Hartman 5e Accessible PPT Ch02-1

Chapter Two:
Ethical Decision
Making: Personal
and Professional
Contexts
Copyright © 2021 McGraw-Hill Education. All rights reserved. No reproduction or distribution without the prior written consent of McGraw-Hill Education.
Chapter Objectives
After reading this chapter, you will be able to:
• Describe a process for ethically responsible decision making.

• Apply this model to ethical decision points.
• Explain the reasons why "good" people might engage in unethical behavior.
• Explore the impact of managerial roles on the nature of our decision
making.
Ethical Decision Making 1
It is very important to know who you are. To make decisions. To

show who you are.
Malala Yousafzai
A Decision-Making Process for Ethics 1
An initial sketch of an ethical decision-making process.

• The first step is to determine the facts of the situation.
• Perceptual differences surrounding how individuals experience and
understand situations can explain many ethical disagreements in a situation.
(Understand your own framework)
• An ethical judgment made in light of a diligent determination of the facts is a
more reasonable ethical judgment than one made without regard for the facts.
• A second step requires the ability to recognize an ethical decision or an
ethical issue—then identify the ethical issues involved.
• The first and second steps may arise in reverse order in some circumstances.
• Economic decisions and ethical decisions are not mutually exclusive.
• An ethical decision should be made based on how it would affect the well-being
of all the people involved. (Who are the stakeholders?)
• Some call the inability to recognize ethical issues as normative myopia, or

shortsightedness about values. (Always ask is there a moral dilemma?)
• Others warn of inattentional blindness, which is a result of focusing on too
narrow a range of questions.
• When we focus on the wrong thing or fail to focus, we may fail to see key
information that will lead us to success or prevent unethical behavior.
• Change blindness occurs when gradual change goes unnoticed over time.
(VUCA)
Third step is to identify and to consider all of the people affected

by a decision, the people often called stakeholders.
• Many perspectives and interests at stake means that ethical decisions often
involve conflicts and dilemmas.
Figure 2.1: Stakeholder Map
The third step involved in ethical decision making

requires decision makes to identify and to consider all of
the people affected by a decision, the people often called
stakeholders.
Access the text alternative for slide image.
An Ethical Decision-Making Process 1
• Determine the facts.

• Identify the ethical issues involved.
• Identify stakeholders and consider the situation from their
point of view.
• Consider the available alternatives—also called using moral
imagination.
An Ethical Decision-Making Process 2
Compare and weigh the alternatives, based on:
• Consequences (for all stakeholders).

• Duties, rights, principles.
• Implications for personal integrity and character.
Make a decision.
Monitor and learn from the outcomes.
The fourth step is to consider the available alternatives.

• When facing an ethical decision, moral imagination is the ability to
envision various alternative choices, consequences, resolutions, benefits,
and harms.
The fifth step in the decision-making process is to compare and

weigh the alternatives on each stakeholder you defined.
• The point of this exercise is to recognize that a responsible and ethical
decision should be explainable, defensible, and justifiable to all
stakeholders involved.
• Some alternatives might concern principles, rights, or duties that override
consequences.
• Decision making requires consideration of the effects of a decision on one’s
own integrity, virtue, and character.
Once the variables are explored, the sixth step is to make a

decision.
• Making a decision in business usually means formulating a plan and
carrying it out.
The final step is to evaluate the implications of the decisions, to

monitor and learn from the outcomes, and to modify actions
accordingly when faced with future similar challenges.
On an important decision one rarely has 100% of the information

needed for a good decision no matter how much one spends or how
long one waits. And, if one waits too long, he has a different
problem and has to start all over. This is the terrible dilemma of the
hesitant decision maker.
Robert Greenleaf
When Ethical Decision Making Fails 1
Some stumbling blocks to responsible decision making are

intellectual or cognitive.
• Ignorance.
• Considering only limited alternatives.
• Finding comfort in simplified decision rules.
• Selecting the alternative that satisfies the minimum decision criteria, also
known as satisficing.
When Ethical Decision Making Fails 2
Other stumbling blocks to decision making are more a question

of motivation and willpower.
• Sometimes it is easier to do the wrong thing.
• Sometimes people make decisions that they regret later because they lack
the courage to do otherwise at the time.
• Courage is also needed when responding to peer pressure.
There are two kinds of people, those who do the work and those
who take the credit. Try to be in the first group; there is less
competition there.
Indira Gandhi
Ethical Decision Making in Managerial Roles
Within a business setting, individuals must consider the ethical
implications of both personal and professional decision
making.
Some of our roles are social and some roles are institutional.
• Social roles are friend, son or daughter, spouse, citizen, neighbor.
• Institutional roles are employees, managers, employees, parents, children,
professor, and president of a student club.
Managers, executives, and board members have the ability to

create and shape the organizational context in which all
employees make decisions.
• They have a responsibility to encourage ethical behavior and discourage
unethical behavior.

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Chapter Two:

• Describe a process for ethically responsible decision making.

It is very important to know who you are. To make decisions. To

An initial sketch of an ethical decision-making process.

• Some call the inability to recognize ethical issues as normative myopia, or

Third step is to identify and to consider all of the people affected

The third step involved in ethical decision making

• Determine the facts.

Compare and weigh the alternatives, based on:

• Consequences (for all stakeholders).

Monitor and learn from the outcomes.

The fourth step is to consider the available alternatives.

The fifth step in the decision-making process is to compare and

Once the variables are explored, the sixth step is to make a

The final step is to evaluate the implications of the decisions, to

On an important decision one rarely has 100% of the information

Some stumbling blocks to responsible decision making are

Other stumbling blocks to decision making are more a question

Managers, executives, and board members have the ability to

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