Ethics And Social Issues For Market Scenario

Ethical Issues of the Stakeholders

Discuss about the Ethics and Social Issues for Market Scenario.

In today’s market scenario, IT related organizations aim towards embracing strong ethical principles, rules and regulations at the workplace. According to Badaracco (2013), it is important to an individual or team or organization to operate morally and consider taking ethical decisions. Ethics is a set of ideology and values that govern an organization in conducting its business in adherence to its productivity, reputation, and structural bottom line. It, therefore, expresses values and morals of an organization to both its internal and external stakeholders. Due to in-depth computer knowledge, it may be easy for an IT manager or professional in accessing an organization’s data and information. But, it will be ethical if the IT professionals don’t misuse their knowledge of accessing organizational data and sharing it with some other organizations or competitors. It will enhance the reputation of the organization along with the IT professionals (Armstrong et al. 2013).

This report will be dealing with ethical issues of Sony Australia’s stakeholders and reasons behind choosing ethical aspects over legal ones in solving these ethical issues. Moreover, it also discusses the ethical obligations that stakeholders need to have towards one another and general civilians along with guidance provided by Australian Computer Society in solving Sony Australia’s ethical issue.

Stakeholders are the people or groups of people those provide an organization with prolific resources and also do have a claim on their shared resources. As opined by Clegg et al. (2015), managers of an organization should behave ethically and shouldn’t risk any of the investor’s capital in illegal actions where it may hurt an organization’s reputation. It is because these managers are responsible for utilizing both financial capital as well as human resources of an organization. So, they have a direct admittance and admission to the organization’s personal information such as financial strength, IT codes, passwords and access rights. Carroll and Buchholtz (2014) mentioned that employees also should be ethical in their approach to their behavior and attitude creates the structure and culture at the workplace. They should behave ethically to maintain a healthy and safety environment within organizations.

Moreover, as stated by Hill et al. (2014), suppliers as well as distributors of an organization should be ethical in their approach. The organization should pay all its managers, suppliers and employees fairly and timely. Even the customers should be provided with good quality products at competitive prices; that is they should be provided value for products and services. It is also necessary for an organization to behave ethically while storing the personal information of customers. It not only improves the reliability of customers but also their reputation is elevated. Fiolleau and Kaplan (2016) opined that suppliers at the same time should also be ethical in their approach by proving the organization with premium quality raw materials at the agreed-upon price. Privacy of the stakeholder’s personal information should be maintained at every step of operation within and outside the organization.

Reason behind Resolving Ethical Issues of Sony Australia via Ethical Aspects Rather Than Legal Ones

In Australia, Sony Entertainment’s account was somehow hacked by the 3^rd party intruders. Whenever the customers create an account in the Network Platform, Sony Australia doesn’t have access to it (Ferrell and Fraedrich, 2015). The whole customer database is stored in the data center of California. But, after the customers relied on Sony Australia and created accounts, they had to provide their personal details to access it. But, a group named GOP (The Guardians of Peace) unethically broken into the security code and accessed the information of customers. It, therefore, could have resulted in numerous compromising of Australian customers’ debit and credit cards. The Australian Piracy Commission immediately took the entire matter under investigation and saved a lot of customers from getting bluffed and deceit by those impostors and intruders. Later it was even proved that Sony Australia didn’t breach the Piracy Ac as they didn’t have any personal information of the customers (Estévez et al. 2015).

When an organization faces an unethical situation, the top authorizes, and managers fall in a dilemma whether to solve the problems ethically or legally. According to Clegg et al. (2015), there are certain situations that need to solve ethically rather than legally as it may threaten the basic or fundamental principles. One of the threats may arise due to self-interest, where the scam of top officials or authorities may affect the organizational image and reputation. It may affect the customer’s behavior towards the organization and may turn them judgmental towards the ethical and moral principles of the business. Smither et al. (2016) also stated that another threat that may arise is due to advocacy, where the threat will be promoting the position of an organization’s clients to compromise the business objectives. It will result in a competing disaster of the organization’s reputation, and status and hence organizations prefer to solve certain problems ethically rather than legally at the workplace.

Moreover, Martin (2015) also mentioned that familiarly is another reason behind organization’s choosing ethical way of solving problems over legal ways. Due to having a close relationship with any of the internal stakeholders, organizations tend to solve the problems ethically through warnings, discussions, and suggestions. These are not taken as it may hamper the relationship or may dishevel to the organization’s image in this competitive marketplace. As stated by Badaracco (2013), these dilemmas can also occur due to intimidation, where the stakeholder has a threat from other stakeholders in maintaining silence. Hence, under any of such pressures, the stakeholder is bound to keep quiet and only perceives the unethical happenings at the workplace. So, to solve any of such ethical dilemma problems, any of the internal stakeholders can seek an independent legal advice from any professional body.

Ethical Obligations That Stakeholders Have Towards One Another and General Population

As opined by Markman et al. (2016), the stakeholders for solving problems ethically need to gather relevant facts and information regarding the cause and raise of the problems. The affected areas also need to be identified and also should involve the ethical issues regarding the cause. The fundamental principles those are affected due to this unethical behavior are integrity, confidentiality, honesty, professional behave and objectivity.  To take any ethical actions, the stakeholders need o be well-equipped with the rules, regulations, and principles laid down by the organization (Ferrell and Fraedrich, 2015).

Stakeholders should have ethical obligations towards one another as well as for the society. As commented by Reinecke and Ansari (2015), managers of an organization bring into behavioral and personality traits in the work. Based on the value system of a manager, the employees’ personal needs, religious background, and family influence are shaped. The personality traits like self-confidence, ego, mutual trust and respect are largely affected by the managers’ way of handling things ethically at the workplace. Whenever the organization considers social and ethical elements in the business operation, it makes sure to integrate both philosophy and morals within it. As opined by Stazyk and Davis (2015), the organizations’ objectives should be socially responsible and should either meet or exceed the stakeholders’’ expectations. It will help in growing a sense of reliability and trusts on one another that will improve an organization’s social status, position, and reputation.

As commented by Smither et al. (2016), research has shown that customers identify organizations those overlaps between individual attributes and organizational attributes. There may be certain potential conflicts between other stakeholders and customer stakeholders’ regarding economic development or valuing money. It may be due to the presence of certain customers those have a self-centered approach. These customers look out for best quality products and services at a comparatively low price. Moreover, the employees and workers of organizations should have an honest communication with the customers. False and lucrative ads should not be given to attract customers. Moreover, van Gils et al. (2015) mentioned that customer groups are in general too much concerned about child labor and unethical practices within the organization. They tend to boycott certain organizations those have a bad reputation in advocating child labor or are ill-treating its employees or are increasing environmental pollution.

It is seen that the development of organization’s ethics and principles have leveraged organizational relationships will be all its stakeholders. As stated by Weiss (2014), ethical programs should be held that helps in balancing orientation of internal and external stakeholders for aligning the requirements and demands of all the stakeholders. Moreover, distribution of information throughout an organization also facilitates ethical behavior and responsiveness of the business. The balancing between the stakeholders helps in increased performance of an organization (Zadek et al. 2013).

The ACS offers legal recognition of ICT as it embraces global ICT professionals like lawyers, accountants, and engineers. As commented by Luo (2016), it, being a Disciplinary Committee has adopted a consistent Model Code that is fair, accessible as well as accountable. ACS has also adopted a discipline and complaint system that offers a fair resolution of the disputes, thereby, maintaining the integrity of the consumers. When GOP invaded Sony Australia’s customer database by GOP, the ACS brought into action its Code of Professional Conduct and Code of Ethics to resolve this con. Every organizations and professional are bound to follow and adhere to the set rules, regulation and principles laid down by ACS. According to Johnston and Marshall (2016), ACS has also passed the law that the customers have every right to ask the IT professionals and repair merchant those providing them with services whether they are members of the professional organization. The members of ACS are bound to adhere to the rules and regulations set by it for their members. 

Moreover, Kaptein (2015) stated that Australia being a free and democratic country have freedom of speech, association; enjoy equality, opportunity, and peacefulness. At the same time, the Information and Communications Technology (ICT) also should maintain its principle of making ACS members adhering to the codes of conduct. It helps in resetting and restoring moral philosophy among customers as well as monitors the professionals over their conduct. As mentioned by Martin (2015), in Sony Australia case, along with ICT, the ACS investigated whether it is the fault of Australian Network site or other country. With the technological development, the ACS is also getting stronger and observant towards the IT professionals’ activities. It has informed that the IT professionals are bound to act honestly and also should have integrity as well as respect for the members.

Markman et al. (2016) also commented that as per ACS, the IT professionals and members of this reputed organization should include public interest as one of the primary factors to be taken care of. The members should have respect to the intellectual properties of others and also should preserve both privacy and confidentially of other’s information. The principles that ACS members should embrace are honesty, competence, professional development and professionalism in their activities. The members of ACS should also aim towards protecting as well as promoting the safety and health issues of the people those taking services from ACS members (Matten, 2015).

Conclusion

This entire report deals with Sony Australia’s incident where an invader group named GOP broke its path into the network system of Sony Entertainment. It is seen that with the rise of IT using cloud technology, innovative ways of hacking are coming into existence along with ethical and lawful ways of handling these matters. The report discusses several ethical issues from the stakeholders’ viewpoints. It shows that every internal and external stakeholder of an organization should have values and moral in contributing their services to the organization’s productivity and success. It is also seen that there are certain issues that should be resolved ethically rather than legally to them a chance of improvement. It also saves the reputation of the organization or stakeholders. It is also explained that ACS have individual codes of conduct and ethics, and its members should adhere to it. ACS social values comprise of honesty, professional development, competence, professionalism, enhancing quality life and serving of public interest.

References

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