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OGL 481 Pro-Seminar I:

PCA: Ethical Frame Worksheet

Jamey Taft

Arizona State University

October 3, 2021
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OGL 481 Pro-Seminar I:

PCA-Ethical Communities Worksheet
Worksheet Objectives:
1. Describe the four ethical communities
2. Apply the ethical communities to your personal case situation

Complete the following making sure to support your ideas and cite from the textbook and other

course materials per APA guidelines. After the peer review, you have a chance to update this and

format for your Electronic Portfolio due in Module 6.

1) Briefly restate your situation from Module 1 and your role.

My current role is a reservation specialist, I take calls to facilitate revenue and schedule services.

I also aim to solve issues before they need management intervention. My situation involves

coworkers who do not align with the company values and the lack of boundaries when it comes

to managing issues that arise between coworkers. Another big issue related is not having the

proper channels of support for reporting misconduct.

2) Describe how the ethics of the organization influenced the situation.

Ethics is fundamental within this organization. They take pride in doing what is right by their

customers and their employees. They believe in a high level of care with every situation to the

point of one of the values being “360 degrees of care.” However, with the situation that I

experienced they went very against what they preach. To start, one of the ethical communities is

Human Resources.
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My organization did not have a human resources department, and when questioned they

stated they never had an HR department. When I went to management with my concerns they

were unprofessional in a sense that they did not hold my concerns privately and did not try to

bring solutions or reason with my concern. This uncovered a greater structural issue in not

having a formal problem solving system in place to protect employees or the business.

3) Recommend how you would apply one of the ethical communities for an alternative

course of action regarding your case.

The ethical community needed in this scenario is a Human Resources Department.

Human resources is an ethical guideline specifically designed to unite the organization with

their teams. Human resources empowers their teams to do better and gives them a safe space

to troubleshoot issues without the fear of retaliation.

With the situation I experienced, if I were the leader of this company I would invest in an

experienced human resources leader to establish and re-educate the staff on what it means to be

apart of the organization. I would implement new policies that enforce new code of ethics that

follows the companies pre-existing mission statement. I would establish guidelines for proper

reporting and ways to bring issues to HR with confidentiality guaranteed. I would then find ways

to unite the teams teams through fun team development practices.

Reflect on what you would do or not do differently given what you have learned

about ethics.

With the position I am currently in, as someone not in management I did the best I could

considering the issues I faced without support. When hired, I was told how to go about the issues
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to seek resolution, by reporting it to my manager. When I went this route, there was no one to

help me establish boundaries or even mediate the situation. I went to management who are

supposed to help with conflict resolution and I stayed professional and curtious throughout the

whole situation. As someone who wants to be a leader some day, I have learned a lot through

this experience and would not wish for it to happen to anyone.

I truly do feel failed by this company and it is a level of injustice that I think needs a lot

of work. While I am still trying to figure out my next steps, ethical communities is something

that I will be considering in the search of my next job.

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Reference

Bolman, L. G., & Deal, T. E. (2017). Reframing organizations: Artistry, choice, and
leadership (6th ed.). San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass