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Personal Ethical System “Even the most rational approach to ethics is defenseless if there isn’t the will to do what is right” (Alexander Solemnity quotes, Para. ). Not everyone has the same view of what is right and wrong and not everyone cares to do what is right. My ethical system has been shaped by my parents, my belief in the Catholic Church, my education, and my experiences. Through out my teenage years and my adult life my beliefs of what is right and wrong has changed, so has some of my morals and values.
By becoming more educated in politics and society, experiencing problems at work and life’s little disasters, coming a wife and mother and by choosing to be baptized in the Catholic Church has shaped who I am today. Ethics in the Work Place Most people follow set standards of ethics that is expected of them in the work place. This ethical system is often rights-based and goal-based. The goal-based system focuses on the business’s intended outcome and the rights-based system is what the community or business feels is acceptable behavior (Treato, 2007).
Employee’s personal ethics may also play a role in ethical decisions made at work. My personal ethics can play a positive and negative role in my job performance. Usually am working as a Licensed Practical Nurse in long term care facilities. Here I am often working with the elderly who are in a fragile state and can easily be taken advantage of. I believe that it is important to always put the patient’s feelings, beliefs, and health above my own. For most of these patients the long term care facility is their home, so I treat them as though I am a guest in their house.
When I find that my ethical beliefs can play a negative role in my job performance is when my personal beliefs of what is morally right or wrong is so often different from the patients. This is often due to the large age difference. My generation is often more excepting of different life styles and of the right to personal choice. When put in a situation where my opinion is different than that of the patient I keep my opinion to myself and except their right to their own opinion. Why Ethics are needed in an Organization?
Most organizations have a code of ethics that all employees are expected to follow. I believe that ethics are needed in an organization so that their employees are aware Of what they can do or cannot do. Although most people might know the difference between right and wrong not all organizations rules are the same. One organization might allow their employees to do things or act in a way that another organization would not allow. For example one organization may allow their employees to drink during lunch while other another organization would find this as cause to fire an employee.
Ethics are integrated into the organization to achieve its directions and goals by providing guidance to the employees to behave in a way that will make them most productive. These can be different based on type of employment. For example an organization where their employees are on the phone and he computer all day making sales might put in the code of ethics that employees are not allowed to surf the internet or make personal calls during working hours.
The application of the code of ethics can have a different effect on the employee, the organization, and society. The code of ethics effects how the employee performs their job which in return effects the success of the organization. Ethics in the work place effects society by creating a rights- based system, where the behavior is acceptable to the majority of the community (Terrine, 2007). Since most organizations do not allow drinking ruing lunch or business meeting it is no longer accepted by the majority of society as an acceptable behavior.
Conclusion To summarize, personal ethics are formed by ones parents, education, experiences, and religious upbringing, personal ethics can have a positive and negative effect in the work place, and ethics are needed in the work place to provide direction to the employees and to help meet the organizations goals. Ethical dilemmas are something that we deal with on a daily bases. Most of these dilemmas we think nothing of because we know the difference between right and wrong.