Handling Ethical Issues in Business

A careful analysis of businesses today will clearly show that the are faced With numerous challenges. In recent times the have been disturbing trends of business scandals in which companies are reported to have violated the rules or standard of generally accepted behavior in the society. In some instances company's finance have been doctored in a bid to manipulate balance sheet. Toxic waste have been unhealthy channeled into flowing rivers, gas flaring by oil exploration firms, discrimination and nepotism, these unethical actions are carried out knowingly or unknowingly by various stakeholders in business in an effort to make profits or increase market shares.

Business ethics is the application of ethical behavior in a business context. The are rules and principles that define right and wrong conduct. Knowing right from wrong determines a manager ethical intelligence.

A lot of effort has been made to curb un ethical behavior and indiscipline in organizations and society by different heads of state in Nigeria but their efforts have significantly not yielded tangible results. In 1984 General Muhammadu Buhari came up with a decree on war against indiscipline (WAI) instituted to put an end to unethical behavior in both public and private Nigerian organization. Similarly after the return of civil rule in 1999, president Obasanjo led federal government established the independent corrupt practice commission (ICPC) and also the Economic and financial crimes commission (EFCC) in a bid to tackle corruption in the public and private sector.

ETHICAL PROBLEMS IN BUSINESS

1. Human resources ethical problems which relate to equitable and just treatment of current and potential employees.

2. Ethical problems arising from conflict of interest - in this instance individuals or organizations are given special treatment because of some personal relationship with person or group that is making the decision

3. Ethical problems that involves customers confidence, with companies behaving in ways that shows lack of respect for customers or lack of concern for public safety.

4. Ethical problems surrounding the use of corporate resources by employees i.e employees who makes private phone calls at work, use of company facilities for private aggrandizement.

Often times, it becomes difficult to have common grounds about what is right and wrong because people tend to define what is right or wrong based on the angle that affects them, but each individual in organization must critically look at ethical matters by answering the following questions - Can I take personal email and phone calls at work? What do I do if I discover that a co-worker is commiting fraud?

BUILDING ETHICAL BEHAVIOR IN YOUR ORGANIZATION..

1. The selection process of bringing new employees into the organization should be viewed as an opportunity to learn about individual level of moral development and personal values

2. A code of ethics should be develop to guide the behavior of members of the organization and rules that will guide managers in handling Ethical dilemma in decision making.

3. Top management leadership should be committed to ethical behavior since the cultural tone for an organization is establish by top managers.