As is the case with many professions and fields of human endeavor in contemporary times, even the seemingly cutthroat arena of marketing has been under greater scrutiny for ethical conduct. To answer the question of whether or not ethical guidelines make a difference, although it might not be a conscious discussion in daily activities, the heavy consequences for marketers caught in the midst of unethical conduct as well as the notion of an organization's reputation as being one of its "...greatest intangible assets" (Ferell), suggests that if guidelines haven't already made a difference, they certainly should matter. Even years ago, there were ethical concerns surrounding how advertisers handled marketing to children, with some stating that intensive advertising created a widespread of materialistic values among children that risked leaving them feeling deficient if they can't keep up with new products (Clay, 2000)
With the contemporary ethos of ethical business, it falls upon marketers to remain true to their objective in conducting fruitful business, but they also need to balance this out with taking the high road. As suggested in the El Sayed and El Ghazaly article, there are organizations that primarily seek to make a quick buck. However, an organization can commit itself towards integrating an ethical culture in order to achieve their end goals while striving to do only good. This would happen best by upholding as heroes those who achieve the most through righteous means, while giving cautionary tales of those who met their downfall by trying to cut corners. Leadership would have to set the example for up and comers, and recognize those who best exemplify the ethical values of the organization (Ferell). In short, a victory in good conscience can't simply be an objective, but must become a way of life woven into the very fabric of the organization's identity.
Tied into the discussion of marketing ethics is the question of consumer data collection. Whether or not this practice is acceptable is still an emerging debate. For the United States, it is known that companies collect data on consumers through tracking social media posts, online purchases, and search habits. There have, however, been instances where companies have embarrassed themselves in applying the information gathered, as in the case where Target sent coupons for baby products to a teenager after analyzing her shopping patterns, leading to her parents finding out she was expecting (Martin, 2014). Admittedly, speaking from personal perspective, people do accept a modicum of invasiveness to have their free services, but this doesn't happen globally. Speaking from personal experience, a close friend of mine related to me that in the process of continuing to create and expand the content for a major apparel company's web site, while Americans didn't balk at the idea of accepting location tracking, they had to work on a solution for the European market as people there apparently don't consent as readily towards sharing their location through web services. Like many questions of acceptable behavior, the answer comes down to the practice being only ethical as far as a given society is willing to permit it.
If placed in the position of managing marketing efforts, I might start at the initial onset by asking what constitutes acceptable behavior not only within the given culture of the organization and its respective industry, but more importantly by the ethical context of our customers or our target audience. It isn't up to us to arbitrarily decide Perhaps the simplest way to deal with this though might be a rule of thumb I've heard by a couple different names, to include the New York Times test or the Washington Post test. Simply put, if we were to do something and it made the front page headlines nationwide, would we feel shame, embarrassment, or otherwise like we were "caught" doing something? If the answer is no or if we would feel proud, then great...if not, then there needs to be immediate course corrections made. Admittedly, there is a potential challenge in that with today's technology driven communications and marketing landscape, there is the chance that unexplored ethical concerns could present themselves within the new mediums of communication or in the initial churn of defining what's acceptable...if virtual reality ever becomes a regular thing, will the regular rules of real society still apply, or will people be permitted to roam as they please? I believe then that management efforts will come down to regularly checking with the organization to ensure we are on course and can sleep soundly at night with our decisions.
Resources
Clay, R. A. (2000, September). Advertising to children: Is it ethical? [Electronic version]. Monitor on Psychology, 31(8), 52.
Ferrell, L. (n.d.). Marketing Ethics. In Cengage. Retrieved November 21, 2014, from http://college.cengage.com/business/modules/marktngethics.pdf
Martin, E. (2014, March 27). The Ethics of Big Data. In Forbes. Retrieved November 22, 2014, from http://www.forbes.com/sites/emc/2014/03/27/the-ethics-of-big-data/
Sunday, November 23, 2014
Sunday, November 16, 2014
A634.4.4.RB_SienkiewiczRaymond
In discussing the broader issue of racism, Hugh LaFollette discusses the more specific issue of affirmative action in his text The Practice of Ethics. Affirmative action, in brief, is the practice of giving special consideration to minorities and women, generally with regards to hiring processes and admission to colleges and universities. Although some programs were considered by the US Supreme Court as legally permissible in 2003, many Americans reject the practice (LaFollette, 2007). Interestingly enough, a 2014 Supreme Court decision upheld a Michigan constitutional amendment that prohibited the use of affirmative action at the state's public universities and colleges (Liptak, 2014).
Whether or not affirmative action is ethical, however, depends on one's viewpoint. There are certainly those who would be inclined to run with the argument that it is needed. LaFollette, for this half of the argument, poses the arguments of mitigating veiled or indirect racism, or ensuring equality of opportunity (LaFollette, 2007). Santa Clara University, in a comprehensive piece on affirmative action from their applied ethics center, writes that those favoring such programs appeal to distributive and compensatory justice, further asserting that whereas discrimination in the past was done out of ignorance or malice, preferential treatment programs have the aims of creating equal opportunity, and promoting equality. Further, they wrote that some arguable benefits include creating a cadre of professionals more responsive to needs of minorities, as well as cultivating benefits from the diversity of perspectives in the workplace and academia (Andre et al, n.d.)
As noted though, there are arguments against affirmative action. For discussion purposes, LaFollette presents several issues including perceptions of reverse discrimination in promoting others simply on account of race, doing harm to those that have done no wrong, potentially bringing up those who aren't necessarily the most qualified, and possibly even bringing further stigma upon minorities (LaFollette, 2007). The Santa Clara write up adds in that preferential treatment potentially ignores the claim of need in a situation, grants benefits to select groups regardless of whether or not individuals experienced discrimination, can encourage dependency in some cases, and related to the earlier note of stigma, can devalue the achievements of individuals that are members of a benefited group (Andre et al, n.d.).
Regarding my personal opinion of affirmative action, I can certainly see the argument of both sides from both an academic and experiential standpoint, as I am a member of both a majority and minority group as a bi-racial individual (which in itself can be classified as a minority group). Although I may myself have benefited from checking the box on university applications and the like, I personally do not believe in ascribing value to a person's performance and qualifications simply because of their racial, ethnic, or cultural background. Perhaps from deontological standpoint, one can make the argument of correcting the wrongs of society after the fact. However, from that same perspective, I still believe that though there is positive intent, affirmative action is still an act of discrimination, and and any benefit gained could potentially be seen as something of a "hand out" rather than something earned or an affirmation of a person's achievements. Further, from a consequentialist standpoint, I would argue there is greater harm in the intentional pursuit of affirmative action, for rather than forming an objective system or allowing an existing objective system to evaluate individuals on merit, affirmative action actively takes away a benefit or desired object from one person and gives it to another. Rather than having a single beneficiary as an end result of the system, there would then be one beneficiary and one person who was arbitrarily deprived to pay for another's benefit.
Sources
Andre, C., Velasquez, M., & Mazur, T. (n.d.). Affirmative action: Twenty-five Years of Controversy. In Santa Clara University Markkula Center of Applied Ethics. Retrieved November 15, 2014, from http://www.scu.edu/ethics/publications/iie/v5n2/affirmative.html
LaFollette, H. (2007). The Practice of Ethics. Malden: Blackwell
Liptak, A. (2014, April 23). Court Backs Michigan on Affirmative Action [Electronic version]. The New York Times, p. A1.
Whether or not affirmative action is ethical, however, depends on one's viewpoint. There are certainly those who would be inclined to run with the argument that it is needed. LaFollette, for this half of the argument, poses the arguments of mitigating veiled or indirect racism, or ensuring equality of opportunity (LaFollette, 2007). Santa Clara University, in a comprehensive piece on affirmative action from their applied ethics center, writes that those favoring such programs appeal to distributive and compensatory justice, further asserting that whereas discrimination in the past was done out of ignorance or malice, preferential treatment programs have the aims of creating equal opportunity, and promoting equality. Further, they wrote that some arguable benefits include creating a cadre of professionals more responsive to needs of minorities, as well as cultivating benefits from the diversity of perspectives in the workplace and academia (Andre et al, n.d.)
As noted though, there are arguments against affirmative action. For discussion purposes, LaFollette presents several issues including perceptions of reverse discrimination in promoting others simply on account of race, doing harm to those that have done no wrong, potentially bringing up those who aren't necessarily the most qualified, and possibly even bringing further stigma upon minorities (LaFollette, 2007). The Santa Clara write up adds in that preferential treatment potentially ignores the claim of need in a situation, grants benefits to select groups regardless of whether or not individuals experienced discrimination, can encourage dependency in some cases, and related to the earlier note of stigma, can devalue the achievements of individuals that are members of a benefited group (Andre et al, n.d.).
Regarding my personal opinion of affirmative action, I can certainly see the argument of both sides from both an academic and experiential standpoint, as I am a member of both a majority and minority group as a bi-racial individual (which in itself can be classified as a minority group). Although I may myself have benefited from checking the box on university applications and the like, I personally do not believe in ascribing value to a person's performance and qualifications simply because of their racial, ethnic, or cultural background. Perhaps from deontological standpoint, one can make the argument of correcting the wrongs of society after the fact. However, from that same perspective, I still believe that though there is positive intent, affirmative action is still an act of discrimination, and and any benefit gained could potentially be seen as something of a "hand out" rather than something earned or an affirmation of a person's achievements. Further, from a consequentialist standpoint, I would argue there is greater harm in the intentional pursuit of affirmative action, for rather than forming an objective system or allowing an existing objective system to evaluate individuals on merit, affirmative action actively takes away a benefit or desired object from one person and gives it to another. Rather than having a single beneficiary as an end result of the system, there would then be one beneficiary and one person who was arbitrarily deprived to pay for another's benefit.
Sources
Andre, C., Velasquez, M., & Mazur, T. (n.d.). Affirmative action: Twenty-five Years of Controversy. In Santa Clara University Markkula Center of Applied Ethics. Retrieved November 15, 2014, from http://www.scu.edu/ethics/publications/iie/v5n2/affirmative.html
LaFollette, H. (2007). The Practice of Ethics. Malden: Blackwell
Liptak, A. (2014, April 23). Court Backs Michigan on Affirmative Action [Electronic version]. The New York Times, p. A1.
Saturday, November 8, 2014
A634.3.5.RB_SienkiewiczRaymond
Completing a read of Kramer's article, The Harder They Fall, the first thing that comes to mind when considering the thought of dilemmas in work, society, and life is the overall notion of the "work-life" balance that many people seem to struggle with, to the point that the subject finds its ways into news stories and is even a point touched upon during military performance reviews. Even a matter of days ago, Forbes published an article centered around four tips on how to manage workloads so as not to displace one's personal life (Nuth, 2014).
Kramer, in conducting his study that formed some of the basis of his article, had noted several characteristics of those who get in trouble, some of which include getting caught up in some of the high-life that comes with success, not maintaining humility, or losing their sense of self-awareness (Kramer, 2003). Much of his vignettes also seemed to highlight well his idea of good people getting caught up in their rise to power and becoming reckless, or even taking an "at any cost" approach to being the winner of a given situation. I thought Kramer had an especially good point in his analysis of there being a "winner take all" market...many people are gunning for the same slice of the American Dream or high achievement, and although there are genuinely great people, much emphasis is placed upon the coveted positive of "number one" given to whoever edges out all others in some manner or another (Kramer, 2003). This drive to succeed, it seems, not only drives people to achieve the end goal of being on top, but as Kramer shared in another vignette of a woman leaving her family, cause people to potentially make extreme sacrifices of their family in order to "keep up".
It is indeed unfortunate that even years after the publication of Kramer's article, a dilemma continues between individuals and their work. An October article from Time's website highlighted a recent study that found 70% of worker suffer from work-family tension (Fondas, 2014). Society seems to have a way of amplifying expectations for productivity in spite of attempts to save working hours and manpower, thus leaving no relief in sight for the individual as progress moves forward. Although it is good that the problem has been recognized, the fact that it has become a part of the national conversation indicates that it has become very deeply seated. There is truly an ongoing push and pull between the individual and the major influencers of their life, to include work, family, and meeting other aspirations of higher education and service to their communities. Effective function without excess sacrifice to any single aspect requires a strong measure of time management, discipline, and as highlighted by Kramer, not sacrificing oneself and their values for the sake of the power game.
Kramer, in conducting his study that formed some of the basis of his article, had noted several characteristics of those who get in trouble, some of which include getting caught up in some of the high-life that comes with success, not maintaining humility, or losing their sense of self-awareness (Kramer, 2003). Much of his vignettes also seemed to highlight well his idea of good people getting caught up in their rise to power and becoming reckless, or even taking an "at any cost" approach to being the winner of a given situation. I thought Kramer had an especially good point in his analysis of there being a "winner take all" market...many people are gunning for the same slice of the American Dream or high achievement, and although there are genuinely great people, much emphasis is placed upon the coveted positive of "number one" given to whoever edges out all others in some manner or another (Kramer, 2003). This drive to succeed, it seems, not only drives people to achieve the end goal of being on top, but as Kramer shared in another vignette of a woman leaving her family, cause people to potentially make extreme sacrifices of their family in order to "keep up".
It is indeed unfortunate that even years after the publication of Kramer's article, a dilemma continues between individuals and their work. An October article from Time's website highlighted a recent study that found 70% of worker suffer from work-family tension (Fondas, 2014). Society seems to have a way of amplifying expectations for productivity in spite of attempts to save working hours and manpower, thus leaving no relief in sight for the individual as progress moves forward. Although it is good that the problem has been recognized, the fact that it has become a part of the national conversation indicates that it has become very deeply seated. There is truly an ongoing push and pull between the individual and the major influencers of their life, to include work, family, and meeting other aspirations of higher education and service to their communities. Effective function without excess sacrifice to any single aspect requires a strong measure of time management, discipline, and as highlighted by Kramer, not sacrificing oneself and their values for the sake of the power game.
Fondas, N. (2014, October 11). Work-Life Balance is Having a Moment - But for the Wrong Reasons. In Time. Retrieved November 6, 2014.
Kramer, R. M. (2003). The Harder They Fall. (cover story). Harvard Business Review, 81(10), 58-66.
Kramer, R. M. (2003). The Harder They Fall. (cover story). Harvard Business Review, 81(10), 58-66.
Nuth, A. (2014, November 4). 4 Work-Life Balance Tips. In Forbes. Retrieved November 6, 2014.
Sunday, November 2, 2014
A634.2.4.RB_SienkiewiczRaymond
In Chapter 2 of Hugh LaFollette's The Practice of Ethics, readers are presented with a detailed discussion of consequentialism and deontology, two categories of ethical theory which discuss two common styles of reasoning through which people will reach a decision on how to act when presented with an issue of ethics. To briefly summarize, consequentialism emphasizes selecting an available course of action which will yield the best overall consequences. Deontology, on the other hand, emphasizes acting in accordance with moral rules or rights which can in some part be considered independently of the end results (LaFollette, 2007).
To expound somewhat further, LaFollette wrote that consequentialism requires consideration of several aspects of the end results. This can include figuring out which consequences of a given action count, and a weight of importance may need to be assigned to the factors that are of interest as part of the results of a given action. There is also the need to consider how to best measure the effect of the end result. By the dominant form of consequentialism, the theory of utilitarianism, one should look towards achieving the greatest level of happiness for the greatest number of people. Of course, with this theory comes the concern of its application, particularly in potentially considering consequences too narrowly. LaFollette uses the example of a proposed “survival lottery” scenario that would randomly select healthy individuals to be harvested for organs to help multiple sick people, provided the process was formalized, public, and democratically supported (LaFollette, 2011). The point, however, is that an individual making a decision through the lens of consequentialism and may not necessarily be considering the ethical implications of, say, actions on one individual that would benefit multiple people as in the survival lottery scenario, or simply not considering the fullest scope of potential impacts through either negligence of long term effects or secondary effects.
Resources
To expound somewhat further, LaFollette wrote that consequentialism requires consideration of several aspects of the end results. This can include figuring out which consequences of a given action count, and a weight of importance may need to be assigned to the factors that are of interest as part of the results of a given action. There is also the need to consider how to best measure the effect of the end result. By the dominant form of consequentialism, the theory of utilitarianism, one should look towards achieving the greatest level of happiness for the greatest number of people. Of course, with this theory comes the concern of its application, particularly in potentially considering consequences too narrowly. LaFollette uses the example of a proposed “survival lottery” scenario that would randomly select healthy individuals to be harvested for organs to help multiple sick people, provided the process was formalized, public, and democratically supported (LaFollette, 2011). The point, however, is that an individual making a decision through the lens of consequentialism and may not necessarily be considering the ethical implications of, say, actions on one individual that would benefit multiple people as in the survival lottery scenario, or simply not considering the fullest scope of potential impacts through either negligence of long term effects or secondary effects.
Deontology has the benefits,
according to LaFollette, of better reflecting how most people learn and develop
moral beliefs, and it doesn't receive as much critical review as
consequentialism. Deontology looks more towards rules individuals were raised
with, and uses these rules as guidelines for action more so than examining the
potential consequences of a given action. For a lot of people, this may seem
more like simply following the rules and may not present itself with as many
potential sticking points as consequentialism. LaFollette writes, however,
there are issues with deontology as well. As most people think consequences
count for something, deontologists must either give appropriate weight to
consequences or show they really don’t matter. Furthermore, there can be
complications as basic “approximations” of more complex rules eventually give
way to complex circumstances, such as the initial rule of “never lying”
eventually including “complex factors” later on. Possible conflicts between
rules may have to be dealt with if they arise. This system, as well, is not
perfect.
For me, I would hesitate to say
that either theory is superior to the other, and both of them have something to
offer in the way of providing inputs for a critical analysis of an issue.
Consequentialism provides a system of thought towards analyzing possible
choices, similar to a Courses of Action comparison in the military, while
deontology provides some guidance towards a choice, similar to best practices
and regulations in the military. In decision making processes, we are often
asked to analyze a problem, and from there develop several courses of action to
choose from. Each course is analyzed in the context of desired variables such
as costs, impact to individuals, and tend to be assigned point values based on
how they score in each variable…potential consequences are analyzed. Of course,
regulations have to be kept in mind and these can often drive what actions can
be taken, providing the initial check from deontology. However, knowing that
sometimes a particular job has to be done, there does come occasions where
waivers have to be signed allowing an exception to accomplish a greater goal,
which can be similar to the push and pull between consequentialism and
deontology. I believe, in short, that it is highly impracticable to depend on
either theory to act as the “be-all, end-all” means for deciding how to
navigate any issue of ethics. Rather, one has to be able to take an honest
assessment of a situation, think through as broad a scope as possible and
considering consequences (ideally soliciting multiple perspectives for a truly
large scale problem), and ideally, possessing sound judgment to decide when to
follow rules by the book and when to act in accordance with the best intent of
their conscience and good will.
Resources
LaFollette, H. (2007). The Practice of Ethics.
Malden: Blackwell.
Subscribe to:
Comments (Atom)