BUS323 Business Ethics
Module 2 Assignment
Ethical Issues in the Workplace
Recognition, Analysis, and
Resolution
One of the most beneficial exercises in a course exploring ethics is to develop a paper that allows you the opportunity to create connections between your professional view of ethics and applied ethical theories. The nature of ethical decision making is recognition, analysis, and resolution.
Your paper must explore a current ethical issue in your workplace. It can be a current or former employer, or someplace where you have volunteered. Ideally, the issue that you explore is something related to your current or future career.
A few ideas for your consideration:
~ You are responsible for enforcing a physical fitness/readiness standard for your employer. Due to your workplace responding to a catastrophe for the past month, many people have neglected their physical fitness. How do you address the issue of physical fitness when the staff has not had the time to put into it?
~ Your co-worker has been consistently late for the past month unbeknownst to the supervisor. Reporting such behavior could mean that your co-worker is dismissed, or put on a performance improvement plan. Yet, the co-worker is dealing with a personal tragedy because her 5-year-old son was diagnosed with Leukemia. Do you report?
~ You take a new hire on a sales call and meet with an executive at company X, your most important client. While your back is turned to grab something out of your briefcase, the executive fondles the back side of your new employee. What do you do to protect the employee yet preserve the relationship with the client?
This final paper is your opportunity to delve into a topic within the framework of ethics that you find interesting based on your approved topic and thesis statement.
Select the topic of your final project and submit a two paragraph write-up.
For your submission, in the first paragraph, explain the issue in 3 sentences or less. Then, give the ethical dilemma, which is the identification of values that are in conflict.
The second paragraph should identify any internal and external stakeholders.
BUS323 Business Ethics
Module 3 Assignment
The Whistleblower
"The sad truth is that societies that demand whistleblowers be martyrs often find themselves without either, and always when it matters most." ~ Edward Snowden
Assume that you work for one of the organizations that was the subject of the whistleblower complaint (see below). The directors of the organization want to eliminate the barriers to reporting issues, address concerns immediately, and thus avoid future embarrassing and costly whistleblower claims. In a 1-2 page paper, give a very brief overview of the matter, identify barriers to whistleblowing in the organization, and ways to overcome those barriers. Determine whether competition played a role in the unethical behavior or hindered potential whistleblowers. Give your recommendations for an updated whistleblower policy.
Read the following articles, and select the organization you want to focus on.
Harvey Weinstein's Army of Spies (Links to an external site.)
Nova Nordisk Agrees to pay $58M for Failure to Comply with FDA-Mandated Risk Program (Links to an external site.)
Insurance whistleblower recoveries from Phillips & Cohen cases bring Novo Nordisk's Victoza settlement to $60 million (Links to an external site.)
Military Whistleblowers Express Fears Over Safety & Health (Links to an external site.)
Air Force: No Punishment for F-22 Whistleblowers Captain Josh Wilson & Major Jeremy Gordon (Links to an external site.)
In this assignment, you will outline the process of whistleblowing from a personal and managerial perspective. Consider reviewing this article (Links to an external site.) in preparation for the assignment. To earn maximum points:
Your paper should be 1-2 pages in length (not including title and reference pages) and must follow APA guidelines, use Time New Roman, 12-point font, double spacing, with one-inch margins.
Grammar, spelling, punctuation, sentence/paragraph structure do matter; spend time editing your paper. Suggest giving yourself a three-day cooling off period between finishing the paper and editing the paper; this approach can make a difference in what you catch and correct.
You must use and cite to the articles listed above and include at least one additional resource.
BUS323 Business Ethics
Module 4 Assignment
Final Project Annotated Bibliography
Ethical Issues in the
Workplace
Recognition, Analysis, and
Resolution
One of the most beneficial exercises in a course exploring ethics is to develop a paper that allows you the opportunity to create connections between your professional view of ethics and applied ethical theories. The nature of ethical decision making is recognition, analysis, and resolution.
Your paper must explore a current ethical issue in your workplace. It can be a current or former employer, or someplace where you have volunteered. Ideally, the issue that you explore is something related to your current or future career.
A few ideas for your consideration:
~ You are responsible for enforcing a physical fitness/readiness standard for your employer. Due to your workplace responding to a catastrophe for the past month, many people have neglected their physical fitness. How do you address the issue of physical fitness when the staff has not had the time to put into it?
~ Your co-worker has been consistently late for the past month unbeknownst to the supervisor. Reporting such behavior could mean that your co-worker is dismissed, or put on a performance improvement plan. Yet, the co-worker is dealing with a personal tragedy because her 5-year-old son was diagnosed with Leukemia. Do you report?
~ You take a new hire on a sales call and meet with an executive at company X, your most important client. While your back is turned to grab something out of your briefcase, the executive fondles the back side of your new employee. What do you do to protect the employee yet preserve the relationship with the client?
This final paper is your opportunity to delve into a topic within the framework of ethics that you find interesting based on your approved topic and thesis statement.
Building on your paper topic selection from Module 2, in this assignment you will be creating and submitting an annotated bibliography. First time creating an annotated bibliography? No worries! The Excelsior Owl (Links to an external site.) has guidance, an example to view, and tips for success. For maximum points be sure to include:
At least 5 different references listed in the annotated bibliography; feel free to have more than 5 sources!
Cite at least 2 of the sources used in this course. Your references may include academic and trade journals, but should not include unverified, non-credible sources such as blogs.
Your annotation for each reference must include:
A brief summary of the information in that source.
A brief evaluation of the quality of the source’s information.
A brief evaluation of whether the source is useful for the purpose of the research.
BUS323 Business Ethics
Module 5 Assignment
Corporate Social Responsibility
"Creating a strong business and building a better world are not conflicting goals - they are both essential ingredients for long-term success." ~ Bill Ford
Assume that you work for the organization that was the subject of the ethics complaint. You will describe the ethics scandal and stakeholders. Then, using at least two of the articles below, explain how you will update your organization’s CSR policy to avoid similar ethics breaches going forward and regain public trust.
Please research a current (within the past 2 years) scandal involving online privacy. You may use scholarly or credible news sources for the background information (for example, Wall Street Journal, New York Times), but not blogs or news aggregators (such as Huffington Post).
Here’s the list of potential sources on CSR:
Benefits of Corporate Social Responsibility (Links to an external site.)
Pitfalls to Avoid (Links to an external site.)
Tips for Corporate Social Responsibility (Links to an external site.)
Carroll’s CSR Pyramid And Its Applications to Small And Medium Sized Businesses (Links to an external site.)
Business Cases and Corporate Engagement with Sustainability: Differentiating Ethical Motivations (Links to an external site.)
Corporate Social Responsibility, Noise, And Stock Market Volatility (Links to an external site.)
References and Image Sources
In this assignment, you provide an analysis of a company that is not following its CSR and ethics policies. You will be presenting your response in a video (or short paper if you prefer). To earn maximum points:
Your video should be 2-3 minutes in length. Please make sure that you “share” the video; if you keep it private, it cannot be graded. Free video sources (Links to an external site.). Of course, you can use your own video recording software if you choose. YouTube links are allowed as well.
In lieu of a recording, you may submit a paper. The paper should be 4-5 pages in length (not including title and reference pages) and must follow APA guidelines, use Time New Roman, 12-point font, double spacing, with one inch margins.
Grammar, spelling, punctuation, sentence/paragraph structure do matter; spend time editing your paper. Suggest giving yourself a three-day cooling off period between finishing the paper and editing the paper; this approach can make a difference in what you catch and correct.
You must use and cite to the articles listed above, and include at least one additional resource.
BUS323 Business Ethics
Module 6 Assignment
Final Project Outline
Building on your paper topic selection from Module 2 and annotated bibliography in Module 4, in this assignment you will be creating and submitting an outline for the Module 8 paper.
A full-sentence outline helps you create the structure of your paper and the topic sentences of your paragraphs at the same time. Think of this document as your blueprint for the final paper. By approaching the outline in this way, you can easily move paragraphs around and edit the flow of the paper before you write a full draft. This makes editing for the flow of information easier.
For this activity, create a full-sentence outline for your final paper. Each sentence will act as a topic sentence for a new paragraph. The entire paper should be outlined using this method. This will allow your instructor to provide feedback to you about the information flow in your paper.
First time creating an outline? No worries! The Excelsior Owl has guidance, examples to view, and tips for success.
BUS323 Business Ethics
Module 8 Assignment
Final Research Paper
Ethical Issues in the
Workplace
Recognition, Analysis, and
Resolution
One of the most beneficial exercises in a course exploring ethics is to develop a paper that allows you the opportunity to create connections between your professional view of ethics and applied ethical theories. The nature of ethical decision making is recognition, analysis, and resolution.
Your paper must explore a current ethical issue in your workplace. It can be a current or former employer, or someplace where you have volunteered. Ideally, the issue that you explore is something related to your current or future career.
A few ideas for your consideration:
~ You are responsible for enforcing a physical fitness/readiness standard for your employer. Due to your workplace responding to a catastrophe for the past month, many people have neglected their physical fitness. How do you address the issue of physical fitness when the staff has not had the time to put into it?
~ Your co-worker has been consistently late for the past month unbeknownst to the supervisor. Reporting such behavior could mean that your co-worker is dismissed, or put on a performance improvement plan. Yet, the co-worker is dealing with a personal tragedy because her 5-year-old son was diagnosed with Leukemia. Do you report?
~ You take a new hire on a sales call and meet with an executive at company X, your most important client. While your back is turned to grab something out of your briefcase, the executive fondles the back side of your new employee. What do you do to protect the employee yet preserve the relationship with the client?
This final paper is your opportunity to delve into a topic within the framework of ethics that you find interesting based on your approved topic and thesis statement.
Focus your paper on the connection between your topic and ethics theory. You must use your approved topic. You must use at least two ethical theories in your analysis.
You must support your views. While your opinions are important, they are not enough for a discussion for this type of paper. The academic connections are crucial.
Use your full-sentence outline to build the paper. This creates the blueprint for the final paper.
Your paper must include the following:
Introduction and overview of the ethical issue. Provide a clear description of the topic including all relevant facts (who, what, when, where, and why). This is where your thesis statement resides.
History of an ethical issue in the workplace. Provide a brief background of the organization, description of the dilemma, and justification for why this experience is an ethical dilemma. (Hint: define ethical dilemma, and show how your facts meet the definition).
Academic research on ethical theories, lenses, or models. Include both modern and traditional ethical theories in your analysis.
Explore ramifications of potential solution options based on the ethical theory analysis.
Conclusion; include a final discussion of how you—as a participant in the resolution—would play a role, the personal implications or consequences you may experience, and how you would handle these consequences.
References in APA format. You must cite at least 2 of the sources used in this course. Your references may include academic and trade journals but should not include unverified, non-credible sources such as blogs. You must have a minimum of 5 references.
Your paper should be 5-7 pages in length (not including title and reference pages) and must follow APA guidelines, use Times New Roman, 12-point font, double spacing, with one-inch margins.
