Ethical responsibility

Question 1

Ethical responsibility requires an individual to follow an ethically truthful pathway when conducting their activities. Whether it is in a management position or regular staff duties ethical responsibility should be observed. Managers and supervisors carry the biggest duty when it comes to exercising ethical responsibilities for the reason that they encounter numerous challenges where they are required to act ethically.  As an Assistant Controller, my job is to supervise, safeguard and foster the interests of the institution, thus, my duties are to act in a truthful and fair manner in all counts (IMA 1). Any deviation by an employee from the set code of conduct must be observed and taken as unlawful and unethical. Every employee prior to acquiring a position in this institution is given an awareness regarding the conduct that they are supposed to follow. This set code of conduct preserves and keeps the company in business. If the clients learn that unethical behavior of any sort is tolerated in the institution they are keep away from its services. Thus, for the case of the employee, I possess an ethical responsibility to extend action to the defiant staff. This is because she is breaking rules voluntarily and is acting against the best interest of the institution. Any reason provided for the unethical act will not be taken into consideration since they are not part of the institutions best interests (IMA 2). Additionally her inefficient performance is a threat to the institutions existence. If other employees learnt that the unlawful conduct is tolerated they would mostly engage in it or see prejudice in my actions as the supervisor.

Question 2

Regarding the IMA Codes of Ethics, her unwarranted deeds have broken the required conduct. She has broken the integrity, credibility and competence elements. Firstly, for integrity: she engages in activities that prevent her from carrying out her actual duties ethically. Her actions present an act of conflict of interest whereby she seems to be acquiring funds on the side thereby pretending to perform her duties when she actually is not. Integrity requires performance to ones best interest towards what they actually are required to do, this is not the case since she is even underperforming (Ziegenfuss, and Martinson 15).    Secondly, for credibility: the dictionary’s definition of credibility is the element of being plausible or rather trustworthy. The employee fails this test since she has been engaging in secret actions that serve self interests away from the interests of the institution that has hired her. One fails the test of credibility once they engage in lies and that qualifies them to be untrustworthy. The employee has been lying for the longest time due to personal reasons that she would have raised with the management. These actions show that she cannot be depended upon or accorded any future trustworthy required duties since she may lie about them by not performing them (IMA 2). Thirdly, her inefficiency in performance is also a failure; this raises the question of competence. Competence definition is the capability to perform an action efficiently and accomplish the required results. The fact that she is underperforming raises several questions regarding her competence. It might be due to her side engagements that she can barely concentrate on the actual job or she could be unqualified or has no capability to tackle the duties she has been accorded. Her competence places the business at risk of being discredited by the clients and ultimately losing business. Her position requires high levels of proficiency, skill and accuracy since it entails dealing with lives of people. This is a business that requires highly competent individuals and she has proven to be inefficient.

Question 3

My personal code of ethics cannot conflict with the IMA Code of Ethics since in entails fairness, competence, professionalism among others. The IMA code of conduct is a widely encompassing and accommodative list of requirements or rules. This list checks for the interests of every person that is both the employers and the employees. I would even recommend that every manager align most of their personal code of conducts with the IMA codes (Ziegenfuss, and Martinson 36). I personally value competence; this is because every person is hired and rewarded due to their proficiency in work. Any deviation is regarded as incompetence and inability to carry out duties.  Secondly, fairness is one code that I exercise this entails treating every staff equally and according to the rules devoid of discrimination thus, if one employee breaks the rules they will face the subsequent punishment without favoritism.

Question 4

In terms of dealing with the underlying issue, I would utilize the stated channels of dealing with the issue. I would also involve the superiors in deciding the course of action that is appropriate towards the staffer. Additionally, since the employee never before stated her case then awarding her a consideration would be rare and it would not be possible to predict whether her actions would recur in the future if pardoned (IMA 3). The interests of the company would be vital in deciding her fate since she previously failed to raise her concerns and her actions are fatal to the business existence and performance. 

Works Cited

IMA. IMA – The association of accountants and financial professionals working in business. N.p., 2011. Web. 30 Aug. 2014. <http://www.imanet.org/pdfs/statement%20of%20Ethics_web.pdf>.

Ziegenfuss, Douglas E., and Otto B. Martinson. “The IMA code of ethics and IMA members’ ethical perception and judgment.” Managerial Auditing Journal (2002): n. pag. Print.