An Ethical Dilemma
Kip A. Magee
Great Basin College
Abstract
Megan Jones has a bachelor of
science degree in Management and is continuing her career with Global App
Creations (GAC). She works as a Human Resource Management and has been at GAC
for six months. Megan is fresh out of college, the University of Rhode Island and
picked up a lot from training. Her boss Debbie has laid out a specific job of
finding the violation’s in the data package of the business files. While doing
her research she came across some basic violations that deserved to be demoted,
and some she wasn’t quite sure of. For example, an employee using the company
vehicle was tracked visiting the hospital of a sick family member. Megan
thought it is illegal for a firm to track the vehicles. And so this is where
the dilemma starts for her. With sensitive information a certain protocol has
to be follow, and thinking outside the box Megan did some research of her own.
She asked Jeremy some question that he should have known about. But this was in
violation of company’s protocol of GAC and strict confidentiality of the
rules. Question 1. If tracking employees through
technology is not illegal, why should Megan be concerned if she is not involved
in any misconduct? Second question, at this point, what are Megan’s
alternatives to resolve her current dilemma about her involvement and knowledge
about GAC’s tracking employees? Thirdly, who should have a stake or an interest
in how GAC tracks and monitors its employees?
When we examine what is happing in
the ethical dilemma of Megan Jones, we have to ask our selves a lot of
questions? Does this scenario fit the description of what we know about Global
App Creation? If tracking employees
through technology is not illegal, why should Megan be concerned if she is not
involved in any misconduct? The principle of tracking one’s vehicles is a
matter of knowing the law about safety and protection under your States legal
system. It’s in truth that a company can business ethically be responsible for
the employee’s vehicle even if they are off the clock. But it’s to a morality
limit of how close and to what extent they are being monitored. To prevent
damage to vehicles, “In 2010, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration
(OSHA) issued a letter to all employers stating that it is their
‘responsibility and legal obligation to create and maintain a safe and
healthful workplace, and that would include having a clear, unequivocal and
enforce policy against the hazard of texting while driving.” (Abcarian 2015).
This basically gave a pass to monitor employees company car and cell phone
activity. Megan clarified her concerns of the observation of employee’s usage
of vehicles thinking it’s illegal. Megan brought it to Debbie attention that
technically it should be consider unethical for an employee was just visiting a
sick hospitalized daughter. Debbie look at the situation as each employee has
rights to maintain clarity and use their own vehicle. Since it was a company car
it was a violation, and Megan attempt to save the situation was rejected.
At this point, what are Megan’s
alternatives to resolve her current dilemma about her involvement and knowledge
about GAC’s tracking employees? Debbie at this point was stern that big boy’s
play a different game and if she’s going to make it observing her employees is
going to be done. Megan defense is to note that employee have the right to sign
out a contract that tells them monitoring of company vehicles are done for the
safety of the employee. And this will save the company from any pending
violation in the future. The feeling of
Megan right or wrong understanding is to be left deflected from her true
emotion and stick to the business ethic of the matter. Because she’s not a
board member who make the rules her true nature is to oversee the daily activity
of her assignments. Being a six-month
employee has a lot to do with her feelings and questions that she does not
understand yet as a human resource employee. “An attempt to codify such a right
by the US Congress, the Location Privacy Protection Act of 2001 [55], was
proposed but not passed into law.” (Gundars Kaupins, Robert Minch, 2005). This
fail bill made Megan Jones emotions about protecting employee’s privacy rights a
debatable item.
Who should have a stake or an interest in
how GAC tracks and monitors its employees? If stakeholder voted to protect
their interest and modernizes the vehicles surveillance, then management should
create a department that does just that. To ask Megan Jones to keep what she
feels a violation in her mind secret then it’s an over step of her duty. Mobile surveillance company are up linked to
tracking systems that can keep watch on employees and vechiles plus cell
phones. “The global positioning system (GPS), able to determine location
outdoors worldwide, to sensor network, able to determine location inside
building rooms.” (Gundars Kaupins, Robert Minch, 2005). This should be handle
by professionals, I respect the ethics behind the motive to protect individual
employees but time has change and the insurance company value is based on the
law.
Work Cited
Michael
Abcarian, 2015, “monitoring Employees: How Far Can You Go?” Society For Human
Resource Management. Web. January 27, 2015. https://www.shrm.org/resourcestools/
hr-topics/risk-management/pages/monitoring-employees-gps.aspx 9/18/18
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