Atlas Cold Storage - The Best Cold Storage Solutions

In the contemporary world, many managers try to cover up their mistakes, incompetence and bureaucracies by overstating their capital. Financial statement is a requirement by the federal law for all businesses whether small or big. Financial statement helps key stakeholders especially investors to make necessary decisions. The board at Atlas Cold Storage Inc are miss representing their financial statements to cover up for the loss they incurred in their supply chain, inappropriate use of funds and other loses incurred. Ethical leadership requires that company funds and decisions are managed properly, honestly and with integrity that protects the company brand (Joan, 2010) . According to deontologist, decisions are looked at in terms of their badness or goodness, and in this case, the decision by the management of Atlas can be termed as a bad decision because it does not conform to the provisions of the ethical standards by the ethical standard regulation boards such as Social Accountability International (SAI), International Labor Organization (ILO), Ethical Trading Initiative (ETI) and Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) (Joanne, 2002) . The ethical standards require that every organization prepare the financial statements that reflect the true assets of the business to enable key stakeholders make appropriate decisions. 

E & Y is an auditing company that issued a clean audit opinion on the financial statements of Atlas that were entirely incorrect. From the statements, it is clearly evident that the auditing company might have been compromised. Auditors usually makes mistakes in their auditing exercise, however, the problem indicated in the case is recurrent and cannot be a mistake. It is a responsibility of auditors to detect malice such as inventory leakage, reimbursement, pilferage, financial fraud, misappropriation, theft and embezzlement (Catherine, 2008) . E & Y failed to obey the vouch of credibility that auditors usually undertake. According to the standards ISA 700 that deals with auditor’s responsibility, auditors establish qualified opinions that reflect the true nature of financial position of a business. In this regard therefore, the stakeholders have the obligation to sue E & Y for failing to adhere to the international labor standards requires for auditing (Joanne, 2002) . 

Notably, the fault in auditing by the E & Y might have been due to the management imposing limitation on the scope of auditing and therefore the auditing company was unable to obtain sufficient auditing data. In this case the auditor accepts the engagement but must make the following ethical decisions; the auditor formally request Atlas to remove the barriers to enable a complete audit that can support an opinion (Joan, 2010) . I n paragraphv11 of ISA 700, if the management is adamant to remove the limitations due to bureaucracies, and since the report does not affect the auditor, E & Y decided to qualify the statement without sufficient data or information. However, E & Y failed to include a paragraph describing a situation like that in their opinion statement, thus, they are held victim for declaring the misrepresented statements as clean opinion (Joanne, 2002) . 

Termination of contract of a senior manager is a huge decision because recruiting or replacing a similar workforce might to be very difficult. However, in Andrew Peter’s case, the base of termination is ethically justified. Every managerial position in a trust organization have set ethics and ethos that must be protected, respected and adhered to (Joan, 2010) . As the VP and CFO, he should protect the company values that they stand for. However, he is involved in the fraud that the company has engaged in and as a senior manager, she should have reported such issues. This implies that he failed to obey the integrity of his professional as an ethical leader (Joan, 2010) . Ethical leadership requires that leaders must work in their day-to-day routines to protect the company values and make ethical decisions that binds all stakeholders. In other words, managers should be honest, dependable and credible in their management decisions. Firstly, he was involved in misappropriation of capital expenses, inappropriate recording of funds, recording capital wrongly based on the time that they were due and failing to disclose the truth on breach of covenant (Catherine, 2008) . Consequentialist will define this kind of decision making as a bad decision because the consequences are harmful to the key stakeholders of the trust. Therefore, terminating the contract of Andrew Peter together with others is ethically justifiable both by law and with the provisions of the societal norms (Catherine, 2008) . 

The chairman Nicholas Ross had a responsibility to foster an ethical culture and environment at the workplace and ensure that they take responsibility of their conduct. The chairman has a responsibility to promote ethical conduct and integrity at the workplace. This can be fostered by first acting as a role model to other managers and junior staffs in their conduct and decision making (Joan, 2010) . He should have shown commitment to adhering to the ethical standards and principles to make proper decisions that do not pose threats of legal ramifications. Further, he should have shown strong commitment towards protecting the organization’s ethical culture by training and encouraging workers to use ethical provisions as the basis of guiding decision making, behavior and sense of responsibility (Joanne, 2002) . He should have fostered appropriate skills and values at the workplace such as honesty, integrity, accountability and respect. All decisions must be made considering that the welfare of the key stakeholders: customers, employees, investors, communities and governments are dependent on them. Further, he should have encouraged an ethical climate within the organization setup which enriches individuals to commit to the organization’s culture, values and ethos (Joanne, 2002) . It is important to note that the organization culture defines the extent of which workers in an organization adhere to the primary policies, ethics and conditions required in a workplace setting. Thus, fostering positive ethical culture would have helped in avoiding the situations that Atlas is experiencing currently (Joanne, 2002) . 

Deontologist describes decisions as either bad or good. Crediting a decision depends on the morals and rules that are set for the business profession. In the case presented, the mangers compromised their moral justice, rights and duties of protecting the company’s integrity and well-being. The decision made by Atlas to cheat is a bad decision which is misguided, arrogant and with completely misconception outright (Joan, 2010) . When investors and financial institutions receive the financial reports of Atlas, they will be intrigued and interested in pumping more money into the business which will continue to be mis-appropriated and thus continued poor performance. When Atlas overrepresent their capital, many investors and consumers would be willing to invest and request services, however, the present resources and facilities would be insufficient to handle the demands (Catherine, 2008) . This would be the indicator of cheating in Atlas. 

The banks, creditors and the client depend on the report that is released by the auditing company, E & Y as a confirmation of the financial claims by the company on their assests. Audit reports is important for making investment decisions for future sustainability. Firstly, to the banks, creditors and clients, the auditing reports will enable them to know whether the company has maintained a proper book record and has been honest in their operations to make appropriate investment decisions based on the report (Joanne, 2002) . Therefore, the three groups will be able to determine, from the audit report, whether the company is honest in their financial statements. 

The leadership of Atlas Cold Storage are guilty of mis-representation of their capital. The allegations seem to be true and valid. In this case, the reviewed report will present the malice that have been going on. In this regard, the leadership of Atlas expects the key stakeholders to take a legal step for being mislead by false statements. They are sure to face a legal ramification for failing to honor their integrity of adhering to the ethical standards set by the ethical review organizations such as ILO (Joanne, 2002) . The ramifications could be damaging for one’s profession 

Reference 

Catherine, H. (2008). The Code of Ethics: A Guide for Everyday Practice. Early Childhood Australia Inc. 

Joan, P. S. (2010). Ethical Leadership and Decision Making in Education: Applying Theoretical Perspectives. New York: Routledge. 

Joanne, B. C. (2002). The Ethics of Leadership. New Orleans: Wadsworth Publishing.