Excelsior BUS323 Module 3 Learning Community Latest 2021 April

BUS323 Business Ethics

Module 3 Learning Community

"Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it."

- George Santayana

One reason business students look at history and case studies is the chance to reflect on the facts of the case, determine the causes of a (regrettable) action, and through analysis make a recommendation regarding the policies and procedures that would have prevented such a disaster. To start the course, we will look at the 2007-2009 financial disaster. The actions leading up to the crises were not illegal at the time. Yet, in retrospect, they were unethical because the actions were unfair, lacked accountability and transparency, and held few responsible for any negative outcomes.

Financial institutions in the U.S. had governmental pressure to provide loans to potential homeowners. That pressure was intense enough such that lenders were lax on determining whether the borrowers could pay back those loans. At the same time, the availability of mortgages led to an increase in the cost of real estate, leading many investors to choose real estate investment funds. Typically, there are agencies that value all types of investment funds to determine the safety of the funds. Those rating agencies and government regulators did not assess the risk in these shady loans.

Here is a brief video to explain what happened next:

For our first discussion, pick one of the following roles from the 2007-9 financial crises described in the articles below. Also, be sure to review the lecture posted below by your instructor.

Mortgage Lender (Links to an external site.)

The 49-year-old mother of two became a face of housing-crisis misdeeds when the Justice Department pursued civil-fraud charges against her for her work at Countrywide Financial Corp.

Manager-Real Estate Securities Investment Firm (Links to an external site.)

Why only one top banker went to jail for the financial crisis.

Director-Security Risk Rating Firm  (Links to an external site.)

Your chosen role in the title of your post.

The ethical dilemma, or values conflict, your role faced in the 2008 crisis.

The values lacking in your role’s organization that would have led to a comprehensive analysis of the risks associated with the bad practices.

Identify the stakeholders from your point of view, and the way those stakeholders will influence your decisions on how to resolve any dilemma.

Talk about the role of conformity bias in your chosen organization and other external influences on your role in decision making in your organization.

Be sure to provide a citation at the end of your initial post.

Post your primary response on the discussion board. Be sure to review your writing for grammar and spelling before posting. Read any postings already provided by your instructor or fellow students. See the Discussion Rubric for how you will be evaluated for this activity. You are also expected to read the responses to your original posts, and if a classmate raises a question or an issue that warrants a response, you are expected to respond.

Reply to one of each of the roles above (Lender, manager, director). In your reply, consider any items missed by the original post from the list above. Also, discuss which of your personal values would have prevented the crises, and which what blind spots you may have had.

Your responses to the discussion questions should relate the assigned readings and viewings to the discussion topic and should not consist only of personal opinion. Your opinion is important to the discussion, but you should add connections to the material to support your views. Without a foundation in the literature, your opinion has little professional value. For example, "Based on Trevino and Nelson's stance that cultural relativism creates an environment where unethical behavior is justified through the cultural discourse (year, P#), the discussion should center around....". This type of statement allows you to connect your views to the literature. This is possible even when you are providing personal examples.