Ethical Issues Faced By Bridget Donovan: A Case Study Essay.

describes how your ethical standards and ability to solve ethical dilemmas has changed over the semester.

This report is based on the case study on the carrier path of Bridget Donovan. In the career path of the concerned person, there are some ethical issues faced as mentioned in the case study. In this report, the ethical decision model has been used for describing the ethical issues faced by Donovan.

In the childhood, Donovan faced some tragic family issues. She got her first job in an insurance company while studying to complete the IT degree in university. After that she was promoted to middle management and worked for ten years. Then she was moved into a government sector.

In her career, Donovan faced several ethical issues, which have been analysed in this report. The report is about the fact finding behind the issues and suggesting some actions for resolving those issues in some acceptable manner.

The people associated with the ethical dilemmas are employees of the organizations, vendors, customers and  public.

Fraudulent of records

Another department of the organization was providing false invoices to the customers. Donovan was working as a government employee and this type of activities were very embarrassing and against the law.

Vulnerability of database

As per the information given by Jason, there were some vulnerabilities in the database of another department of the organization. This activity was a breach of the Privacy Act 1988.

Constructive Dismissal

The insurance company forced Bridget to resign from her position. There was no chance of providing any fact about her juvenile offence. In this case, the Fair Work Act 2009 was violated.  

Spent Conviction

Bridget was accused for the dishonesty in her working contract. However, as per the Australian law, she has no conviction. The law says if someone convicted as a child then there is no requirement of presenting criminal record. 

Bridget was aware about the fact that the other departments are doing some discrepancies with the public data. Being aware the facts, she did not inform any one regarding this. According to ACS code of professional ethics public interest should be taken into consideration while doing some IT profession. If some works has potential impacts over the public then it must be avoided.

The sales representative of the organizations tried to develop a personal relationship with Bridget to get some favours for the contract regarding the ERP system for the organization. This was an unethical behaviour for the sales representative.

As per the professional ethical standard, it was the duty of Bridget to inform her employer regarding the juvenile. However, the fear of not getting the job resisted her from doing so. However, it was not an ethical decision from the professional viewpoint.

Ethical Issues

When considering the efficiency of developing the ERP system, the reputation of the developer organization were considered. The ACS codes are saying that misinterpretation of the skills and knowledge.

Being aware about the facts regarding the discrepancies, Bridget decided to information a journalist regarding the facts. In this case, this whistle blowing was hampered the reputation of the government organization. Many employees’ professional life was hampered. Considering these facts, the whistleblowing was not ethically correct.

The behaviour of the journalist was not ethical in this case as the activities was not according to the media ethics. The journalist presented the story as a scandal.

Organizational policies and values

When working with an organization, it is the moral responsibilities of the employees to maintain the reputation of the organization. In this case, the disclosure of the information was harmful for the organization. The unethical practices of the employees were also against the values of the organization.  

Scapegoats

After disclosing the information regarding the unethical practices, the people who were blamed for the wrongdoings of other people were the scapegoats. This was very unethical from the context of the ethical standards of workplace.

Malicious gossip

This is not ethical to gossip about the activities of the other employees within  the workplace.in this case Jamie discussed the personal details of Bridget’s past with other employees.

Misleading statement

In this case study, it has been found that Bridget misled Jason to believe that she would act on the report of the database vulnerabilities. She was not able to handle the situation by her own and she was also not supposed to do so. In this case, they should inform the concerned department. Therefore the act performed by Bridget was not ethically correct.

Retribution

While considering the ethical issue regarding the retribution it has been found that Jason was incorrectly reprimanded for not using the chain of command and feeling discouraged at the inaction of his managers, his act of retribution was to contact the media.

Education

This fact is about the high school education. Jason was incorrectly reprimanded for not using the chain of command and feeling discouraged at the inaction of his managers, his act of retribution was to contact the media.

Upbringing

The upbringing of Bridget was very pathetic and unethical also. She was raised by an alcoholic father and her mother died when she was three. She was arrested several times in her teens. These incidents has a bad impact over the later life of her.

	Factor	Issues
1	Vulnerability of database (Legal)	The vulnerabilities regarding the database may be the reason of violation of the public data stored in the database of the organization.
2	Fraudulent of records (Legal)	The fraudulent in billing conducted by Elizabeth was harmful for the public and the reputation organization where the maintenance charges are included in the bills.
3	Constructive Dismissal (Legal)	Bridget was forced to resign from her position for some other references.
4	Spent Conviction (Legal)	Bridget should not be convicted for hiding her conviction details as she was minor at that time.
5	Issues in public interest (Professional)	Bridget did not inform the concerned department regarding the discrepancies done by the other department in the database.
6	Wrong behaviour (Professional)	Roger tried to develop personal contact with Bridget to get the contract of the ERP development.
7	Responsibility of disclosure (Professional)	The details regarding the discrepancies were disclosed to journalist which hampered the reputation of the organisation as well as some employees.
8	Competency (Professional)	The efficiency of the developing the ERP system was decided by the reputation of the developer organizations.
9	Whistleblowing (Professional)	Jason blown the whistle by telling the story to the journalist.
10	Fairness (Professional)	Journalist casts a scandalous light on the story.
11	Organizational policies and values (Employment and Social)	The disclose of the information was done without thinking about the organizational values.
12	Scapegoats (Employment and Social)	Some employees were charged for the wrong doings of other people.
13	Malicious gossip (Employment and Social)	Jamie is discussing Bridget’s private history with staff.
14	Misleading statement (Personal)	Bridget told Jason that she will be able to handle the situation.
15	Retribution (Personal)	Jason was upset and have bad feeling.
16	Education (Intrinsic)	Bridget completed her graduation with honours.
17	Upbringing (Intrinsic)	The hard life experience of Bridget.

Legal and Professional Standards

Table 1: Priority List

The choice ought to be organized around the huge elements that create an outcome in light of a legitimate concern for the general population. As lawful factors dependably take need over everything, they should correct them first where conceivable, and think about alternate factors arranged by significance.

The main lawful issue is that the database powerlessness could affect people in general's protection. As the issue was spilled to the media by Jason, it has now turned into a genuine lawful issue, in spite of the fact that the issue ought to have been redressed, it is currently a need. The office needs to assume liability for the issue and correct the issue guaranteeing that it doesn't occur once more. In this way, they should first fix the issue promptly and set up new measures; these might incorporate settling the storehouse mind set by empowering interdepartmental gatherings, proper administration, arrangements, and methodology. The staff ought to likewise get preparing on moral conduct and the significance of the mission, vision, and qualities. 

The following lawful issue is a fake adulteration of records, for example, wrong charging. This training should stop promptly. The charging practices ought to be conveyed to the consideration of the official in the event that they are not as of now complicit. Arrangement and procedural changes ought to be made to guarantee that the fitting spending plans are subsidized and bolstered by the official. It would likewise be judicious to meet with customers and disclose the progressions to the charging practices to guarantee a legitimate and open win-win relationship. 

The other lawful issues are about Bridget's helpful expulsion and the spent conviction. Bridget may have some legitimate plan of action for the manner by which she was rejected. Be that as it may, the convoluting factors are, to what extent it has been since the expulsion and what the probable implications could be.

 In connection to a portion of alternate elements, Bridget ought to educate administration that there has been wrong conduct for the businessperson.

 As Bridget did not bear the cost of the correct regard to Jason when he utilized the levels of leadership she may profit by facilitate administration preparing. 

Jason may consider changing employments as the report he made was not followed up on, and his notoriety may well have been discoloured among his companions by whistleblowing. It is in all likelihood that the organization and some staff routinely act deceptively. 
Discussion

Priority List

While breaking down Bridget's conduct, her initial life and childhood have significantly affected her moral judgment. In the ethical establishment's hypothesis created by Jonathan Haig and partners, he guesses the six natural good points of view. Bridget has been on the negative side of huge numbers of these points of view. In her first part with the insurance agency, she picked not to enlighten them concerning her criminal past; she was not legitimately obliged to, and this left her in a morally traded off circumstance. 

When it went to the charging issue, it appears Bridget had taken after the dishonest basic practice potentially trusting she was making the best choice. As Elizabeth and other undertaking administrators were likewise associated with the training, there is prove that they might be thoughtlessly following the gathering think instead of testing deceptive conduct.

A few elements consolidated conveyed Jason to the point where he wound up displeased and felt dismissed by his bosses. He at that point settled on some nonsensical choices which would demonstrate that there was a fundamental absence of help in the office. It is a central need of an individual to feel upheld and needed.

Conclusions on Analysis

Utilizing the EDM has empowered the moral difficulty to be separated and organized to guarantee that components are considered arranged by need and that people in general intrigue is dependably put first. It has likewise enabled the idea of the issues to be examined giving understanding in the matter of how the issues happened. The objective of the EDM is to dissect the circumstance, redress it rapidly and inside the best enthusiasm of all partners with negligible effect, and afterward to gain from the circumstance and set up measures to decrease the shot of the same or comparative circumstances reoccurring. This course is about the analysis of ethical issues in the career of an IT professional. While working as an IT professional, individuals should maintain certain ethical facts. The ACS code of ethics has several code of ethics for the ICT professionals. It has been understood the different types of issue associated with the working life of an ICT professional. This will help the learner to lead a good professionalism in my future life as an ICT professional. In order to maintain the ethical issues associated to this working field, the understanding of the ACS code is very important. This course helped me a lot to understand the different types of laws and ethics mentioned in the ACS code of ethics.

The application of the EDM model for the analysis of the IT ethics is another important factor learnt in this course. I can say from my personal viewpoint that only theoretical study is not enough to understand all the facts and figures associated with the IT ethics, the study of the practical case study is very helpful for this purpose. In this report, the analysis of the case study helped me to understand and analyse the practical field of the IT with the help of the ethical theories and frameworks. 

I have learnt how to apply the theories in different types of ethical issues that may be raised in the workplace of the ICT professionals. In the workplace, the behaviour of the employees with the management and the other employees is very important for marinating the workplace ethics. Through the study of this course, I have learnt the different types of ethical considerations regarding the workplace behaviour.

Sometimes it is important to disclose the information regarding the ethical discrepancies within the workplace but it should be done in an ethical way. The concerned person need to think about the well beings of the organization as well as the associated people. I have learnt that the IT professionals are responsible for thinking about the issues of public interests. In some cases, the activities of the IT professional have some major impact over the common public. In these types of cases, the activities may not be considered as ethically correct if those have the negative impact over the public.

I have also learnt about the ethical issues associated with the information hiding from the management of the workplaces. In some cases, people used to hide some information regarding the personal background due to the fear of not getting the job. After analysing and understanding the case study of Bridge Donovan, I have understood that hiding any information from the employer is not an ethical behaviour.

It is very important to be aware about the laws and ethics regarding the professionalism for being not accused wrongly by the employers. This course study is also helpful for this fact. I have learnt that the accusing of Bridge by her employer was ethically wrong. There are some ethical factors that should be maintained by the management of the organization. This will help me to protect myself in my professional life.

The main need which is related to the need of ethics in technology is directly related to the aspect of the data security. In most of the technology it can be stated that security of the data which is involved play a very vital role. The ethical aspect which can be related restriction of the intruders who directly want to indulge into the data. The privacy aspect of the data can be directly connected to the ethics in technology. The privacy aspect can be directly related to the securing of the personal data of the customer or the user who is indulged into the concept of the technology. The privacy aspect of the technology can be considered as one of the most ethical parts in technology.

Risk of the technology can be directly related to the loss of the personal data of the user. In most of the cases it is seen that loss of data can be considered as very much crucial for the user due to the factor that the data can be used in many areas which can affect the life of the common people.

The main competence of the ethical technology is in the sector of the issue which is related to the judgment of the scenario of the availability of the technology. The technology should be very much available in different scenario so that it does not affect the different functionality of the technology and on the other hand impact the life of the common people.

1. The technology involves the security of the data
2. The technology is user friendly
3. The technology involves different aspects of interaction
4. The technology should be available for access at any time and from anywhere.
5. The technology should be highly secured
6. The updating of the technology should be easily available.

The main content which is related to the ACS code of ethics mainly involve the following points

The primacy of the public interest: The interest of the public or customer should be upmost propriety.

The enhancement of the quality of the life: The enhancement of the quality of the life should be done by the work.

Honesty: Level of honesty should be there in work

Competence: The work of the stakeholders should be done competently.

Professional development: Enhancement of the quality of the people.

Professionalism: You will enhance the integrity of the ACS code of ethics.

The main issue which is majorly seen in the information age is the aspect of the data availability. For example in the concept of the cloud computing. The data are stored in the server of the cloud providers. In most of the times it can be stated that the data would be directly available but sometimes it can be stated that the data are not available due to some problem in different linking areas. This can be very much problematic due to the factor that it would be directly involving risk factor for the people who store the data in the concept of the servers. The security issue can also be part of the problem as it includes different area of working.

The concept of thinking machine can be considered as an area which mainly include the learning aspect of the machine. It can be stated here that the data which is fed into the system would be directly helping the aspect of the learning for the system. In most of the situation it can be stated that the data which is fed into the system directly helps the machine to learn and make appropriate decisions related to the data. It can be stated that the concept is directly linked to the aspect of the artificial intelligence and in the near future it can be stated that it would be playing a role in the sector of identification of fraud activity.

The main factor which can be stated in context of the common dominator is the working of the principles which are related to the security of the data. Most of the time in any type of technology the security of the data play a very vital role which directly enhances the security of the data in the technology. In most of the times the user or the customers should have a precise knowledge of the involvement of the technology and how it can be implemented into the framework of the data. The customer should be very much aware of the different technological risk factors so that they could directly involve into the working of the internal as well as external concept of the technology.

The concept of the artificial intelligence can be directly related to the aspect of the data which is stored in the concept of the machine and how the machine would be learning from the data. The most important factor which play a role in the concept is that the data is fed into the system or the machine and the leaning aspect of the system and the machine would be done according to the requirement of the system.

Human potential can be directly related to the learning of the machine and how the machine would be learning form the different data which is fed in by human activity and how they would be directly benefiting from the concept.  

References:

Al-Saggaf, Y., Burmeister, O. K., & Schwartz, M. (2017). Qualifications and ethics education: the views of ICT professionals. Australasian Journal of Information Systems, 21.

Bastos-Filho, C. J., & Guimarães, A. C. (2015). Multi-objective fish school search. International Journal of Swarm Intelligence Research (IJSIR), 6(1), 23-40.

Bayer, R., Santelli, J., & Klitzman, R. (2015). New challenges for electronic health records: confidentiality and access to sensitive health information about parents and adolescents. Jama, 313(1), 29-30.

Burmeister, O. K. (2017). Professional ethics in the information age. Journal of Information, Communication and Ethics in Society, 15(4), 348-356.

Carroll, A. E. (2015). How health information technology is failing to achieve its full potential. JAMA pediatrics, 169(3), 201-202.

Davis, S., Palmer, L., & Etienne, J. (2018). The geography of digital literacy: Mapping communications technology training programs in Austin, Texas. In Information and Technology Literacy: Concepts, Methodologies, Tools, and Applications(pp. 1766-1780). IGI Global.

Ferguson, S., Thornley, C., & Gibb, F. (2016). Beyond codes of ethics: how library and information professionals navigate ethical dilemmas in a complex and dynamic information environment. International Journal of Information Management, 36(4), 543-556.

Glosoff, H. L., Renfro-Michel, E., & Nagarajan, S. (2016). Ethical issues related to the use of technology in clinical supervision. Using technology to enhance clinical supervision, 31-46.

Hesse, B. W., Ahern, D., & Beckjord, E. (2016). Oncology informatics: Using health information technology to improve processes and outcomes in cancer. Academic Press.

Hoffmann, A. L. (2017). Beyond distributions and primary goods: Assessing applications of rawls in information science and technology literature since 1990. Journal of the Association for Information Science and Technology, 68(7), 1601-1618.

Hoffmann, R., Kabanov, A. A., Golov, A. A., & Proserpio, D. M. (2016). Homo citans and carbon allotropes: for an ethics of citation. Angewandte Chemie International Edition, 55(37), 10962-10976.

Jacob, J. A. (2015). GAO Issues Report on Health Information Interoperability. Jama, 314(18), 1906-1906.

Jannah, R., Handajani, L., & Firmansyah, M. (2018). The Influence of Human Resources, Use of Information Technology and Public Participation to the Transparancy and Accountability of Village Financial Management. International Journal of Scientific Research and Management, 6(5).

Joy, M., Clement, T., & Sisti, D. (2016). The ethics of behavioral health information technology: frequent flyer icons and implicit bias. Jama, 316(15), 1539-1540.

McDermid, D. (2015). Ethics in ICT: an Australian perspective. Pearson Higher Education AU.

Moy, M. (2016). Evaluating Federal Information Technology Program Success Based on Earned Value Management.

Nath, P. A., & Sharp, C. D. (2015). A user-centered design approach to information sharing for older patients and their families. JAMA internal medicine, 175(9), 1498-1499.

Percac-Lima, S., Ashburner, J. M., Zai, A. H., Chang, Y., Oo, S. A., Guimaraes, E., & Atlas, S. J. (2016). Patient navigation for comprehensive cancer screening in high-risk patients using a population-based health information technology system: a randomized clinical trial. JAMA internal medicine, 176(7), 930-937.

Perlin, J. B. (2016). Health information technology interoperability and use for better care and evidence. Jama, 316(16), 1667-1668.

Platt, R., Kass, N. E., & McGraw, D. (2014). Ethics, regulation, and comparative effectiveness research: time for a change. Jama, 311(15), 1497-1498.

Santos, C., Ferreira, A. D. C. S., Marques, R. P. F., & do Carmo Azevedo, G. M. (2018). EAGLE_Index: Enhancement of an Accountability Guide for Learning E-Government. In Handbook of Research on Modernization and Accountability in Public Sector Management (pp. 103-129). IGI Global.

Schwalbe, K. (2015). Information technology project management. Cengage Learning.

Thomas, G., Burmeister, O. K., & Low, G. (2017). Issues of Implied Trust in Ethical Hacking. In Proceedings of The 28th Australasian Conference on Information Systems, December(pp. 4-6).

Valacich, J., & Schneider, C. (2015). Information Systems Today: Managing in a Digital World Plus MyMISLab with Pearson eText--Access Card Package. Prentice Hall Press.

Venables, A. T., Tan, G., & Pradhan, S. (2014). A collaborative framework for a cross-institutional assessment to shape future IT professionals. Issues in Informing Science and Information Technology, 11, 215-223.

Wang, Z. (2015). Iron-polyphenol Complex Nanoparticles Synthesized by Plant Leaves and Their Application in Environmental Remediation (Doctoral dissertation, University of South Australia).

Warren, M., & Lucas, R. (2016). Ethics and ICT: Why all the fuss?. Journal of Information, Communication and Ethics in Society, 14(2), 167-169.