RESPONSIBILITIES TO EMPLOYERS

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RESPONSIBILITIES TO EMPLOYERS COLLEGIALITY AND
LOYALTY Collegiality When engineering codes of
ethics mention collegiality, they generally cite
acts that constitute disloyalty, e.g NSPE code
states that Engineers shall not attempt to
injure, maliciously or falsely, directly or
indirectly, the professional reputation,
prospects, practice or employment of other
engineers, nor untruthfully criticise other
engineers work. Engineers who believe others
guilty of unethical or illegal practice shall
present such information to the proper authority
for action. Definition of Collegiality Collegial
ity is a kind of connectedness grounded in
respect for professional expertise and in
commitment to the goals and values of the
profession, andas such collegiality includes a
disposition to support and and cooperate with
ones colleagues. The central elements of
collegiality are respect, commitment,
connectedness, and cooperation.
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Respect is valuing ones peers for their
professional expertise and their devotion to the
social goods promoted by the profession. Commitmen
t means sharing a devotion to the moral ideals
inherent in the practice of engineering. Connected
ness means an awareness of being part of a
cooperative undertaking created by shared
commitment and expertise. Why is collegiality a
Virtue? From societys perspective, collegiality
is an instrumental value, it is good in promoting
professional aims, by sharing commitment with
others, supports personal efforts to act
responsibly in concert with colleagues and
strengthen ones motivation to live up to
professional standards. From professionals
perspectives, collegiality is intrinsically
valuable. It defines as professional community as
composed of many individuals jointly pursuing the
public good. Collegiality, like most virtues, can
be misused and distorted, such as when peers
appeal to it in urging silence about corporate
corruption. It is not an excuse or justification
for shielding irresponsible conduct. Collegiality
can degenerate into mere group interest, rather
than shared devotion to the public good.
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Two Senses of Loyalty Loyalty to an employer can
be two things a. Agency-loyalty is acting to
fulfil ones contractual duties to an employer.
These duties are specified in terms of the
particular tasks for which one is paid, as well
as the more general activities of co-operating
with colleagues and following legitimate
authority within the corporation. b.
Identification-loyalty, by contrast, has much to
do with attitudes, emotions, and a sense of
personal identity as it does to actions. It can
be regards as agency-loyalty that is motivated by
identification with the group to which one is
loyal. It implies seeking to meet ones moral
duties to a group or organisation willingly, with
personal attachment and affirmation. People who
detest their employers and companies, who do
their work grudgingly or spitefully, are not
loyal in this sense, even though they may
adequately perform all their work
responsibilities and hence manifest
agency-loyalty. When code of ethics assert that
engineers ought to be loyal to employers, or that
they should act as their employers or clients
faithful agents or trustees, it means that
engineers should avoid conflict of interest, to
inform employers of any possible of conflicts of
interest, to protect confidential information, to
be honest in making estimates, to admit ones
errors etc.
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Obligations of Loyalty What about
identification-loyalty Is it obligatory? John H.
Fielder argues that loyalty based on personal
identification is obligatory when two conditions
are met. 1. Employees must see some of their own
important goal as met by and through a group in
which they participate such as pleasures of
affiliating with the group, recognition from the
group that ones contribution are valuable, and
a sense of worth and accomplishment in pursuing
the goals of the group. 2. Employees must be
treated fairly, each receiving his/her share of
benefits and burdens. Once these conditions are
met, employees acquire obligations to identify
with groups and sometimes to support groups in
particular ways. Some corporations deserve
identification-loyalty from their employees, and
others do not. A company that regards its
workers as mere tools for maximising profits can
require agency-loyalty. A company that seeks to
maintain a sense of community in which
professionals and other employers are valued as
stakeholders, will probably achieve
identification loyalty. Identification-loyalty is
reciprocal Employees can be expected to be loyal
to companies only when companies show strong
commitments to them as well.
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Misguided Loyalty Sometimes inappropriate or
misguided loyalty to a leader or employer can
harm corporations, general public and also
co-workers. (Refer case study Clean Air Act
requirement on Ford Motor co. p
193). Professionalism and Loyalty Agency and
identification-loyalty are virtues depending on
the specific group, organisation, cause involved
and on the the circumstances in which they are
displayed. Loyalty is a virtue that has limits
and needs to be balanced against virtues of
responsible concern for the good of the public.
Therefore, loyalty is a dependent virtue it is
desirability depends on the value of the projects
and communities to which it contributes. Case
Study An applicant for employment in a number of
companies accepted employment with Company X,
knowing that he preferred employment in Company
Y. He did not get an offer from Company Y until
he after he had worked for Company X for three
months. He then changed to Company Y, and after
several months there he discovered that
employment conditions were not as good as they
were in Company X. He then applied at Company X
for re-employment. Did the person fails to act
loyally to Company Y?
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RESPECT FOR AUTHORITY Salaried engineers have
obligations to respect their employers
legitimate authority. What is the nature of this
authority, and how far should it be recognised by
salaried professionals as being morally
justified? Institutional Authority Institutional
authority is acquired, exercised, and defined
within institutions. It may be defined as the
institutional right given to a person to
exercised power based on the resources of the
institution. It is given to individuals in order
for them to meet their institutional duties -
their assigned tasks within an organisation. For
example, managers are given responsibilities to
make policy decisions and recommendation, oversee
projects and issue directives to subordinates. To
enable managers to meet these duties,
organisation assign them requisite authority. On
the other hand, project engineers have
institutional duty to ensure projects they
supervise are successfully completed and he must
be given rights that involve of
liberty. Institutional Vs. Expert Authority It is
clearly benefits institutions to give authority
to the individuals best qualified to serve the
institutions goals in a given capacity. Expert
authority is the possession of special knowledge,
skill, or competence to perform some task or give
advice.It is possible for engineers to have
expert authority but have little or no
institutional authority to make decision.
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Authority vs. Power Institutional authority must
also be distinguished from power. Institutional
authority typically carries with it an allotment
of resources needed to complete tasks.Ineffectual
persons may not be able to summon the power their
position allows them to exercise. Some may misuse
the power to force their subordinate to oblige.
People who are especially effective may acquire
great power or influence-power that goes beyond
the authority attached to the positions they
hold. Charismatic leaders often have influence
outside their domains of authority. Morally
Justified Authority An employer may have the
institutional authority to direct engineers to do
something that is not morally justified but
engineers may not obey if they consider that it
is against their moral duty. Institutional
authority is the institutional right to exercise
certain kinds of power, and this right is merely
the liberty that the rules of the institution say
a person has. Institutional duties are the duties
specified by the rules of the institution, either
directly as attached to offices and positions, or
indirectly as delegated by a superior. Rights and
duties are established to meet institutional
goals. In order to know whether the
institutional authority is morally justified, we
need to know (1) whether the institutional goals
are morally permissible or desirable (2) whether
the act violates basic moral duties.
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Accepting Authority Employees recognise their
employers authority when for the most part they
accept the guidance and obey the directives
issued by employer having to do with areas of
activity covered by employers institutional
authority. In Administrative Behaviour, Herbert
Simon states A subordinate is said to accept
authority whenever he permits his behaviour to be
guided by the decision of a superior without
independently examining the merits of that
decision . Simon notes that all employees place
limits on the zone of acceptance in which they
are willing to accept their employers authority.
But within that zone, an individual, relaxing
his own critical faculties, permits the
communicated decision of another person to guide
his own choice. Paramount Obligations Recent
codes of ethics typically state that an
engineers paramount obligation is to protect the
public health, safety, and welfare, rather than
the obligations of loyalty and faithful service
to employers. It is true? Paramount is
understood to mean chief in importance or
deserving primary emphasis. Most employers have
enormous power compared with engineers they
employ. They have the power to fire or take other
negative sanctions against individuals who fail
to meet their obligations to the employer.
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Paramount Obligations Recent codes of ethics
typically state that an engineers paramount
obligation is to protect the public health,
safety, and welfare, rather than the obligations
of loyalty and faithful service to employers. Is
it true? Paramount, in technical sense means
that whenever the obligations to employers and
public come into conflict, the obligation to the
public always takes precedence. Study
Question Bootlegging is making, transporting, or
selling something illegal against required
authorisation. In engineering contexts it is
often understood as working on projects that are
not properly authorised. The projects may be for
personal profit, for the sake of a client or
corporation.Is bootlegging permissible for the
following example? A companys policy on using
company resources for personal use is somewhat
vague. For example, it does not explicitly forbid
using the company copy machine for making a few
copies of family documents. It does, however,
explicitly forbid taking any company property out
of the corporation without approval from ones
supervisor (even pencils or eraser). It also
forbids using using the company phones for
personal calls, although in practice most
employees interpret this to mean long-distance
calls. Is the personal use of the company
materials in any of these instances morally
permissible or does respect for employers
authority imply obtaining permission first?
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CONFIDENTIALITY Keeping confidences is one of the
most central and widely acknowledge duties of any
professional. Definition Confidential
information is information deemed desirable to
keep secret. Engineers and other employees are
usually expected to withhold information labelled
confidential from unauthorised people both
inside and outside the organisation. What are the
criteria for identifying confidential
information? 1. ABET codes of ethics defines
asEngineers shall treat information coming to
them in the course of their assignments as
confidential. 2. Any information which if it
became known would cause harm to the corporation
or client. 3. Most business defines confidential
information as any information that the employer
or client would like to have kept secret in order
to compete effectively against business rivals.
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Confidentiality - Related Terms Privileged
information - means available only on the basis
of special privilege, such as the privilege
accorded an employee working on a special
assignment. Proprietary information - is the
information that a company owns or the proprietor
of. It is used primarily in a legal sense and are
ideas carefully defined by law. Another synonym
for proprietary information is trade secrets. It
can be virtually any type of information that has
not become public and which an employer has
taken steps to keep secret. It may be data about
designs and technical process, organisation of
plant facilities, quality control procedures,
customer lists, business plans etc. They are
protected by common law. Patents differ from
trade secrets. Patents legally protect specific
products from being manufactured and sold by
competitors without the express permission of the
patent holder. Patents are protected by statute
laws passed in order to provide incentives for
creativity. It gives the patent holder the reward
of legally protected monopoly.
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Justification and Limit The obligation of
confidentiality can be justified at two
levels. The first level - is to appeal three
ordinary moral considerations respect for
autonomy, respect for promises, and regard for
public well-being. The second level - is to
appeal directly to major ethical theories. Right
ethicists justify employees confidentiality
obligation by appealing to basic human rights.
Duty ethicists will emphasise the basic duties
of both employers and employees to maintain the
trust placed in them at the time they committed
themselves to an employment agreement, a
commitment that is understood to extend beyond
the time of actual employment. Rule-utilitarians
will view rules governing confidentiality as
justified to the extent that such rules produce
the most good for the greatest number of
people. Act-utilitarians will focus on each
instance where an employer decides on what is
count as confidential information . Is that act
the most beneficial for everyone affected by it?
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CONFLICT OF INTEREST Professional conflicts of
interest are situations where professionals have
an interest which if pursued might keep them from
meeting their obligations to their employers or
clients. Sometimes such an interest involves
serving in some other professional role, say, as
a consultant for a competitors company.Other
times it is a more it is a more personal
interest, such as making substantial private
investments in a competitors company. This
threat to meeting professional obligations makes
it clear why conflicts of interest have been
given prominence in engineering codes of ethics,
management policy and law. Impairment of
Judgement and Service Concern about conflicts of
interest largely centers on their potential to
distort good judgement, especially where
professionals are involved. Exercising good
judgement means arriving at beliefs on the basis
of expertise and experience, as opposed to merely
following simple rules.
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Conflict of interest typically arise when two
conditions are met 1) the professional is in a
relationship or role that requires exercising
good judgement on behalf of the interest of an
employer or client, and 2) the professional has
some additional or side interest that could
threaten good judgement in serving the interests
of employer or client Gifts and Bribes A bribe is
a substantial amount of money or goods offered
beyond a stated business contract with the aim of
winning an advantage in gaining or keeping the
contract. Substantial is a vague term, but it
alludes to amounts, beyond acceptable gratuities,
that are sufficient to distort the judgement of a
typical person. Typically, bribes are made in
secret. Gifts are not bribes, as long as they are
small gratuities offered in the normal conduct of
business. Prearranged payments made by
contractors to companies or their representatives
in exchange for contracts actually granted are
called kickbacks.
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Manila hotel owner faces homicide rap

• MANILA Philippine investigators were given until
  late yesterday to wrap up a probe into a hotel
  blaze that killed 78 people, with the owner
  likely to be charged with homicide for violating
  safety codes, officials said. The management of
  Manor Hotel was initially found to have committed
  many offences of the fire code, including
  failing to install a sprinkler system, emergency
  lighting and have unobstructed fire exits,
  officials said. The three-hour blaze ate through
  the middle floors of the hotel in suburban Quezon
  City on Saturday, transforming the six-storey
  building into a death trap for the 200-odd
  guests. Investigators said faulty wiring could
  have triggered the fire, which quickly sent thick
  black smoke into passageways and overcame
  victims. trapped inside rooms with iron-grilled
  balconies. Scores of helpless guests were seen
  weeping and waving to firemen along the
  balconies, crying and begging for help. Firemen
  had to train water hoses on victims as they
  frantically sawed through the metal bars. Many of
  those who died were born-again Christians from
  out of town attending a one-week evangelisation
  seminar by the Texas-based Don Clowers Ministry.

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The investigation is ongoing right now and we
will try our best to finish it today (Sunday) and
file a case with the city prosecutor's office
early morning tomorrow (Monday), Senior
Superintendent Romeo Villafuerte, chief of the
task force created to probe the accident, told
AFP. He said city engineers and license officers
and others who issued pertinent documents to
Manor may also be asked to give statements, amid
radio reports the hotel management had paid
bribes for officials to turn a blind eye to
violations of safety regulations. Interior
Secretary Jose Lina had given the task force
only 48 hours to finish the probe and transmit
findings to prosecutors, Villafuerte said. He
said the hotel owner, whom he identified as
William Tan Henato, could be charged with
multiple homicide resulting from negligence and
recklessness. The prosecutor will be the one to
name the case, there were many violations of the
fire code, he said. Quezon City Mayor Feliciano
Belmonte vowed a get to the bottom of this
noting that it was a logical conclusion that
corrupt city hall officials connived with the
hotel management.