Workplace

Responsibilities and
Rights
Jazer N. Urrea
BS CPE 5A
• Engineers in turn should see top
performance at a professional level as their
main responsibility, accompanied by others
such as maintaining confidentiality and
avoiding conflicts of interest.
• Engineers also need the opportunity to
perform responsibly, and this means that
their professional and employee rights must
be respected.

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Confidentiality &
Conflict of Interest
Confidentiality
• The duty of confidentiality is the duty to keep
secret all information deemed desirable to keep
secret.
• Basically, it is any information that the employer
or client would like to have kept secret to
compete effectively against business rivals.
• The employer or client as the main source of the
decision as to what information is to be treated
as confidential.

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Confidentiality &
Changing Jobs
• The obligation to protect confidential
information does not cease when
employees change jobs.
• Unless the employer gives consent,
former employees are barred
indefinitely from revealing trade
secrets.

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Confidentiality &
Changing Jobs
• Many engineers value professional
advancement more than long-term
ties with any one company, and so
they change jobs frequently.
• They are also the people most likely to
be exposed to important new trade
secrets.

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Confidentiality &
Changing Jobs
• Moreover, when they transfer into
new companies they often do the
same kind of work as before—
precisely the type of situation in which
trade secrets of their old companies
may have relevance, a fact that could
have strongly contributed to their
having readily found new employment.

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Confidentiality &
Management Policies
• What might be done to recognize the
legitimate personal interests and rights of
engineers and other employees while also
recognizing the rights of employer?

• One approach is to use employment

contracts that place special restrictions on
future employment.

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Confidentiality &
Management Policies
• Those restrictions are:
 geographical location of future
employers
 length of time after leaving the
present employer before one can
engage in certain kinds of work
 the type of work it is permissible to
do for future employers.

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Confidentiality:
Justification
• Moral basis for confidentiality obligation:

 To respect the autonomy of individuals and

corporations
 To recognize their legitimate control over
some private information concerning
themselves.
 Trustworthiness

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Conflicts of Interest
Professional conflicts of interest
• situations where professionals
have an interest that, if pursued,
might keep them from meeting
their obligations to their
employers or clients

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Conflicts of Interest

Conflict of Interest Conflicting Interest

• a situation in which an individual • occur any time two people's
has competing interests or interests aren't aligned.
loyalties
• involve a person who has two
relationships that might compete
with each other for the person's
loyalties.

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Conflicts of Interest
• Because of the great variety of possible outside interests,
conflicts of interest can arise in innumerable ways, and with
many degrees of subtlety and these are:
 Bribes, gifts, kickbacks
 Interests in other companies
 Insider information.

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Conflicts of Interest
Bribe
• a substantial amount of money or goods
offered beyond a stated business contract
with the aim of winning an advantage in
gaining or keeping the contract, and
where the advantage is illegal or
otherwise unethical
• “suhol”

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Conflicts of Interest
Gifts
• small gratuities offered in the normal
conduct of business.

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Conflicts of Interest
Kickbacks
• prearranged payments made by
contractors to companies or their
representatives in exchange for
contracts actually granted

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Conflicts of Interest
Interests in other companies
• some conflicts of interest consist in
having an interest in a competitor’s or
a subcontractor’s business.

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Conflicts of Interest
Insider information
• an especially sensitive conflict
of interest consists in using
“inside” information to gain an
advantage or set up a business
opportunity for oneself, one’s
family, or one’s friends.

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Conflicts of Interest
Moral Status of Conflicts of Interest
• Employee conflicts of interest
occur when employees have
interests that if pursued could
keep them from meeting
their obligations to serve the
interests of the employer or
client for whom they work.

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Conflicts of Interest
Moral Status of Conflicts of Interest
• Such conflicts of interest should be
avoided because they threaten to
prevent one from fully meeting
those obligations.

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An Ethical Corporate
Climate
Ethical climate
• working environment that is conducive
to morally responsible conduct.
• Produced by a combination of formal
organization and policies, informal
traditions and practices, and personal
attitudes and commitments.

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An Ethical Corporate
Climate
Defining Features
• Ethical values in their full
complexity are widely
acknowledged and appreciated by
managers and employees alike.

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An Ethical Corporate
Climate
Defining Features
• The use of ethical language is
honestly applied and recognized
as a legitimate part of corporate
dialogue.

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An Ethical Corporate
Climate
Defining Features
• Top management sets a moral
tone in words, in policies, and
by personal example.

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An Ethical Corporate
Climate
Defining Features
• There are procedures for
conflict resolution.

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Loyalty and Collegiality

Agency-loyalty
• acting to fulfill one’s
contractual duties to an
employer

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Loyalty and Collegiality

Attitude-loyalty
• has as much to do with
attitudes, emotions, and a
sense of personal identity as it
does with actions.

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Managers and
Engineers
• Respect for authority is important
in meeting organizational goals.
• Clear lines of authority provide a
means for identifying areas of
personal responsibility and
accountability.

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Managers and
Engineers
Executive authority
• corporate or institutional right
given to a person to exercise
power based on the resources
of an organization.

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Managers and
Engineers
Power authority
• influence in getting the job done

Expert authority
• possession of special knowledge,
skill, or competence to perform
some task or to give sound advice
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Managers and
Engineers
Engineer-oriented companies
• Quality of products
Customer-oriented companies
• Satisfaction of customers
Finance-oriented companies
• Profit

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Professional Rights

• As professionals, engineers have

special rights that arise from their
professional role and the obligations it
involves.

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Professional Rights
Importance of Professional
Rights
• Professional Conscience - to exercise
professional judgment in pursuing
professional responsibilities.
• Conscientious Refusal - to refuse to
engage in unethical behavior and to
refuse to do so solely because one
views it as unethical.
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Professional Rights
Importance of Professional
Rights
• Recognition - recognition for their
work and accomplishments.

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Employee Rights
• any rights, moral or legal, that involve
the status of being an employee.
• include institutional rights created by
organizational policies or employment
agreements, such as the right to be
paid the salary specified in one’s
contract

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Privacy Rights
• to control the access to and the
use of information about oneself.

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Right to Equal FR
Opportunity: Preventing Sexual
Harassment
Sexual Harassment
• the unwanted imposition of sexual
requirements in the context of a
relationship of unequal power

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Right to Equal FR
Opportunity: Preventing Sexual
Harassment
Quid pro quo
• require sexual favors as a condition for
some employment benefit
Hostile work
• any sexually oriented aspect of the
workplace that threatens employees’
rights to equal opportunity.

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Right to Equal
Opportunity: Nondiscrimination

• fair and decent treatment at

the workplace and in job
training are vitally important.

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Right to Equal
Opportunity: Affirmative Action
Affirmative Action
• giving a preference or advantage to a
member of a group that in the past
was denied equal treatment, in
particular, women and minorities
• Weak form – minority over equally qualified
• Strong form – minority over better qualified

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Thank You.
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QUIZ
Essay
Write an essay about your
experience in having conflict of
interest. Tell how you handled and
decided for it.

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