Ethics, Values and Morality

According to Merriam webster.com, Ethics is the rules of behavior that deals with ideas about what is morally good and bad. So basically ethics is the set of rules or moral principles.

The philosophy of morality is ethics that vary on the person or individual view, social involvement, age, cultural group, religion, gender or even education. It is one’s vision of good and bad, it differ on many aspects because each individuals have their own set of principles, and belief of what moral or immoral.

This includes the moral code as our teacher told us in between her lecture “don’t judge onto others what you don’t want others to do onto you”.

As the lesson pulls us further we discuss about virtues, which are the habits  or actions that a person are acceptable to do so, this includes generosity, compassion ,etc.,  these can be associated with ethics as  virtues are behaviors that a person shows or do. Habits may be sometimes considered as bad but it is, for me, based on what habits it may be, for example, being humble, honest, compassionate and kind are actions that always have a positive response to many. Having liking on these habits is not terrible but could even give a person more acquaintances and friends.

 Vices is also part of this, though, on other hand is regard as habits of persons that are unacceptable, such as selfishness, vanity, greedy, envy, anger and much more. Vices are behaviors but the very exact opposite of the first one mentioned, because this behavior contains the darkest side of every person that if shown may result to hatred and negative feedbacks from people around. Showing this kind of actions could garner more foes and fewer allies. Vices are habits, though attach in each and every one of us, should not be tolerated and took a liking upon.

This two habits or behaviors as seen makes up the person’s value or worth, because through a person’s manners and actions one can observe if this person is good enough to hang around or bad enough not to be too close with.

It became much deeper when we discuss about the foundation of ethical behavior which is integrity

the act of a person in accordance to his/her own code of principles, it’s all about respect and consideration to others. However, we all experience times where we lose our integrity, it is in times where we are in pinch, as what our teacher used as an example, if in a situation that you caught close friend cheating on the exam what will you do? This left us confuse especially if you’re a person that believes that cheating is inappropriate, in such conditions you will be torn between following on what you deem is right and right; right, in the sense of ‘spilling the beans’ or protecting your friendship.

Integrity is the foundation of ethical behavior. 

People with integrity act in accordance with their personal principles, they apply the same moral standards in any situation. A person with integrity, Is a person with honor, truthfulness, honesty and uprightness in any place or people they met. 

Lack of integrity appears if you apply moral standards differently according to situation or people involved. For example, saying the dress your friend wore is good to look at even if it’s not, considering her feelings you told her yes even though honestly speaking it’s a no.

 it just goes to show that Ethical problem is not as simple as yes vs. no.

Ethics in Business world, Its Importance...

Ethics is not for personal but also in business world. Globalization today has change the moral view of business or companies in order to gain more profit white lies has become a part of everyday transaction. 

Promoting Good Business is Important per se. the following are the reason as so why it is significant:

• To gain the good will of the community
• To create an organization that operates consistently
• To promote good business practices
• To protect organization/employees from legal action
• To avoid unfavorable publicity

Good ethics program in business could bring out the best in their employees. And to monitor, and provide vision and leadership for business conduct a corporate ethics officer is being appointed that ensures that the ethical program is being followed. Ethical standards are not just set for employees only but also for the board of directors because they oversees the organization’s activities and management so it is important for them to know it for them to be a role model for their subordinates.

Now, it is best for the employees to take ethical training enable for them to be educated and encourages on how to be a responsible worker and how to act ethically, how to treat their co-workers fairly and with respect, to continually improving themselves and others and to work with honestly.

If we talk about ethical standards there is also called:

Code of Ethics

which highlights an organization’s key ethical issues. It aides the employee abide the law and regulation, that are necessary to follow enable for them to behave in an ethical manner. It is a must continually be applied to company’s decision making and emphasized as part of its culture.

Decision Making

In decision making there are also steps to follow.

• Develop problem statement
• Identify alternatives
• Evaluate and choose alternative
• Implement decision
• Evaluate results
• Success

These processes assist to arrive in good results if problems arise. These are also considered as characteristics, which are being follow-up by the four approaches to decision making which consists: virtue ethic approach, utilitarian, fairness and common good. Which focuses on the concern of the communities daily life, choose action that has the best overall consequences, focuses on the fair distribution of benefits and lastly working together for the common set of values and goals.

Ethics In Information Technology

Ethics is also present in Information Technology. As public is concern with ethical use of information technology, this includes, spams, hackers and identity theft, students and plagiarism, downloading in violation of copyright law and many more. People don’t have any idea of the ethical approach in IT, there are doing that are ethical in some way but are also unethical.

It aims to educate people about the impact of ethical issues in the successful and secure use of information technology and etc., thus, In Information technology being ethical is important to secure trust.

So in conclusion, Ethics is the basis may it be personal, in a business or in Information technology, with morality and principles as support being ethical is a good way to live an honest life, or to pursue a successful business and righteous career.

 “if ETHICS is not the engine of success, in the train of growth, it sure is a guard, with a flag, which may be green, or at times red. ”

― Priyavrat Thareja