since employees are expected to be to be innovative, strict rules are useful to sustain

values, ethics and morality.

Bibliography

Bhattacharya, C. B. & Polman, P., 2017. Sustainability lessons from the front lines. MIT Sloan

Management Review, 2(71), p. 58.

Pre-course assignment –Ethical journey 6

Carroll, A. B., 2016. Carroll’s pyramid of CSR: taking another look. International Journal of Corporate

Social Responsibility, 1(1), p. 3.

krishna, A., Dangayach, G. S. & Jain, R., 2011. Business ethics: A sustainability approach. Procedia-

Social and Behavioral Sciences, Volume 25, pp. 281-286.

Maheshwari, s. k. & Ganesh, M. P., 2006. Sunil Kumar Maheshwari and ‘Ethics in Organization-The

Case of Tata Steel. VIKALP, 31(2), pp. 75-78.