104626241 Ethics and Social Responsibility

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Ethics and Social

ResponsibilityProfessional Development

Word Count 3,400


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Abstract

Good ethical behavior is the basis on which our societies function. It connects all our

relationships whether they are social, community or employment. The Engineers

Ireland (EI) code is divided into four parts but these headings are not exclusive to EIand can be found in the Code of Ethics of other professional institutions. These Codes

provide a template for the operation of the institution and how it is to conduct its

operations in an ethical manner. This behavior can be influenced when self-interest

and emotional involvement are threatened by the actions. Our primal instincts of

self-preservation influence our decision making. In the case of J&J it is shown how a

company under threat from two distinct sources, external and internal, operates in

an ethical manner. This behavior is repeated in the space shuttle Challenger case.


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Table of ContentsAbstract ......................................................................................... 2

Abbreviations ................................................................................... 3

1. What is Ethics? .............................................................................. 4

1.1 Definition ................................................................................ 4

1.2 Engineers Ireland Code of Ethics ..................................................... 4

1.2.1 Part 1: Relations with Colleagues, Clients, Employers and Society .......... 5

1.2.2 Part 2 : Environmental and Social obligations ................................... 5

1.2.3 Maintenance & Development of Professional Conduct and Standards ........ 6

1.2.4 Enforcement Procedures and Disciplinary Action ................................ 6

2. The Need for Ethics and Social Responsibility .......................................... 6

2.1 Cost V Service ........................................................................... 6

2.2 Emotional Engagement................................................................. 7

2.3 Decision Making. ........................................................................ 8

3. Cases of Good and Bad Ethical Behaviour ............................................... 8

3.1 Johnston & Johnston Tylenol........................................................ 8

3.2 LifeScan SureStep ....................................................................... 9

3.3 A.H. Robins Dalkon Shield ............................................................. 9

4 Space Shuttle Challenger Launch ......................................................... 10

Conclusion ...................................................................................... 11

Bibliography ...................................................................................... 12

Abbreviations

BP British PetroleumCEO Chief Executive OfficerEI Engineers Ireland

MT Morton-Thiokol

NASA National Aeronautics and Space Administration

NPD New Product Development


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1. What is Ethics?

1.1 Definition

The Engineering profession likes to categorise topics within clear and defined

boundarys and prefer to use mathematical expressions in definitions where there is

no room for ambiguity. The definition of ethics introduces a difficulty to this method

of thinking as ethics cannot be defined in this manner. It can be defined as a set of

principal or moral values but this is open to individual perception as what one

individual portrays as moral may not be accepted by another.

The definition offered by Nelson and Trevino (1) is that ethics are the principles,

norms and standards of conduct governing an individual or group. This definition

targets conduct and the individual/group are expected to carry out its business to

established guidelines. In the case of groups or associations these guidelines are

communicated to their members through the Code of Ethics by either supplying a

copy of the document to the particular member or via a training programme.

1.2 Engineers Ireland Code of EthicsThe Engineers Ireland Code of Ethics outlines to members, how they are to carry out

the duties as a member of the Institution. As a member they are obliged to conduct

their business to the guideline in the code. Guidelines exist for integrity,

competence, responsibilities and promotion of the profession. These principles are

fundamental and are to be found in the Code of Ethics for other non-engineering

Professional Associations and Councils such as the Medical Council (2) and the

Institute of Chartered accountants of Ireland (3) .

These fundamental principles are required for good management and provide

leadership and direction to the governing bodies. These bodies do not operate in a

vacuum and their interrelationships with other groups depend on the good ethics. In

other words when an engineering company hires an accountancy company to prepare

its tax return it expects that it will be treated with the same due diligence that the

engineering company affords to its customers. These relationships are recognised


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within the code as it is divided into four parts with Part 1 dealing with

interrelationships with colleagues, clients etc.

1.2.1 Part 1: Relations with Colleagues, Clients, Employers and Society

This section indicates in an unambiguous manner how it expects its members to carry

out their business. The standards expected are in keeping with what we would expect

of normal good citizenship behavior in a first world society. As engineers, members

may find themselves working in other parts of the world where standards may be

different and the morals up held in our society, are not part of normal culture. In

these instances these guidelines provide a structure for good decision making and

management.

1.2.2 Part 2 : Environmental and Social obligations

The code outlines distinct directives in how the members of the institution are to

conduct themselves in regard to matters surrounding the environment and the safety

of the public and fellow colleagues. As engineers are trained with a background in

science their decision making is factual based. In one of the most recent major

environmental disasters, the blow out at The Deepwater Horizon Well in the Gulf of

Mexico, the response to the media by the then BP Chief Executive Mr Tony Hayward

an engineer, displayed the characteristics of his profession by giving the direct facts

of the case to the media. His media performance was not welcomed by BP and was

subsequently replaced by Bob Dudley. The different approach to the media by

Dudley, who portrayed that BP was on top of the problem, stemmed the anger of the

shareholders. (4)

This case is similar to the response of Exxon in the Exxon Valdez disaster in

1989.Exxon image was badly damaged and Exxon CEO Lawrence Rawls also anengineer, whose media performances appeared to slow and dispassionate (1) . Both

of these cases highlight the obligations placed upon these professionals by their

relevant institutions. They behaved in a factual manner to the media and told it as it

was which is not what the parent companies or shareholders needed to hear. It was

what the public wanted to hear- the truth.


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1.2.3 Maintenance & Development of Professional Conduct and Standards

The terms of the code in relation to conduct and standards are not unique to the

Engineering profession. As outlined earlier these standards are expected in all walks

of life and is the base on which all our relationships are built. EI provide guidelines

and rules in order to control the behavior of its members.

This control leads to a stronger unified organization as it reduces the risk of

members heading off on a tangent with that may impact on the institution. This part

of the code encourages members to strengthen the association encouraging others to

join and indicates a willingness to partake in education and in the promotion of the

profession. In this manner the standards will be maintained and the association will

be held in the high status that it seeks.

1.2.4 Enforcement Procedures and Disciplinary Action

In order to ensure that its rules and guidelines are adhered to all organisations and

association no matter what their background must have disciplinary procedures.

Discipline is important and the sanction must not be influenced by the standing of the

offender within the organisation. The responsibility of ensuring that the standards

are being met rests with the Ethics Board. It functions are clearly defined and this

part is the largest part of the Code of Ethics. The procedures in dealing with a

breach of the Code are well set out and with areas such as investigation, sanctions

and appeal well covered. Unless sanctions are truly delivered then the code will

breakdown.

If one considers the recent banking crisis in Ireland. The bankers operated their banks

in an unethical manner but yet they have to receive sanction. Similarly in the health

service where a failure has happened the results of any inquiry have found systemicfailure and not failure on the part of any particular individual. In cases like these, this

behaviour leads to is public cynicism in the organisation.

2. The Need for Ethics and Social Responsibility

2.1 Cost V Service

In the NPD process the design engineer may be far removed from the end user of the

product, thus they may never meet. The standards used by the engine in the designwill impact on this end user. They are linked by the ethical decisions taken in the


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decision stage. Cases such as the Ford Pinto fuel tank highlight such scenarios. In the

design stage the engineer may be under pressure to build a product as economic as

possible which may increase risk of failure to the ultimate user. This may not have a

huge impact if for instance, the product failure will not impact on human life such as

a defective mobile phone housing but poses a different set of questions if the product

is for instance an airplane wing.

The design engineer will be under pressure to design a product that can be

manufactured at the lowest cost. The ethical question posed at this stage is will he

use inferior materials of reduce the factors of safety to a minimum level this using

lighter components. The balance between cost and service should be met with the

ultimate safety and wellbeing of the end user but at price that is economic. Sure cars

could be built of far superior materials and safety systems far and beyond what is

required but no one could afford them. Similarly design compromises can lead to

failure rather that poor construction practice such as the failure of the levees in New

Orleans during Hurricane Katrina (5) . There is conflict of interest between cost and

service and failure to compromise on the design to reduce cost when instructed by an

employer could result in the engineer getting the sack. This situations call for moral

judgement on the part of the employee and could entice them to enact the whistle-blower act on the employer.

2.2 Emotional Engagement

As stated the link between the engineer and the end user of a product may only be

an ethical one where the consumer trust that the engineer as designed the product to

such a standard that it will not cause harm or fail. For the engineer he has invested

himself into the creditability of this product. The decision that are made at the

design stage affect the end user and while there is no emotional link between the two

groups the ethical decisions regarding the component used and products construction

will impact on the user. This emotion moral dilemma is discussed by Dunbar (6)where

he sets out the scenario of the runaway train, the bystander at the diverting switch,

the homeless man sleeping on the train tracks and the fat man. There are seven

workers on the rail line and to save them the bystander is given two choices. He

either A diverts the train and kills the man sleeping on the track or he throws the fat

man onto the track to divert the train. In the case of the former choice he can pull


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the lever and walk away and the man sleeping on the track will be unaware what is

happening, while the later requires direct personal involvement.

When Dunbar posed this question what would you do to people on the street most

were happy to take the first choice as it lacked personal intervention. This moral

dilemma is similar to the design engineer that has compromises to make for cost

reasons. This is where the guidelines in ethics can help support the engineer in his

decision making.

2.3 Decision Making.

The way that humans process information is a combination of affective reaction and

logical controlled processing in order to come to decisions. Dunbar commented that

ethical decision making in professional bodies often involve a conflict between self-

interest and professional responsibilities, with self-interest engaging an affective

response whereas the later requires a logical process. (6) If there is conflict between

the two responses then it is likely that as self-interest is linked to our survival

instincts it will win over and lead to unethical behavior. The emotional engagement

that has evolved with our species could be seen to protect or assist someone that has

decisions to make that involve conflict and uncertainty; equally it can protect the

self-interest leading to unprofessional or unethical decisions being made.

3. Cases of Good and Bad Ethical Behaviour

3.1 Johnston & Johnston Tylenol

In their book Trevino and Nelson present several case studies in ethical behaviour. In

the case of the pharmaceutical company Johnson & Johnston whose reaction when

their product Tylenol was sabotaged with cyanide, J&J set the standard of how to

behave in an ethical manner. From the outset the company took control and

removed all products from the shelves in the local area and then a nationwide recall

with retail value of $31 million. The management of Johnston and Johnson were

made available for interview by the media. In the media they outlined the

importance of the customers and refused to dodge the responsibility even though the

contamination was not caused by them.


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Lessons learned in this case were far reaching in the industry as newly designed

packaging to reduce the risk of product interference became an industry standard and

the company CEO James Burke became renowned for his concern in ethical issues.

In the Tylenol case the company were not responsible for the defective /sabotaged

product. It wasnt a defect caused by them so they could go out all guns blazing on

the offensive and tackle the issue head on. While the product and the customers were

theirs, the company still had no emotional or self-interest in the failure of the

product. As outline earlier when there is no self-interest or emotional involvement

the ethical standards will be raised.

3.2 LifeScan SureStep

In the other case presented on J&J their reaction is completely different. In this

instance a product developed by their sub division company Lifespan, SureStep a

device for monitoring glucose levels in diabetic was shown to be defective and caused

the death of at least three customers. In this case the company were not as

transparent about the defects and didnt disclose the information regarding the

defects to the FDA. They were subsequently found guilty of criminal charges and paid

$60 million in fines.

In this case as the defects in the product were caused by the company, they had anemotional connection and self-interest to protect. This can be presented as the

reason for a different reaction as the company attempted to protect itself.

The companys response, when defective products are presented to customers from

two different sources, can be influenced by the source of the defect. It is a good

example of this theory that ethical decisions are affected by our emotional

involvement and protection of self-interest as outlined by Dunbar.

3.3 A.H. Robins Dalkon Shield

In this case which is similar to that of the SureStep where a defective device was sold

to customers. In this case however the company Robins didnt develop the product

but bought the rights to it. The product was an IUD with the brand name Dalkon

Shield. The product had under gone very little testing when it was launched onto the

market in 1975.Robins became aware early on that there was problem with the

device and alerted 120,000 doctors to the danger, by this stage 4 million devices

were sold worldwide. It didnt recall the product until 1984 when it had caused the


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death of fifteen women, 60,000 miscarriages and birth defects in hundreds of

children. (1)

The company reacted by destroying test data, presenting falsified medical data and

denied any knowledge of the dangers when questioned under oath. The company set

up a fund of $615 million to deal with claims but this proved in adequate and the

eventually the company were declared bankrupt in late 1985.

This is another case where the companys self-interest, in this case, its investment is

protected. In order to protect this self-interest it behaved in an unethical manner.

4 Space Shuttle Challenger Launch

The decision to launch the Space shuttle Challenger posed ethical issues on both

sides- MT, the company responsible for the design and manufacture of the rocket

boosters and NASA. The MT engineers that presented the test data to the group

teleconference meeting displayed typical engineering principles that they had gained

in their training. This was to present the data as they saw it, similar to the BP CEO

Tony Hayward in the Gulf of Mexico. At the teleconference the day before the launch

MT engineers expressed their fears that the O rings would fail at the low temperature

and presented evidence to support their claim. There had been a previous failure to

launch this mission and the NASA officials were under pressure from the political

sources to proceed with this launch. This was in order to gain further support for the

shuttle programme. NASA was unhappy with the MT recommendation and asked the

company to prove it was unsafe rather than it was safe to launch.

The engineers at MT knew that there was an inherent risk to the crew and the

programme should a launch proceed. The decision to break into a smaller group and

exclude those that were presenting the argument not to launch meant that the

decision would be based not on the scientific data and facts but on the impact on thefuture of MT and their positions at the head of the company. At no point in the

decision process were those directly involved the crew asked for their opinion.

This poses a similarity to the design engineer who is asked to comprise on a design by

an employer for commercial reasons and who is linked only by his ethical decisions to

the end user, who in this case were the space shuttle crew who ultimately had the

most to lose. As components of the process the engineers who had doubts over the

design and the crew book ended the case. In the middle was MT and NASA butfinancial gain was at stake rather than loss of life. The NASA official put the MT


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management under severe pressure and this indicated by NASA posing the satirical

and rather flippant question ,when you want me to launch , next April, knowing

that MT were questioning the safety of the design.

This smaller management looked narrowly at the data trying to find the answer they

wanted. This is typical behaviour as people will analyse the situation to their benefit.

The Senior Vice President in MT Jerry Mason had started to condition the situation in

the early in the group discussion stage and stated that a management decision was

necessary. (6) He dominated the small group and he forced the last one of the four to

decide by requesting that he should remove his engineering hat and put on a

management hat again a similarity to the BP case. When faced with the decision to

launch or not, the information that they had was interpreted in a manner to come to

the decision that they needed. This decision brings us back to the self-interest

situation posed earlier. It was in the self-interest of this group to proceed despite the

dangers that it posed on others. The decision would lead to anger on the part of the

MT engineers that disapproved the launch as they would be linked with the disaster

but were removed from the decision, despite following the ethical reasoning and

linking themselves to the end user while the management group linked themselves to

their end user NASA.

Conclusion

As human beings we all strive to behave in an ethical manner. In the first world

cultures this behaviour is typified by the basic principles of integrity, a responsibility

to clients, employers, employees and customers. We are expected to maintain

professional conduct and confidentiality and promote the profession and its

practitioners. Using this template, social groups, individuals, companies and societycan interrelate in a manner which upholds moral standards. This standard can be

threatened when judgements may become skewed due to self-interest or emotional

involvement. We have seen in our case study of J&J how their ethical behaviour

changed when their self-interest was under threat.


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104626241 Ethics and Social Responsibility