Ethical Dilemma 3

1. The above case is about conflict of interest in workplace. The ethical dilemma occurs to Jayla who is
an intern at Acme Incorporated in the Payroll department. She finds out that there is abnormalities
in salesperson’s salary. The head of Payroll Department Deon was favoring one of the salesperson,
Greg who also happens to be his brother-in-law. Deon was providing top clients to Greg whereas
other salesperson were not receiving good client and had lower pay checks. Now Jayla was in
dilemma on what decisions to be made.

A conflict of interest arises when an individual finds himself or herself occupying two social roles
simultaneously which generate opposing benefits or loyalties. Similarly here Deon’s conflict of
interest has affected salespeople, organization culture and other stakeholders. We can take example
of Enron scandal which not only affected all the employees but also affected stakeholders due to
conflict of interest. Arthur Andersen was serving as both consultant and auditor to Enron and was
helping the firm create off-the-books accounting practices and Enron was later declared bankrupt
after disclosing unethical accounting practices.

Similarly, in this case the head of Payroll Department, Deon favoring Greg has affected the moral of
other salesperson in the company. The organization culture is also affected by such biasness
towards a single salesperson, the company has mentioned about fair practices among sales force
but the actual practice was different from the standard practice. Stakeholders are affected as well
due to such unethical practices as organization will lose its credibility, general morale and
productivity which will then sway investors to choose one company over another.

2. Here Jayla can either be quiet and not mention about the issue or tell everyone about the issue and
the best decision would be that she should inform about the issue to General Manager Mia and also
inform the issue to other salespeople as well so that such matters will be settled within the
company. Informing only General Manager would probably not solve the problem as other
salespeople will be unaware about the actual practice happening in the organization. Informing
other salespeople will aware them about the issue and they could even sue the company if the issue
is not settled properly. By doing so Jayla could lose her internship and job offer after graduation, she
could also receive bad evaluation of her internship at the company. Deon and Greg could also be
fined for their unethical behavior and if the management only fires Jayla and did nothing with Deon
and Greg then other salespeople could sue the management and take this case to the court.

3. The key thing to consider with a conflict of interest is disclosure. If disclosed beforehand, and the
person is given the approval to continue, then the conflict of interest is not a problem – and
consequently legal. However, if the conflict of interest activity was disapproved and the individual
continued despite this, or never was it disclosed in the first place, it could be considered illegal. Here
in this case looks like Deon has not disclosed anyone about Greg being his brother-in-law and hence
favoring him more than other salespeople. It is illegal to favor someone in such a way that violates
company policies and creating illegal discrimination in the workplace. Deon and Greg could be sued
by other employees for violating company policies and promoting nepotism in the workplace.
Reference

[ CITATION Ind19 \l 1033 ]

Wessel, H. (2004, Feb 25). Ethics experts say conflicts of interest affect all employees. Knight
Ridder Tribune Business News Retrieved from https://www.proquest.com/docview/462839206?
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