Apply what you have learned in the unit to develop an answer to the question at the end of the
case study.
Hints:
� It is must to structure your answer using �S-T-A-R�.
� Use diagrams to illustrate your answer
� Find some good journal references to support your arguments
� Find similar real life cases for comparison using Factiva database
study in the order page the question is located in coener page 37
and also i will also post one of my half way done work as well. Inside there are some theories and
concepts i will like to include please based on the concept to build up my answer thank you
Introduction
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The aim of this assignment is critically think on the ethical dimensions on the case
study and apply the theoretical content using the concept of ‘S-T-A-R’. This theoretical
concept can help in terms of identify clearly of the case study issue and help in answering
the question and determining the issues of how Galvatrens strengthen its system for
uncovering misconduct and what roles should the board and management play. Basically
there consist of four stages in this approach which includes See, Talk, Act and Review.
For the first step, it is where we see the ethical dimension. Next, we will follow up to the
approach of talk which various decisions will be made and take make an ethical decision.
The fictional case study is about Galvatrens, a consumer products company, has a
whistle-blower’s lawsuit by the plaintiff which is Mike Field, a former divisional sales
manager claims that he was wrongfully terminated because of trying to report an illegal
scheme to inflate sales. Chip and the board discuss why after the upgrade of company
management and procedures for uncovering misconduct and solving conflicts result with
only one guy came forward with information about the sales scheme and why he ended
up suing the company. Chip and the board need to figure out how Galvatrens should
strengthen its system for uncovering misconduct and what roles should the board and
management play (Hasson 2007).
The S-T-A-R model
The STAR model is an approach that is used on the mitigation of ethical challenges that
arise from time to time in the different organizations. It is termed as the STAR model
because it is an acronym derived from the words SEE, TALK, ACT and REVIEW. The
acronym ‘STAR’ does much more than help students and practitioners to remember the
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four processes. It also serves to provide the logical path which should be followed in the
resolution of ethical issues in the work place (Curry, 2004). The first step, SEE basically
refers to the fact that it is necessary for the person in charge to first take a good look at
the problem at hand so as to appropriately recognize the ethical situation at hand. The
second phase of Talk basically involves the objective discussion of the various dynamics
involved in the particular ethical situation. This may entail debate with regard to the
different angles from which the ethical issue can be analyzed from. It is healthy for
people to debate at this stage. The third stage of Acting basically involves the charting of
a way forward following deliberative processes such as role play and analyzing similar
case studies so as to select the best course of action. The final stage of Reviewing is the
act of decision makers analyzing the impact of the course of action that was taken with
respect to the results it has. This is a more proactive approach to the resolution of ethical
issues in an organization considering the fact that the most common approach to ethical
challenges is the action process and this leads to the compounding of the problem as a
result of ill-matching solutions being implemented.
In this exercise, the STAR model approach will be applied to Galvatrens, an organization
that is currently facing litigation as a result of one of the former employee citing
unethical processes taking place in the firm. The aim of this process is to aid in the
provision of a permanent or at the least long-term solution to this challenge of unethical
SEE TALK ACT REVIEW
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conduct being covered up by the officials. The application of the STAR model is also
meant to aid in the definition of roles that can be played by the management as well as
members of the board.
See
This is the first stage in the mitigation process and it will involve a complete analysis of
the different ethical issues at hand. The main ethical issues that emerge are misconduct
on the part of the employees, retaliation by the Harry Mart against Mike. The matter of
the lawsuit is more of an indicator of the existence of these two issues and not an ethical
issue in itself.
In this case study, the issue of lawsuit against Galvatrens arise is simply because of the
system of uncovering the misconduct is not good enough and makes it easier for terry to
retaliate (Singer, 2011). Mike sent a confidential voice mail to the Galvatrens’s COO,
Harry Mart, and tells him that he want to meet him to talk about the issue regards to the
possible misconduct by a company manager. Harry has then tell this issue to Mike’s boss,
Terry Sample and few weeks later after this, Mike alleges that Terry ask him transfer to
Indianapolis if he wants to stay in the company because his performance was not up to
par, which Mike thinks that it is retaliation for exposing the channel-stuffing scheme. By
looking at this, we can see that the reporting of misconduct does not work very well and
result of making retaliation happens so easily for Terry (Ciulla, 2011).
Chip wants Galvatrens to be a company that excelled in learning and listening to its
employees and customers. In order to do this, they first have to ensure that the
management of the company is good so that their employees can approach to any
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manager at any level of assistance and ensure that there is be no retaliation happens. It is
very important in terms of letting the company top management knows that preventing
the bad ethical is more important than implement a perfect management. By seeing the
issue that the company has in the ethical dimension, it can help them to take an
immediate action on how to solve the issue rather than letting the problem to become
more serious.
Utilitarianism is an ethical principle that refers to the pursuit of happiness for the greatest
number of people. This basically means that the perceived benefit needs to be realized by
the largest number of privy parties possible. In the utilitarianism ethical perspective,
Terry decided not to bring up the misconduct of Greg Wilson, the division sales
managers, out to public and try to cover the issue by remaining silent. This is because
Terry out the reputation and benefit of stakeholders as priority. The reason is because if
this behavior of misconduct by Greg Wilson had been brought out to the public, it will
seriously impact on Galvatrens’s stakeholders. On the investors’ side, this issue will
decrease the profit of share of Galvatrens’s investors and lead to unhappiness of
shareholders. On the employees’ side, the issue will impact on employees’s performance
and confidence whether they going to continue work in Galvaterns or leave the company
as a result it lead into high turnover rate. For Galvaterns, it is considered a very serious
issue as low performance will decrease company’s profit and high turnover rate will
result in cost and time in training a new employee. On the suppliers’ side, supplier will
lose confidence to continue working together with Galvatrens as this issue might impact
their reputation indirectly. On the buyers’ side, buyers will avoid purchasing the product
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from Galvaterns as they will also afraid to be involved in the same situation and impact in
their own reputation.
Deontology refers to the analysis of duty owed to an individual’s superior for the mere
purpose that they are placed relatively higher in the organizational hierarchy (Allen,
2012). It also refers to the duty owed by a creation to the creator. In the context of the
work place, superior personal can be considered to be ‘demigods’ because the fate of
subordinates ultimately lies in their hands given their power, privileges and authority. In
the perspective of Mike field, he did his part or duty as a former sales division manager to
report on misconduct of other sales manager. It is his duty to speak or arise against the
problem or issue that is harmful for Galvatrens’s operations. Mike Field, left a
confidential voice mail for Harry Mart, Galvatrens’s COO in order to discuss this issue.
However, Harry Mart did not follow up the case; in contrast, he referred this matter to
Terry Samples, Mike Field’s Boss. The bosses’ view of this matter however was that
Mike owed them his allegiance and that meant covering up for their acts of channel
stuffing.
Teleopathy is a condition whereby an individual or organization exhibits bias against
some organizational objectives at the expense of other objectives (Curry, 2005). This is
the deliberate pursuit of an individual’s duties in the workplace often for short-lived
personal gains at the expense of the organizational objectives. The manifestation of
teleopathy varies from organization to organization and also individual to individual
because of the different loop holes that different persons are bound to discover and
exploit. In the perspective of Greg Wilson, he conducted this scheme to his two biggest
customers for the purpose of achieving inflated quarterly sales target and increases his
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bonuses. Greg Wilson conducted this scheme based on his personal fixation on the
bonuses of sales and also self-interest which will help him to keep up with the quarterly
target set by the company.
Dirty hand is an ethical concept that refers to the fact that it is seldom possible for
anybody to investigate and resolve the ethical challenges within an organization without
them themselves getting their hands dirty (Spinney, 2011). This means that the person
charged with mitigating the ethical issue on the ground has to contend with the inevitable
fate of engaging in unethical dealings so as to nab the real fraudsters. In the perspective
of Terry, after he knew the scheme or misconduct of Greg Wilson, he forces Greg Wilson
out of the company by resigning himself in order to cover up the issue. At this point,
Terry Sample is on the perspective of deontology. He did his duty in protecting
Galvatrens’s reputation by covering up the issue. In addition, he did not report this issue
to anyone in Galvatrens even the board. The side effect of this dirty hand is Mike Field
felt that the demotion of him to Indianapolis is an act of revenge as Mike Field might
expose the scheme to others in the company and influence the performance of other
employees. As a result of unfairness that felt by Mike Field, he decided to sue Galvatrens
for its action.
Talk
This is the second step of the STAR approach and as stated in the introduction to for this
exercise; it entails the deliberations and discussions over the most appropriate course of
action to be taken with regard to the above ethical issues which have been noted in the
organization. The discussions and deliberations that are considered in this case are those
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that take place between the management of Galvatrens and the company’s board of
directors since it is at this high level where such discussions actually matter as they lay
the foundation for the course of action to be taken.
Moral Myopia or morality myopia is a situation where an individual or institutions
advocate for the strict adherence to a given set of moral standards. Those who advocate
for a moral myopia or those who abide by the standards of a moral myopia therefore tend
to base all their decisions and actions on the implications spelled out by a given code of
conduct such as the rules of the organization. In many instances, the existence of a moral
myopia will provide a suitable breeding ground for unethical practices which are not
particularly defined in the existent moral code. In the case, the board of director and top
management did not notice about this scheme as no one had made a formal report on this
misconduct. This might lead to the weakness of the open door policy. Even though, the
policy is out there but the management did not really took the proper procedure to act on
it. As in the case, Mike Field’s boss did not acknowledge the issue to the board or the
authority according to the process.
Moral muteness is the deliberate action by an individual to turn a blind eye to issues that
contradict any given moral code that is in existence. In many instances, people opt to
uphold moral muteness in a bid to save their professional relationships in the workplace
at the expense of their obligations to the organization. Different individuals prefer to
exhibit moral muteness because in itself it is a gray area that cannot really be proven and
punished (Bunton, 2013). In the case study Harry remained silent to keep the case down
in order to protect the reputation of the company. Due to this situation Harry also had to
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be silent about the effort that the whistle blower try to attempt and reward and
acknowledge were not been distribute (Grenne et al, 2010).
In the above scenarios, the process of talking about the ethical issues was obstructed by
employee indecision as well as institutional barriers. The success of the existent structure
was at a lower level and it required escalation by the recipient of the report for this
information to be of any use. In the management’s effort to formulate strategies that will
strengthen internal reporting of misconduct, it may be wise of them to focus on these two
areas. This is because a key component of the problem in their view is the weakness of
existent structures for reporting (Borodin, 2011).
Action
This is the third and most conspicuous aspect of the STAR model as implemented to an
organization. The main reason for its conspicuousness is the scope with which it is
applied to an organization. The first two processes of Seeing and Talking will largely
involve the tip-tier management of the firm. Action however will affect and be witnessed
by most if not all the employees working in
Non-consequentialist- Galvatrens should urge employees in all level to follow the code of
conduct as it is very important for them to follow so that the process can be considered
fully. The code of conduct needs to be communicated in a top-down fashion till the
employees at all levels get to internalize the regulations.
Heuristics are intuitive logical paths created by individuals following their exposure to
the same situation over and over again. Galvatrens should enforce the significance of
heuristics in the improvements of the employees’ work output. With heuristics being
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applied, the workers are empowered to make ethical decisions without the need of
constant reference to the company rules and regulations.
Reviewing
This is the final stage of the STAR model and it basically entails the observation of
mitigation strategies alongside the desired results that were set for them. It should be
remembered at this stage that the main goal of the mitigation effort was to rectify
organization’s misconduct-reporting system so as to avoid a debacle as the one witnessed
in the case study.
In action reviews are those which are conducted concurrent to the regular flow of
business. This refers to the analysis of the application of heuristics to the process of
reporting internal misconduct. The employee surveys will provide an actual picture of
the extent to which the changes and application s heuristics is improving on the real and
perceived. This was done through the comparison of previous reports to the current ones.
Reasonableness is the application of logic to an issue that is at hand and this follows the
consideration of the different aspects of a given case before making a fair judgment over
the matter. Reasonableness is not something that is confined to the individual who is
making a decision. It is in fact more powerful if it is realized and appreciated by parties
other than the decision maker. In the case, it I evident that Harry was not reasonable in
his action of keeping silent over the matter instead of forwarding it to the board. The
board, not wanting to make a similar mistake, critically analyzed both sides of the story
so as to get a good picture prior to the making of their decision.
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Consequentialism is a principle or theory that states that the level of morality in a given
action can be determined by the good it brings out to others. Harry’s single action of not
taking the complaint seriously may have seemed to be inconsequential initially. He might
have felt that he was doing the company a favor by not forwarding the allegations he had
received. The fact that this action ended up bringing disgrace to the company as well as
the individual who had to contend with wrongful termination of employment. This was
applied both rightfully as well as erroneously within the organization. Mike’s boss
demoted and transferred him. This was done with the aim of putting the matter of whistle
blowing to an end. It was however rightfully applied when the board was deliberating the
fate of Harry who they all agreed needed to be dealt with.
Conclusion
From the above application of the STAR mode to the case study helps to bring out the
unique manner that ethical issue in the workplace can be resolved. The biggest obstacle
in most incidences is the human beings who are likely to have brought about the ethical
challenge in the first place. It is therefore important to find out the moral framework
binding the action of different individuals. The last three stages of talking, action and
review may take on a cyclical nature depending on the nature of the ethical challenge. If
diligently applied, this STAR approach will greatly benefit the organization (Johnson,
2013).
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References
Allen, Patrick. “Health Science: East/West Prof Thaker 12 Apr 2012 Deontological
Ethics in Modern Medicine.” (2012).
Borodin, Alexander. “There is more than one” best” state of affairs.” (2011).
Bunton, Kristie. “The Power of Moral Courage.” Journal of Mass Media Ethics28, no. 2
(2013): 150-152.
Ciulla, Joanne B., Clancy W. Martin, and Robert C. Solomon. “Honest work: A business
ethics reader.” (2011).
Curry, Myron. “Ethics in the workplace.” Retrieved September 26 (2004): 2005.
Greene, Joshua D., D. Lindsell, A. C. Clarke, L. E. Nystrom, and J. D. Cohen. “What
pushes your moral buttons? Modular myopia and the trolley problem.” (2010).
Hasson, Ralph. “Why Didn’t we Know?” Harvard Business Review (2007)
Johnson, Kyle P. “Ethics of Leadership: Organization and Decision-Making in Caesar’s.”
PhD diss., New York University, 2013.
Singer, Peter. Practical ethics. Cambridge university press, 2011.
Spinney, Laura. “The underhand ape: why we are all corrupt.” New Scientist212, no.
2837 (2011): 42-45.
