© Principles of Ethics in Information Technology – 4th Edition by George Reynolds

1. AN OVERVIEW OF ETHICS
PREPARED BY MARK JHON C. OXILLO

2. Pretest: (1/2 Crosswise)
Give one scenario where
Ethics is applied in the
workplace. Explain why
you think that scenario is
considered ethical.

3. Cisco Advocates Ethical Behavior
• Cisco is a multinational company that
manufactures networking equipments.
• It's Chairman and CEO John Chambers states:
“A strong commitment to ethics is critical to
our long-term success as a company. The
message for each employee is clear: Any
success that is not achieved ethically is no
success at all. At Cisco, we hold ourselves to
the highest ethical standards, and we will not
tolerate anything less.”

4. Cisco Advocates Ethical Behavior
• Cisco conducts numerous programs
aimed at fulfilling what it sees as its
corporate social responsibilities. For
instance, the company provides
ethics training to its over 70,000
employees, and it prides itself on
providing employee benefits that
foster a good work-life balance

5. Cisco Advocates Ethical Behavior
• Cisco employees are also
encouraged to donate money and
volunteer hours to nonprofit
organizations around the world.
Cisco manages energy and
greenhouse emission generated by
its operations.

6. Cisco Advocates Ethical Behavior
• With that, the company’s operations
generated $46 billion in sales and $8
billion in net income for fiscal year
2012.1 Cisco has been named a
“World’s Most Ethical Company”
honoree by the Ethisphere Institute
for five consecutive years (2008–
2012)

7. Questions to Ponder:
1. What does it mean for
an individual to act in an
ethical manner? What
does it mean for an
organization to act
ethically?

8. Questions to Ponder:
2. How should an
organization balance its
resources between
pursuing its primary
mission for existence and
striving to meet social
responsibility goals?

9. WHAT IS ETHICS?

10. ETHICS
• is a set of beliefs about right
and wrong behavior within a
society.
• Ethical behavior conforms to
generally accepted norms—
many of which are almost
universal.

11. ETHICS
As children grow, they learn complicated
tasks—such as walking, talking,
swimming, riding a bike, and writing the
alphabet—that they perform out of
habit for the rest of their lives. People
also develop habits that make it easier
for them to choose between what
society considers good or bad

12. ETHICS
A virtue is a habit that inclines
people to do what is acceptable.
Fairness, generosity, and loyalty are
examples of virtues.
A vice is a habit of unacceptable
behavior. Vanity, greed, envy, and
anger are considered vices.

13. Questions to Ponder:
1. Is it okay to lie to protect
someone’s feelings?
2. Should you intervene
with a coworker who
seems to have a chemical
dependency problem?

14. Questions to Ponder:
3. Is it acceptable to
exaggerate your work
experience on a résumé?
4. Can you cut corners on a
project to meet a tight
deadline?

15. The Importance of Integrity
A person who acts with integrity
acts in accordance with a personal
code of principles. One approach to
acting with integrity is to extend to
all people the same respect and
consideration that you expect to
receive from others.

16. The Importance of Integrity
Unfortunately, consistency can be
difficult to achieve, particularly when
you are in a situation that conflicts
with your moral standards. Another
form of inconsistency emerges if you
apply moral standards differently
according to the situation or people
involved.

17. MORALS, ETHICS, LAWS

18. MORALS, ETHICS, LAWS
Morals are one’s personal beliefs
about right and wrong, while the
term ethics describes standards
or codes of behavior expected of
an individual by a group (nation,
organization, profession) to
which an individual belongs.

19. MORALS, ETHICS, LAWS
For example, the ethics of the law
profession demand that defense
attorneys defend an accused client to
the best of their ability, even if they
know that the client is guilty of the
most heinous and morally
objectionable crime one could
imagine.

20. MORALS, ETHICS, LAWS
Law is a system of rules that tells
us what we can and cannot do.
Laws are enforced by a set of
institutions (the police, courts,
law-making bodies). Legal acts
are acts that conform to the law.

21. ETHICS IN THE
BUSINESS WORLD

22. Ethics in the Business World
Ethics has risen to the top of the
business agenda because the risks
associated with inappropriate
behavior have increased, both in
their likelihood and in their
potential negative impact.

23. Ethics in the Business World
In today’s difficult and uncertain
economic climate, organizations
are extremely challenged to
maintain revenue and profits.
Some organizations are sorely
tempted to resort to unethical
behavior to maintain profits

24. Ethics in the Business World
For example, the chairman of
the India-based outsourcing
firm Satyam Computer Services
admitted he had overstated the
company’s assets by more than
$1 billion. (2019)

25. Ethics in the Business World
The revelation represented
India’s largest ever corporate
scandal and caused the
government to step in to
protect the jobs of the
company’s 53,000 employees.

26. Most Common Forms
of Employee Misconduct
TYPE OF EMPLOYEE
MISCONDUCT
Percent Of Surveyed Employees
Observing This Behavior
Misuse of company time 33%
Abusive behavior 21%
Lying to employees 20%
Company resource abuse 20%
Violating company
Internet-use policies
16%
Discrimination 15%

27. Most Common Forms
of Employee Misconduct
TYPE OF EMPLOYEE
MISCONDUCT
Percent Of Surveyed Employees
Observing This Behavior
Conflicts of interest 15%
Inappropriate social
networking
14%
Health or safety violations 13%
Lying to outside
stakeholders
12%
Stealing 12%
Falsifying time reports or
hours worked
12%

28. Ethics in the Business World
Source Line: Ethics Resource Center,
“2011 National Business Ethics
Survey: Workplace Ethics in
Transition,” © 2011,
www.ethics.org/nbes/files/FinalNBES
-web.pdf

29. Ethics in the Business World
Corporate Social Responsibility
(CSR) is the concept that an
organization should act ethically by
taking responsibility for the impact
of its actions on the environment,
the
community, and the welfare of its
employees

30. Ethics in the Business World
Supply Chain Sustainability is a
component of CSR that focuses on
developing and maintaining a supply
chain that meets the needs of the
present without compromising the
ability of future generations to meet
their needs

31. Ethics in the Business World
Supply Chain Sustainability takes
into account such issues as fair labor
practices, energy and resource
conservation, human rights, and
community responsibility.

32. Question to Ponder:
Why fostering Corporate
Social Responsibility and
Good Business Ethics is
important?

33. Ethics in the Business World
Why fostering Corporate Social
Responsibility and Good Business
Ethics is important?
- Gaining the goodwill of the
community
- Creating an organization that
operates consistently

34. Ethics in the Business World
Why fostering Corporate Social
Responsibility and Good Business
Ethics is important?
- Fostering good business practices
- Protecting the organization and its
employees from legal action
- Avoiding unfavorable publicity

35. CORPORATE ETHICS

36. CORPORATE ETHICS
• Corporate Ethics Officer - also
called corporate compliance
officer; he/she provides an
organization with vision and
leadership in the area of business
conduct

37. CORPORATE ETHICS
• Responsibilities of a Corporate
Ethics Officer:
- Responsibility for compliance by
ensuring that ethical procedures are
put into place and consistently
adhered throughout the organization

38. CORPORATE ETHICS
• Responsibilities of a Corporate
Ethics Officer:
- Responsibility for creating and
maintaining the ethics culture that
the highest level of corporate
authority wishes to have

39. CORPORATE ETHICS
• Responsibilities of a Corporate
Ethics Officer:
- Responsibility for being the key
knowledge and contact person on
issues relating to corporate ethics
and principles

40. CORPORATE ETHICS
• Code of Ethics - is a statement that
highlights an organization’s key
ethical issues and identifies the
overarching values and principles
that are important to the
organization and its decision
making.

41. CORPORATE ETHICS
• Code of Ethics - it frequently
includes a set of formal, written
statements about the purpose of
an organization, its values, and the
principles that should guide its
employees’ actions.

42. CORPORATE ETHICS
• Intel's Code of Conduct:
1. Conduct Business with Honesty and Integrity
2. Follow the Letter and Spirit of the Law
3. Treat Each Other Fairly
4. Act in the Best Interests of Intel and Avoid
Conflicts of Interest
5. Protect the Company’s Assets and
Reputation

43. ETHICAL DECISION
MAKING APPROCHES

44. Ethical Decision
Making Approaches:
1. Virtue Ethics Approach
2. Utilitarian Approach
3. Fairness Approach
4. Common Good Approach

45. Virtue Ethics Approach
- focuses on how you
should behave and think
about relationships if you
are concerned with your
daily life in a community

46. Utilitarian Approach
- states that you should choose the
action or policy that has the best
overall consequences for all people
who are directly or indirectly
affected. The goal is to find the single
greatest good by balancing the
interests of all affected parties

47. Fairness Approach
- focuses on how fairly actions and
policies distribute benefits and
burdens among people affected by
the decision. The guiding principle
of this approach is to treat all
people the same.

48. Common Good Approach
- is based on a vision of
society as a community
whose members work
together to achieve a
common set of values and
goals

49. ETHICS IN INFORMATION
TECHNOLOGY

50. Concerns About the
Ethical Use of IT
• Monitoring employees’ email
and internet access
• Downloading music and movies
at no charge
• Contacting millions of people
worldwide through unsolicited
emails (spams)

51. Concerns About the
Ethical Use of IT
• Hacking into databases of
financial and retail institutions
to steal customer information
• Students downloading material
from the Web and plagiarizing
content for their term paper

52. Concerns About the
Ethical Use of IT
•Websites planting
spywares on visitor’s
hard drives to track their
online purchases and
activities

53. E N D
© Principles of Ethics in Information Technology –
4th Edition by George Reynolds