Ethical decision making in organizations

“Even the most rational approach to ethics is defensless if there isn´t the will to do what is right”

-Alexander Solzhenitsyn

Many times we use our decisions to solve problems, to judge something or someone, to choose between hing etc, but the thing is that many ime we don’t use the right tools or the righ time to make our decision correctly but many times is because we don’t actually know what are the step we need to take. In this blog entry I will explain all about decision making and how sometimes the best option is to make ethical decicions  in an organization.

A significant part of decision making skills is in knowing what good decision techniques to use. One of the most practical decision making techniques are broken down into the following steps:

1. Identify the purpose of your decision.
2. Gather information.
3. Identify the principles to judge the alternatives.
4. Brainstorm and list different possible choices.
5. Evaluate each choice in terms of its consequences.
6. Determine the best alternative.
7. Put the decision into action.
8. Evaluate the outcome of your decision and action steps.

After having the right techniques, here sare some models the give us ideas to follow when we are making decicion making:

·         Rational model: like its name is trying to do what is more rational, what is more logical when it comes down in making a decision, this  model refers to the best decision in maximazion the organizational benefits.

·         Bounded rationality model : assumes that actors

are goal-oriented, but bounded rationality takes into account the cognitive

limitations of decision makers in attempting to achieve those goals. In other words, this means that there is limitation to our rational decision making.

·         Garbage can Model:  explains that sometimes decision in organizations are arbitrary and chaotic, like a garbage can, all mix in one

Now, when it comes down to decision making in an organization, the decision are mainly in the hands of the manager, so it is highly important that our manager fits a good profile when he I taking the decision. He can either be a risk taker meaning, being able to take bigger challenge without being afraid of is out comes because it has higher tolerance to uncertainty or  he can be the total opposite and be a Risk aversion, a more traditional everyday manager.

Ethical Organization
http://www.captainintegrity.com/branding.php

Poor manager!!, can we really put all the weight in his shoulders in the decisions of the organization? …..many times decisions can be made as a group, or as an organization, since most of the tie organizations are run by many people. According to Sin kit, Groups who work together for longer periods of time outperform the more competent members 70% of the time. So many times decisions can be mad with more than one brain. But like most of the things in this world, group decision making has its ups and its downs. Let me exceedingly review its downs, so we ought to make the best choice. The group limits its discussion to only a few alternatives, the group fails to reexamine those alternatives originally disfavored by the majority and the overall result of groupthink is defective decision making.

A factor that influences our decision is ethics. Ethics, refers to standards of behavior that tell us how human beings ought to act in the many situations But should this ethics be used in organizations?

The vast majority of successful organizations believe the high ethical standers and integrity are exceptionally important to long term success.

Making good ethical decisions requires a trained sensitivity to ethical issues and a practiced method for exploring the ethical aspects of a decisions so let’s consider these 3 theories:

·         Consequential Theory. a theory that explains the consequences or results of behavior.

·         Rule-based Theory: this theory that takes a deeper look at the character of the act itself rather than its effects.

·         Character Theory–an ethical theory that emphasizes the character, personal virtues, and integrity of the individual.

How does attribution theory explain mistakes that can be made as managers and employees work together to explain why the problem occurred?

Attribution theory indicates that it is the subjective perception of causality, not necessarily reality, which influences outcome behavior (Heider, 1958; Jones and Davis, 1965; Kelley, 1973; Weiner,1985a, b, 2000; Weiner et al., 1971). The main focus Attributing theory has is that individuals blame  their  performance failure on to other things  and credit themselves  for success  in things. This may ound a very reasonable thing most humans being would do. But it is nt always the best thing to do when we are involved in team work and in an organization, it may cause conflict in groups and organizations.

Now, if a mistake is done in the organization, who is to blames? I think individuals will try to blamed the problem onto others making their hand clean,  because according to the Attribution theory, individuals seek to gain favorable judgments or to avoid unfavorable judgments in the eyes of others specially in the eye of the manager. The most reasonable thing they would do is to blame to those with a higher passion at work then to those with a lower position. I think the solution comes to the individual’s ethics and doing the right thing being to take responsibility for its mistakes and take the blame it is theirs. Our ethical decision making gives make wiser prudential and ethical decisions.


BIBLIO

 

Bryan D. Jones- BOUNDED RATIONALITY.Department of Political Science, University Washington, Seattle, Washington Retrieved from Esmerald.

http://www.unf.edu/~gbaker/Man6204/Decision.PDF

Patricia D. Schwarber- LEADERS AND THE DECISION-MAKING PROCESS ; Kepner-Tregoe, Inc., Princeton, New Jersey, USA Retrieved from Esmerald.

http://www.princeton.edu/~smeunier/JonesBounded1.pdf

Nathan C. Whittier, Scott Williams and Todd C. Dewett EVALUATING ETHICAL DECISION-MAKIN MODELS: a review and application; Raj Soin College of Business, Wright State University, Dayton, Ohio, USA . Retrieved from Esmerald