Overview of the central unethical decision
It is very important that ethical conduct is maintained in this organization. Each and every employee in this organization has to task some measures to ensure that confidential information is kept secret and that no other person can access them. In the organization, there has been a case of an employee who has committed a serious mistake regarding confidentiality. The employee who has behaved in an unethical manner is in charge of a big department that is very crucial to our organization. The unethical behavior done by the employee is revealing confidential information about the General Manager. The HR partner told the operations Manager that the General Manager was going to be fired. This is something that is worth learning since the HR department is supposed is entrusted with maintaining sensitive information within the organization (Barkhordari-Sharifabad, et al., 2018). There are laws that govern confidentiality and any employee working within the HR department must behave ethically.
Analysis of the central unethical decision
The information that was revealed by the HR partner is very sensitive and the decision to tell the operations manager about firing of the general manager was very unethical. The HR partner violated the confidential policies. According to the confidential policies, no private information regarding an employee should be revealed or used in a manner that will put the employee vulnerable (Loi, et al., 2015). According to the ASHA and HIPAA policies, the decision made by the HR partner to reveal the dismissal of the General Manager was unethical and punishable by law (Danley, 2016). This is because the dismissal was not yet publicized for other employees and again, the general manager’s privacy was breached. In order to avoid litigations and protect employee’s privacy, the HR employees need to safeguard information, keep them in a secure place, and only pass the information to the intended person when the need arises or when the time reaches that it should be communicated officially.
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Ethical decision options, with a rationale
Instead of telling the Operations Manager about the firing of the general manager, the HR partner could have used safer ways that are also ethical. There are more ethical decisions or options that the HR operator could have used. One option is to use encrypted email to inform General Manager officially about the dismissal instead of telling the operations manager. The HR operator could have used encrypted mail by turning on the “Encryption mode” and setting a password to be decrypted by the Operations Manager when receiving the mail (Demirtas, & Akdogan, 2015). The other option was to go the old way to deliver the sensitive information in person. This will ensure that no one gets to know about firing except the HR department and the general manager first. Again, the HR partners being a person who works in the HR department could have just kept quiet with this information about the firing of the general manager until the right time comes for delivering it to the right person (White, & Lean, 2018). It is very stressful and traumatizing to just start getting information from other people about dismissal without any official announcement from the HR department.
Comparison of the unethical decision’s actual effects and lessons learned
When sensitive information is accessed by other people, there are various effects that can be caused to individuals, teams, and organizations at large. For example, personal information can be used to track employees by malicious people and even harm them. Their bank accounts can be hacked, and their homes can also be raided (tenbrunsel & chugh, 2015). Therefore, from the case, employees and different groups should learn to keep sensitive information confidential. Without this, the organization will go at loss and employees will also be vulnerable to attacks.
Utilitarianism
Utilitarianism is an ethical theory that is mostly applied to determine right from wrong. Also referred to as a form of consequentialism, utilitarianism is used to derive wrong from the right by putting a focus on the outcomes (Lu, et al., 2017). According to utilitarianism theory, the most ethical choice is the one that will produce a good result for many people. In the case of the HR partner, they are required to handle confidential data in an ethical manner that will protect not only the organization but also all the employees (Barkhordari-Sharifabad, et al., 2018). HR partners need to act in a manner that best serves the interest of the majority of the employees and the organization at large (Remišová, et al., 2019). This is why they are required to safeguard information and data about employees that should not be accessed by any internal or external party.
References
Barkhordari-Sharifabad, M., Ashktorab, T., & Atashzadeh-Shoorideh, F. (2018). Ethical leadership outcomes in nursing: A qualitative study. Nursing ethics , 25 (8), 1051-1063.
Danley, J. V. (2016). Ethical behavior for today's workplace. College and university , 81 (2), 53.
Demirtas, O., & Akdogan, A. A. (2015). The effect of ethical leadership behavior on ethical climate, turnover intention, and affective commitment. Journal of Business Ethics , 130 (1), 59-67.
https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/0969733016687157
https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10551-013-1868-y
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Loi, R., Lam, L. W., Ngo, H. Y., & Cheong, S. I. (2015). Exchange mechanisms between ethical leadership and affective commitment. Journal of Managerial Psychology . https://www.emerald.com/insight/content/doi/10.1108/JMP-08-2013-0278/full/html
Lu, C. S., & Lin, C. C. (2017). The effects of ethical leadership and ethical climate on employee ethical behavior in the international port context. Journal of Business Ethics , 124 (2), 209-223.
Presbitero, A., & Teng-Calleja, M. (2019). Ethical leadership, team leader’s cultural intelligence and ethical behavior of team members. Personnel Review . https://www.emerald.com/insight/content/doi/10.1108/PR-01-2018-0016/full/html
Remišová, A., Lašáková, A., & Kirchmayer, Z. (2019). Influence of formal ethics program components on managerial ethical behavior. Journal of Business Ethics , 160 (1), 151-166. https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10551-018-3832-3
White, D. W., & Lean, E. (2018). The impact of perceived leader integrity on subordinates in a work team environment. Journal of Business Ethics , 81 (4), 765-778. https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10551-007-9546-6
