Business Ethics: Values, Theories, and Case Studies

            Small, unethical transgressions often seem innocuous and employees often rationalize their misconducts to justify their actions. They develop an attitude that no one got hurt following the transgression and everyone does it. It is these minor ethical abstractions that motivate people who are good to gradually do more bad things that may end up being measured as major ethical transgressions as they find themselves comfortable with what they do. Minor ethical abstractions are taken seriously more than all the other cases (Cohn 2014). This is because they usually end up making it easier for the people to justify other bigger serious unethical conducts. Over time, these minor ethical transgressions such as stealing a pen at the workplace can place employees in positions where they will gradually increase their unethical behaviors. However, most of the individuals’ often just small recklessness as opposed to other major unethical behaviors. Unfortunately, moral disengagement is likely to happen when unethical behavior increases progressively over time rather than immediately (Cohn 2014). Minor ethical abstractions ought to be taken seriously and the victims should be reprimanded with an immediate effect since minor unethical behaviors may develop into major violations with time if they are left unchecked.

            Therefore, to help control and prevent unethical misconducts in workplaces, the human resource managers should emphasize strong ethical policies and should also deal with minor ethical transgressions before they rise. Through instilling of strong ethical culture that clearly defines and punishes transgression, will put employees in a more vigilant mindset. The company should also take part in offering ethics training to their employees while the managers should continually enact and reinforce ethical standards.  

References

Cohn, E. (2014). Stealing a Pen at Work Could Turn You On to Much Bigger Crimes. Retrieved from:                 https://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/06/25/stealing-from-work-corporate-    fraud_n_5530999.html