Duty Based Ethical Decision Making

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Business ethics are best described as moral principles within the business environment of what is right or wrong, and guides the way a business is run. The ethical decisions made by businesses can affect their company in a positive way while unethical decisions made can affect them in a negative way, although these unethical decisions are not necessarily illegal. The same rules or principles that regulate a person’s actions also applies to the business environment. Running a business in an ethical way involves differentiating between right or wrong, and then making the right choice. Ethics can be extremely important in business decision making. When a business or corporation is making an important decision, it should assess the legal ramifications, …show more content…

These duties could come from religious or logical reasoning, or principle of rights (basic rights of human beings). Duty-based ethics concentrates on the obligations of the business. Employees displaying duty-based ethics follow the company rules, does exactly what they are suppose to do, and honors the company’s guidelines and policies. This ethic is based on the responsibility felt to do the right thing, with no concern about what the cost could be. It is the intention of the action itself that is judged either good or bad. An example of duty-based ethics is following of the Ten Commandments. In the scenario of Cary Mason, representing John Doe, in a case against Acme Corporation, it is a tough decision for Mr. Mason to make on whether or not he will pay one of the three judges $250,000 in order to win his case. An ethical decision will need to be made by Mr. Mason based on what he thinks is right or wrong, and making the right choice. Mr. Mason has a duty to represent his client, but he has to decide if he can do so by acting unethically. If Mr. Mason pays the $250,000 to the judge in order to win the case, he obviously will be helping his client, Mr. John Doe, but the question is whether or not Mr. Mason feels that this bribery is right or

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