This Business School Believes That Ethical Leadership Is Impossible in a Shareholder Focused Econom

APPENDIX A

In the class debate concerning the argument “This Business School believes that ethical leadership is impossible in a shareholder focused economy” surrounding Mike, Jan, Mei Hua and Deshi. The group representing Mike thinks that he is against the argument, similarly with Jan group. The basis for that claim for mike group believes that an organization ethical behavior is set by the top management and if the action of the top management is unethical or ethical, the whole company will follow suit (Hodgins & Shrives, 2015), which uses rule utilitarian to prove it and placing him at stage 4 of Kohlberg moral development. I would disagree with them on the placement of mike on the Kohlberg stage as I feel that he should be place in stage 5 instead as he will go against his believe when it matter his daughter by participating in a riot.

Next, the group that represent Jan have an interesting idea that she is egoistic despite her goodwill effort due to the fact that they feel that she is forcing the employee, especially the newly graduate manager to donate their free time to her charity program.  I do not completely disagree with their view, but the basis of their claim is that the employees is unwilling to put in their donation which result in their contribution made only on the self-interest on Jan, whereas if the employee put in their donation willingly, then all of them are following the utilitarian approach of acting on the greater good (Brusseau, 2015). But, despite the different take on the normative ethical action (Brusseau, 2015), she should be place in stage 6 in Kohlberg theory for her involvement in providing educational facilities and teaching businesses to manage their businesses which help create job opportunity.

All the group had a diversify thought on Mei Hua ethical action and standing. Where they are some group who think that she is a stage 1 consequential person and other group that think she is a Kantian that should be place on stage 4. Different thinking comes from the fact that she is completely fine with avoiding tax as long as she is within the legal boundary. She also feels that shareholder money being used for marketing is perfectly fine because it is link to charities activities. Due to her believe that strong code of conduct and rules are important in moral and ethical businesses, my view on her are that she is a Kantian acting on duties as she define ethical leadership as the moral obligation to follow code of conduct and rule, which point her to disagreeing with the argument presented that ethical leadership is impossible (Crane & Matten, 2010).

Deshi is at first glance a very straightforward and practical character, and the groups view him as an egoistic person who disregard business ethic and think it is a waste of time and wish for the teaching of ethic to be remove from his course while blaming it to be hindering his dream of a nice safe office job. His ethical viewpoint is as such that he views code of conduct is a waste of time when profit and market share are more important. Which made it very clear as well that Deshi is at a stage 1 of Kohlberg moral development.

Finally, Code of Corporate Governance can be understood as how a business is controlled and directed. It represents the value framework, the ethical framework and the moral framework under which business decisions are taken. Examples of value that are followed are transparency, accountability and responsibilities. While clearly Mike approved of this theory as well as Jan, Mei Hua can be understood as going for CGOG as well despite her somewhat toeing the line kind of behavior. Deshi is the only one that is against COCG as morals, ethics and value are not important in regards to profits. My personal opinion of COCG is that while a lack of COCG will lead to questionable corporate practices or even failure, it is not an absolute guarantee that a business would not fail if they have COCG in place.

APPENDIX A END – WORD COUNT: 685

APPENDIX A REFERENCE:

Hodgins, M., & Shrives, P. (2015). dawsonera : Home. Dawsonera.com. Retrieved 8 August 2015, from https://www.dawsonera.com/readonline/9781780867045/startPage/8

Brusseau, J. (2015). Business ethics. lardbucket. Retrieved 8 August 2015, from http://2012books.lardbucket.org/pdfs/business-ethics.pdf

Crane, A., & Matten, D. (2010). Business ethics. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Nainawat, R., & Meena, R. (2015). Corporate Governance and Business Ethics. http://www.ripublication.com/gjmbs.htm. Retrieved 8 August 2015, from http://www.ripublication.com/gjmbs_spl/gjmbsv3n10_08.pdf

APPENDIX B

The Holiday debate comprise of four main stakeholders, Borries, his manager, his girlfriend Swee Lan and his friend and colleague Marcus. The main dilemma that intertwine those character appear when one month prior to the planned trip to Borries girlfriend country to eventually meet her parent. His manager informs him that his client has bought forward a product launch which duration falls in the middle his trip. Borries is then face with a dilemma to either cancel his holiday plan and concentrate on his client, or go ahead with his planed trip.    

Eventually, he chosen to cancel the trip and work on his client. And we will touch on the dilemma created by his choice so as to further look upon the main party I am going to talk about, Marcus.

Borries, by making a choice of cancelling the trip, have resolved his own dilemma. But he created a dilemma for his girlfriend and colleague. Apart from upsetting Swee Lan and her family for cancelling the trip, he also creates tension between him and his colleague. And the main concern of Marcus is on him raising the standard for of his colleague as well as changing the cultural of their department.

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