Short Paper Evelyn

Terry Le

Mgmt 320        

                        Short paper #2 Evelyn

I think that Evelyn should contradict her bosses report. I believe this because if she did not contradict her boss, she would be lying. Her report was changed to prove that the tensile stress was responsible for the problem. If she did not contradict the report, and the truth came out, her, her boss, and the lab technician could all get in trouble.

A). One of the ethical issues is Evelyn’s boss lying. Her boss manipulated the data to fit his hypothesis, that tensile stress was the cause, even though Evelyn’s report showed that tensile stress was not the case. The task of Evelyn and the team is to figure out the exact reason why the car is having problems. Fabricating information not only makes Evelyn, and her boss ethically incorrect for lying, but it can also damage the firm's image. With these issues introduced, I believe Evelyn should contradict her bosses report.  

b). This decision could affect Evelyn’s boss in a negative way. If she contradicts her bosses report, he might lose his position in the company. This could also hurt the interpersonal relationship her and her boss had. The boss might feel like Evelyn betrayed him.

C). From the corporate, perspective, they would want the real truth to come out. They would want this because they would not want the public to think that they lie and change reports about their cars. Also, if it came out that the results were fabricated, then corporate could be in big trouble and could lose customers. The government and the society would want the truth to come out. They would want the company to give them the truth because as a customer, they want to be able to put their trust in the company. The perspectives of these parties are very important, therefore Evelyn should contradict her bosses report.

D). When it comes to the utilitarian trade-off it seems like there would be more “utility” overall if Evelyn contradicts her bosses report. If Evelyn decides to contradict her boss, he would be harmed because of the consequences he might suffer. Even though her boss would suffer, the overall utility would still be greater than if she decided not to contradict his report. The customer's utility would be higher because they would know the truth of what is going on with the company, and they can decide if they want to invest in them or not. The company could also benefit because it knows that Evelyn's boss might not be a good worker. Another way the company can benefit is that if they decided to go along with the bosses report, they would have been liable to the boss making a mistake like that in the future, and being even more harmful to the company. Utilitarianism is meant to benefit the majority, and in this case, Evelyn contradicting the report would benefit the most people.  

E). Moral principles are a good way to show which action Evelyn should take. Step 1 is obedience and punishment orientation. When you are a kid if you lie you get punished. If that is the case, under the 1st stage, Evelyn should contradict her bosses report, because it is not the truth. The second stage is individualism and exchange. This step says that the person needs to determine what is right or wrong. Since we don’t have Evelyn’s personal design we can’t determine what she should do at that stage. The third stage is good interpersonal relationships. Under this stage, Evelyn should not contradict her bosses report because it would harm their relationship. The fourth step is maintaining the social order. Under this stage, she should contradict her bosses report. If everyone in the society lies, then there would be chaos, and society could not function as well. Evelyn not contradicting the report could hurt society as whole because she would lie to all the customers. Stage 5 is the social contract and individual rights. In this case, Evelyn would have the right to contradict her bosses report because it is her individual right to do this.