Concerning the Appropriateness of Ethically Questionable Workplace Activities

Ethics is important in organizational life, and business organizations devote a great deal of time, attention, and money to ethics training (Carroll & Buchholtz, 2003). Ethics, however, is not always a “cut and dried” issue with clear demarcation lines between “ethical” and “unethical” conduct. Therefore, part of the purpose of ethics training is (or should be) to provide individuals with tools to assist them in recognizing common situations with ethical overtones and in formulating opinions about the appropriateness of various courses of action (with the expectation that behaviour will often, although perhaps not always, be consistent with such opinions). In different words, at least part of ethics training should involve more than simply telling people what to do, but rather to assist people in thinking independently (because not all ethical situations can be anticipated in advance). As independent thinking in the context of morality is central to the notion of moral reasoning (Kohlberg, 1976; Rest, 1979, 1986), the paper now turns to a brief overview of moral reasoning. Following this, the paper will formulate and test hypotheses concerning relationships between a variety of moral reasoning indices and beliefs about the appropriateness of various ethically questionable workplace activities (a likely precursor to behaviour). Two types of questionable activities will be considered: those designed to benefit individuals at the expense of organizations and those intended to benefit organizations. The specific nature and direction of relationships with moral reasoning indices may depend upon the intended beneficiary of ethically questionable actions.