Ethical and Social Responsibilities of Business

Ethical and Social Responsibilities of Business Objective Examine the meaning of ethics in business. Discussion Overview This discussion forum explores business ethics and social responsibility. Deliverables Step 1 Choose two (2) of the following ethical dilemmas to discuss and post your thoughts about them. Please bear in mind that it's usually safest to do the "right" thing, but ethics also contains many gray areas, and there's not always a clear decision. Also, for purposes of this assignment, making a riskier decision should not adversely affect your grade, since your instructor grades your post and response based upon quality, not content. (These hypothetical scenarios are adapted from corporateinsights.com and americanbar.org.) Scenario A. You’re about ready to sign a big new client to a contract worth over $50,000. Your boss is under a lot of pressure to increase sales. He calls you into his office and tells you his job is on the line, and he asks you to include the revenue for your contract in the sales figures for the quarter that ends tomorrow. You know the contract is a sure thing but the client is out of town and cannot possibly sign by tomorrow. What do you do and why? B. The manufacturing cost of the widgets your company makes has dropped by 50%. One of your customers, Sam, tells you he knows this because he is best friends with your company’s VP of production and asks you for a discount on his order. Your boss okays the discount. Your other customer, Sue (who is one of your best friends and knows nothing about the drop in manufacturing costs), places the exact same order for widgets as Sam. Do you offer her a similar discount? Do you tell her about the drop in manufacturing costs? Explain. C. Company policy forbids co-workers to become romantically involved. You go to the same church as someone from another department, and you find yourself becoming attracted to this person. Do you pursue the relationship? D. You are negotiating a contract to sell a parcel of property, and in this particular state and county, it is customary for the seller to pay the closing costs. After some back and forth discussion, a buyer tenders you with a signed contract offer. You like the price and want to accept the contract, but before doing so, you change one term, specifying that the other party (the buyer) will pay closing costs. You then sign and return it to the other party without mentioning the change. The buyer does not notice the new term and signs. Did you act unethically? Why or why not? E. One of the newest salespeople in your division is a real goof-off, never showing up for work on time, distracting other people with his antics and so on. You complain about him to your boss, who tells you the kid is the son of the company president. Your boss instructs you not only to leave the new guy alone but also to make his sales numbers look good by throwing him some no-brainer accounts. What do you do?