Week 1: Bad Apples, Bad cases, Bad barrels Flashcards
What is unethical intention
one’s willingness or commitment to engage in an unethical behavior
What are bad apples, bad cases and bad barrels?
Bad apples = individuals
Bad cases = ethical issue itself
bad barrels = organizational environment
What are the 5 stages of cognitive moral development?
1 = obedience and avoiding punishment
2 = acting in own self-interest
3 = expectations of peers and significant others
4 = policies and rules including the law stages
5 = principled, individuals cognitively process ethical dilemmas by using sophisticated reasoning
What is idealism and what is relativism?
idealism = one’s concern for the welfare of others
relativism = one’s emphasis on moral principles being situationally determined rather than universal
What is moral intensity (6)? OR what are the moral issue characteristics?
(1) Magnitude of consequences (total harm)
(2) Social consensus (degree of peer agreement that action is wrong)
(3) Probability of effect (how likely is harm)
(4) Temporal immediacy (time between choice and harm)
(5) Proximity
(6) Concentration of effect
Which individual characteristics for antecedents of unethical choices in the workplace matter most and what, surprisingly, does not matter?
- Psychological, individual differences (CMD, idealism, relativism, machiavellianism, locus of control)
- Demographics are unimportant
What are the 3 components of organizational environment characteristics in researching unethical behavior and intention?
- Ethical climate
- Ethical culture
- Code of Conduct
What individual factors are important in explaining unethical behavior? (5)
CMD
Machiavellianism
locus of control
idealism
relativism
what are moral intensity dimensions are important in explaining unethical intention (4)
- concentration of effect
- Probability of effect
- Proximity
- Social consensus
what organizational environmental features are important in explaining unethical intention?
- Strength of benevolent climate
- Principled climate
- Code enforcement
What can be said about ethical dilemmas and if they’re perceived as good or bad cases?
in good case employee is less likely to form unethical intention
in bad cases unethical alternatives are more easily chosen
Do code of conducts matter in unethical intention?
No and yes, only when properly enforced do they have a powerful influence
What is a benevolent ethical climate in organizations
A climate focussed on wellbeing of others, the organisation is just part of a whole and there are many stakeholders that all need to be happy
What is a principled ethical climate in organizations?
Following rules that protect the company and others
