McCaskey Case Analysis free essay sample

Martha McCaskey is a recent employee of Seleris Associates’ Industry Analysis Division. She has been working for the consulting company for the past eighteen months. Throughout this time, her supervisors and managers have been very satisfied with the work she has been performing for their company. Not only does she perform group assignments by herself, but she also conducts thorough research, and completes her assignments in an outstanding, and timely manner. As a result of her outstanding work, both the senior vice-president, and the vice-president are convinced that she can be able to perform one of the toughest projects that is very crucial to the company. Along with her experience, and expertise, her knowledge and background in electric engineering are factors that made her supervisors allocate to her such a hard task. However, she is faced with an ethical dilemma between her values and principles, and the values of her supervisors. We will write a custom essay sample on McCaskey Case Analysis or any similar topic specifically for you Do Not WasteYour Time HIRE WRITER Only 13.90 / page Malone, the vice-president, along with the marketing manager do not mind how the information needed to complete the project will be obtained, whether it is in an ethical or unethical manner. On the one hand, McCaskey does not feel comfortable with obtaining the information from the target company in an unethical way. However, the only way she can complete the project is to get information from Devon, who essentially has all the necessary information. On the other hand, she is under the impression that Devon is offering her too much help, or he either wants to know who she is working for. However, McCaskey is presented with significant incentives to get the project done. Not only is she going to be promoted to group manager, but she is also going to receive a significant increase in pay, and she will also be assigned ten more similar projects with greater benefits. Besides all these incentives McCaskey is presented with, she would not be defined as a â€Å"committed employee†. According to Osland, Kold, Rubin, and Turner, scholarly definitions of employee commitment include strong belief in, and acceptance of the organization’s values and principles, and most importantly a strong desire to remain in the organization (9). Not only do McCaskey’s values and principles differ from the one of the company she works for, she also does not show a strong desire to remain in the organization. Additionally, the psychological contract between herself and her managers is broken on the side of the managers because when she was interviewing for the position, she had some expectations that were not met throughout the time. She was with the company. Some of these expectations include working overtime without any raise in pay, or a promise of getting some time off work upon the completion of one of the crucial and lengthy project of the company. Among her expectations, engaging in unethical behavior could not have come across her mind. If she knew that the job she was obtaining involved unethical actions, and not meeting her expectations; it is more likely that she would not have taken the job offer. Along with a pinch in the psychological contract, and misinterpretation and failure to meet expectations on both sides (employers-employees), both employers and employees have engaged or are more likely to engage in unethical actions. Research proved that 75% of employees have stolen from their employers at least once (Applebaum, Deguire, and Lay, 46). In addition to this fact, it is estimated that between 33% and 75% of all employees have engaged in other unethical and aggressive behaviors such as fraud, theft, vandalism, and sabotage (Applebaum, Deguire, and Lay, 47). The key managerial problem that McCaskey is facing is to decide whether she should engage in unethical behavior in order to receive a promotion, a raise in pay, and all other incentives she has been presented with, or if she should consider other alternatives to solving the ethical dilemma she is now facing. Now, she is starting to question the values of the company she is working for. Essentially, many consulting firms, and all other companies in general have formal, and written policies, laws, rules, and norms that all employees should follow. This is not the case for Seleris’ Associates. They do not have any formal, and written policies and rules. Now that McCaskey is presented with all these issues, she has to decide what is the best decision for her. She only has to make one decision out of two possible choices or alternatives. One of the alternatives would be to leave the company, and seek another job. The second alternative would be to obtain the proprietary information from the target company, and to complete the project in order to be promoted, and receive all the benefits she has been promised to receive. The third alternative is to talk to someone in the company in order to voice her concerns. The second alternative seems more attractive, and appealing to a single worker who is only 29 years old, and who has been praised by her managers from the time she started working, let alone all the incentives she has been presented with. However, upon analyzing the pros and cons of proceeding with the completion of the project, the cons outweigh the pros. One of the cons of obtaining the information from Devon, the semiconductor industry consultant who had worked for Seleris’ competitor for twelve years, is that it is unethical, and she is well aware of it. Another negative aspect of this option is that McCaskey had noticed that there was no significant distinction between senior associates (her current position), and group managers (the position she was promised to be promoted to upon completion of the Silicon 6 project). Although this was an incentive for her to proceed with the project, she would not see a major difference between her current position, and the one she would be promoted to. Given the fact that being promoted would be one of the major incentives for everyone who would be in McCaskey’s position, the fact that there would be no major difference in terms of task identity, significance, and responsibilities, and a significant raise in pay would be major factors to consider when deciding to either engage in immoral behavior or not. Additionally, it is more likely that McCaskey get assigned similar projects like the Silicon 6, where she would have to obtain proprietary information in an immoral way. Besides the benefits McCaskey would receive upon the completion of the project, the other only option she can go about solving this issue would be to let Kauffmann, her coworker meet with Devon, as Kauffmann has more experience in getting proprietary information from target companies. Although she might ask Kauffmann to meet with Devon, the vice-president may still want her to use the information obtained by Kauffmann because she is the Silicon 6 project leader, and she has been recognized to be one of their best senior associates. The reason why this project is crucial to Seleris’ Associates is that it accounts for 20% of the industry division’s revenues. Using the information obtained by her coworker in unethical way (given the fact that she is aware that obtaining that information is not the right thing to do), she would still not be honest in her work. Now, McCaskey is in need of help to decide the righteous thing to do, and there are few suggestions that she can consider applying. One suggestion that McCaskey could implement would be to inform Malone, the vice-president that obtaining detailed information about manufacturing Processes, and costs about the Silicon 6 project would be going against her moral values and beliefs. Even though it would not be an easy matter to discuss with someone who has different values and beliefs, it is McCaskey’s responsibility to speak up for herself, and express her concerns. If Malone reacts negatively to her concerns, then McCaskey should leave the company, as her moral values would not be taken into consideration. This would be the best decision that McCaskey would have to take because one of the major responsibilities of a company is to respect their employee’s moral values. Additionally, Seleris’ Associates Industry Analysis Division must have a mission statement, or clear and well-stated formal and written policies, rules, and norms that all employees should comply with. On the other hand, the obstacles that McCaskey might come across if she chooses to proceed with the project would be to knowingly perform unethical actions, in addition to compromising her moral and ethical values, principles, and beliefs. Being in full consciousness that an action is immoral, and still engage in the action is considered as a criminal offense. She might also be running the risk that Devon may discover that she is an employee of his company’s rival. My recommendation to McCaskey would be to leave the company because she has different values compared to those of the company, and the authorities of the company. Using her personality in the decision process is also a contributing factor because during the meeting with Devon, McCaskey was not comfortable, and she kept asking herself if she was doing the right thing. As it appears to me, I feel like McCaskey is a righteous person, and that she has moral values and beliefs (given the way she was feeling about the meeting with Devon), therefore she should seek for another company where she will not have to compromise what she believes in. In seeking another job, she should be careful as to land a similar job to the previous one she had. She should seek for a company that will provide her with intrinsic motivation as opposed to extrinsic motivation. For the eighteen months she had been working with Seleris’ Associates, her motivation was more extrinsic. Given the fact that McCaskey has a time constraint in her decision (less than a week to complete the project), instead of meeting with Devon, she should use that time to start writing a resignation letter informing her managers about her decision, and being explicitly clear about the reasons why she is leaving. She would clearly state that her moral values and principles do not align with those of her managers, and the company as whole. In the letter, she would assert that she will be leaving the company within two weeks, but in the meantime she will not be performing any work. She would reveal that it is with such an immense disappointment that she has to leave the company because her moral conscience does not allow her to engage in unethical behavior. She would end the resignation letter by giving them words for thought relating to the principles and values of their company, and also by raising her concerns and thoughts about immoral behavior in the workplace.