Understanding Ethical Thinking and Practice in Business - Assessment Task

The Task

Your assessment will take the form of a 3,000 word (you are allowed to go over by 10% making it a maximum of 3,300 words) submission consisting of three parts in total.

You will be expected to show that you understand the importance of individual and organisational ethical thinking and practice and that you can apply ethical decision making. You will also need to show that you can think critically about the role of business in society. Further, you will need to show that you have understand the way in which theory can underpin how ethical issues are viewed, but also that you understand that theory offers a guide but not necessarily the answer to practice. The assessment also requires you to show that you have reflected on what makes an ethical leader and manager and what that means in the context of organisational culture.

An extensive rubric is provided which will show you how the work is marked and what is required to achieve high marks.

Your assessment into two parts with part 1 being further split into two. Read the requirements below and attempt all three parts. You will submit all three parts together in the same submission.

 

You should look at the following cases of businesses that have attracted attention due to some aspect of practice – each will be outlined in a separate case brief on Moodle. You should choose the ONE of these that interests you and complete the following:

Part 1

1. You are required to write a brief report for senior managers at the case of your choosing. This report is written from the perspective of a manager tasked to outline the ethical nature of the case. You will need to explore a number of factors including - Why should this be explored as an ethical question? How might the company want to think about the role of business in society? You will also need to outline who the key stakeholders are and in what way they are affected. You should include research into examples of how ethical choices impact on other companies (e.g where is there research that shows good choices benefit companies and bad choices have a negative impact?). Finally you should conclude with some recommendations for what the company should do

This part of your assessment should be written as a report, but should be referenced in the normal academic way using Harvard citations and referencing.

For this part you should again use your chosen case study – but this time choose TWO ethical theories and demonstrate that you can apply these to the case to show how your chosen theories lead you to a view on the ethics of the case. You should choose theories we have explored in class, but if you have chosen to research a different ethical tradition, for example Islamic ethics, you may use that; it would be useful if you confirm with your tutor if you wish to use an idea not fully covered in class