When discussing the impact of ethics in decision-making, first we must determine in what area of our lives we are discussing. As this is a business management course it would be best to concentrate on the impact of ethics in decision-making in business. There are five steps in the decision making process: identify the issues, evaluate the issues, making a judgment, implementing the decision and lastly monitor the effects of the decision. We will discuss how ethics can impact the decision making process.
First before making any decisions whether they business or personal we must know what are the basis of the decisions that need to be made? What guidelines are involved? Once these have been determined we are better prepared to make the best decision available. Such as if it is a personal issue such as can the kids go to the party? The question asked would be, what kind of party, how long the party last, and where is the party? If the decision is business related such as, is restructuring the office staff a good business move? Then the questions that would need to be asked is why are we thinking of restructuring the staff, what impact will this have on the remaining staff, and how would this affect the companies profits and ability to complete the work loads?.
With the first step, identifying the issue, we must make sure that we get all the information available relevant the problem. Why are we looking to restructure? Is there a valid need for this restructuring? How would it affect the company and employees? Where does the extra workload being go after the restructuring? Plus many more questions that will need to be asked, until we arrive at the conclusion that there are indeed issues that needs to be addressed.
The next step being to evaluate issue, this is where ethics can come into play. What is the reasoning behind restructuring the office staff? Is it to save the company from bankruptcy, or is it to allow more room to hire staff from a previous place of business? Or is it to improve the profit margin until the end of the year to show that the company is not in the red.
