Towson PMA Berg Competition 1

A Five Star Meal

Denny and Danielle Unethical Dinner
What Does Ethics Mean to You"
The law of evolution is that the strongest survives!' 'Yes, and the strongest, in the
existence of any social species, are those who are most social. In human terms, most
ethical...There is no strength to be gained from hurting one another. Only weakness.
Ursula K. Le Guin
Jonna Wood states in the book Business Ethics, that ethics is the study, the science,
the art, the rules, and the practice of right living. Therefore, we define business ethics
as it means to live right in the business world. A successful business organization or
entity requires top level management and senior executives to have a moral and ethical
responsibility to run operations and conduct business in a responsible manner. How
would you react if your career was in jeopardy for careless and irresponsible decisions
made by your top level management? It is important to recognize that employees,
shareholders and owners must take individual responsibilities for acting ethically and
making decisions based on the best interest of all company stakeholders. In this case
aA Five Star Meal, we examine how your unethical behavior and poor decisions in an
organization can result in devastating consequences that affect stakeholders at every
level of the organization including their careers.
Denny and Danielle: Unethical Actions
According to the case video that we received from the Bergs Case Competition, we
were introduced to several characters; Denny, Linda, and Danielle .Denny is a senior
executive for ABC Inc. He is portrayed as an arrogant, egotistical, self-centered,
deceiving corporate executive abusing company funds. The video shows us that Denny
is misusing corporate funds on lavish dinners and abusive drinking and has been doing
so for several years. Denny's wife Linda, indicates that not only Denny but his entire
team of sales executives also have been abusing company funds in a similar way.
Danielle, Denny's daughter; she is an Administrative Assistant in the company. Danielle
appears to be unaware that her fathers and the company sales teams abuse of
company funds. After her discovery, she returns to the company office but fails to tell
her fellow co-worker about the misuse of corporate funds by the executives.

Stand up for Whats Right

Danielle found out that her dad and his sales team were doing unethical things at their

Towson PMA Berg Competition 2

family meeting. She is unsure if she should report the misuse of company funds to
someone because the person at fault isn't just anyone, it is her father. Towson PMA
believes that Danielle should talk privately with her dad about the people being laid off
people because of his over expense in the company and give him a chance to
announce the wholesale team to cut off or reduce the expense as soon as possible or at
once. He also should repay the money he used and re-hire the people that were laid off.
If her dad doesnt accept it, she should report the issue according to the company rules
and law.
Solutions: Protection for the Future
To address the problems in this year case study we recommend several solutions. Our
primary recommendation is to facilitate a highly transparent corporate culture that
promotes accountability for unethical decisions that affect the organization and
functioning stakeholders. To recommend several strategies to implement this initiative:
(1) To perform intra-company audits to primary stakeholders that have access to
company funds (2) Promote ABC Companys Code of Conduct, including company
values, key policies and procedures for compliance issues. (3) Enforce compliance
issues and procedures by implementing ethic advisors that promote the company's
code of conduct and coordinate and resolve ethical matters of organizational concern.
(4) Finally promote a transparent corporate culture that encourages employees to come
forward with discovery of issues and implement a system that protects their
confidentiality.
Takeaways:
It is important to remember as future managers, directors, executives, co-workers and
colleagues, we have to prepare for the responsibilities that lie ahead. It is without a
doubt that we all will be faced with an ethical dilemma where we will be forced to make
difficult decisions. Conducting yourself in an unethical situation will only hurt you in the
long run. In principle, you can only be responsible for your individual actions but as a
business leader you have a responsibility to apply the golden rule which states do unto
others as you would have them do unto you. (Luke 6:31)

Citations
Otis , Chandler . "Goodreads." About Goodreads . US: 2014.

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<http://www.goodreads.com/quotes/tag/ethics>.
The Holy Bible, Luke 6:31, The New International Version. Grand Rapids: Zondervan
House, 1984. Print