Abc Company Case Study

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FACTS: Luke, who is an employee of ABC Company, is assigned to build an adult retail store in Luke’s brother’s neighborhood. The announcement of the new adult retail store in one month will cause property value in the neighborhood to decrease. Owen, Luke’s brother, has recently received an offer to sell his house, but he is not sure whether he should sell his house yet. Owen is unaware of ABC Company’s plans to open an adult retail store and is hoping to get a better offer in the future once the real estate market improves. ISSUES: Luke is in the middle of an ethical dilemma known as conflict of interest. Should he display loyalty to the company by keeping the company’s plans to himself? Should he inform his brother in advance of the company’s…show more content…
In this ethical reasoning concept, it is important for Luke to identify the stakeholders and properly weigh the benefit and harm. Stakeholders could include anyone or anything that will be affected by the ethical decision. There are however, problems with this ethical reasoning concept. What is considered benefit and what is considered harm? Not all stakeholders can benefit, but how do we determine the extents of harm to those stakeholders who cannot benefit? Luke must analyze the benefits and harms of each situation to the stakeholders and compare the situations. He must then pick the situation from which the least amount of harm is caused. He must also consider his decision’s impact on every stakeholder. How would this affect his relationship with ABC Company? How would this affect his relationship with Owen? How would it affect the community and…show more content…
The benefits and harms of both the theories should be compared. Based on utilitarianism, Luke is aware that informing his brother could save Owen from a financial loss but also lead to several other problems. Besides jeopardizing Luke’s future career at ABC Company, the company and the buyer of the house would incur a loss and several employees would lose their jobs. The losses of telling Owen about the adult retail store are much greater than the benefit of saving Luke’s brother from a financial loss. This reasoning allows Luke to see the consequences of his actions on everyone and everything affected by the retail store. Though everyone does not favor this ethical reasoning technique, it makes it clear what would negatively affect majority of the stakeholders and which decision would cause the least harm. Keeping universal ethics in mind, Luke is able to place others in his place and view the effects of their decision. He can see the implications if everyone started sharing company information with their family and friends. The market would be in turmoil as companies lost trust in their employees, projects failed, and people lost their jobs. In this ethical reasoning situation, the loss incurred by a loved one seems minor compared to the loss suffered by the greater

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