MGT 501 Arizona State University Personal Ethics Reflection Paper

Personal Ethics Reflections Paper
MGT 501
The goal of this paper is for you to discuss your inputs to the class as they relate to personal ethics
(your self-assessments and personal decisions on the ethical dilemmas), reflect on what you believe this
says about you, analyze which elements from the lectures and readings are most relevant to your sense of
self, and develop a plan going forward for excellence in ethics that integrates your inputs and experiences
with class content and framed in the manner of a developmental plan.
Inputs:
 Introductory Survey and Defining Issues Survey (attach summarized results)
 Ethical dilemma Summary (table with point distributions across cases)
Format of the paper:
1) Discuss your survey results. How were your results similar to peers? Where were your scores
relatively high/low vs. other scores and vs. peer scores? Comment on interesting patterns and
themes and discuss what they say about you.
2) Describe an ethical dilemma or situation with complex ethics that you’ve dealt with and describe
how you handled it. Make sure the situation is typical, and not atypical, of the person you are and
how you deal with ethical problems. Try very hard to write up a situation that has occurred since
you enrolled in college – students often write up situations that occur when they were very young
and it’s not always clear whether the situation is really revealing as to who you are now as a
graduate student. In writing up this dilemma, apply the course concepts you’ve learned in a way
that demonstrates mastery of course content (we don’t have exams in 501 so this is how I assess
your learning).
3) Discuss your weekly ethical dilemma cases. Choose any 4 to write up. Choose wisely – which are
most revealing into who you really are and what you really value? Or, which are most problematic
and caused you the most opportunity for reflection or concern? Focus more on your rationales
than the decisions themselves. Compare and contrast yourself with your peers in the class, such as
average results and their decisions on cases, and differences in their predominant justifications for
their decisions as well. Where are you similar to your peers? In what ways are you unique relative
to your peers? In this section, focus primarily on each case individually and describing the
rationales behind your decisions. Write each case up in one or more paragraphs and draw on
course concepts to articulate your arguments.
4) Integrated Personal Reflection. In this section you’ll put the above 3 pieces together and make an
overall self-assessment. In what ways are the 3 pieces consistent – that is, what patterns, themes,
or trends are emerging across the inputs? Based on the totality of your inputs (surveys,
experiences, dilemmas) and comparison and contrast to others, what can you say about yourself
generally? How would you now evaluate yourself regarding your biggest strengths as it relates to
making ethical decisions and engaging in ethical conduct? What are your biggest potential
challenges/ obstacles/ areas for improvement? Again, make especially sure you are drawing
heavily on course concepts discussed and assigned the first half of the semester.
5) Developmental Plan. In this section, you will write recommendations for self-improvement so you
can engage in continuous improvement as an ethical decision maker and actor. In order to do this,
you should start with what you’ve written to this point, especially your areas for improvement
identified above. Then, you should apply principles of management by objectives and SMART goals
(see below for a primer) in order to a) lay out specific goals and objectives for future
1
improvements, b) how to carry them out, and c) how to assess your attainment of these goals and
objectives. Write the paper with a 2-3 year time horizon for growth and improvement.
6) Appendix. To ensure proper reporting of all data inputs, I am attaching an Appendix to the end of
this document. Fill out the document and paste that one page to the back of your paper.
Management by Objectives (MBO) and SMART goals – a primer
Management by Objectives (you can google or search Wikipedia if you like) basically argues that
professionals should identify goals for attainment in their jobs, and methods for achieving those goals,
methods for assessing (often quantitatively) whether or not those goals have been achieved. In
organizations, this is often done in consultation with a supervisor and part of a performance review.
SMART goals, derived from Ed Locke’s Goal Setting Theory, argue that some types of goals are much
more motivational and helpful for performance than others. Specifically, effective goals should be:
•
Specific – target a specific area for improvement.
•
Measurable – quantify or at least suggest an indicator of progress.
•
Assignable – specify who will do it.
•
Realistic – state what results can realistically be achieved, given available resources.
•
Time-related – specify when the result(s) can be achieved.
The more specific a goal is, the easier it is to understand, implement and measure. The more
measurable a goal is, the more we can monitor progress rather than simply assume we’ve achieved it.
Assignable goals are less likely to “fall through the cracks”; accountability is ensured. By the way, do
not assume that this plan will only involve YOU. Important friends, family, and professional peers and
supervisors can and should be considered in your plan. Realistic goals, as opposed to overly optimistic
goals, motivate performance. Ridiculous goals (like my goal in high school to win the Olympic 1500
meters someday rather than try to improve my mile time by 15 seconds per year) tend to lead to
disappointment. On the other hand, realistic goals should be challenging enough that there is a nontrivial chance of failure. They should be ambitious goals, such that you should strive, could fall a little
short, and still feel like you’ve accomplished something substantial, and feel aroused to continue to
improve. Finally, time-related goals are self-evident from the term, but do not assume all goals should
be on the same time horizon. Some goals might be attainable in a shorter time frame, or represent
intermediate goals on the way to better future outcomes.
Implementation and Assessment of Goals
What specifically will you do to attain these goals? What acts will you engage in? Hint: Don’t think so
much about, “when faced with a dilemma, I will do the right thing.” Think more about regular habits,
regular behaviors, things that will reinforce your sense of doing right, things that will increase your
comfort and courage to do the right thing, things to improve your awareness of being in dilemmas,
things to improve your creativity, etc.
Finally, what will you do to answer the “how am I doing” question? What standards will you use to
identify whether you are an (increasingly) ethical professional and person? How will you gather this
data or information? How will you interpret it?
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Other comments
The paper should be doubled-spaced, 12pt, Times New Roman font, 1” margins, and perhaps at least 68 pages in length. There is no upper limit on how long the paper can be – this is a reflection paper and if
you feel you have a lot to reflect on and write about that is perfectly reasonable. Additionally, you
should cite any and all references and put those in a separate reference section. I am not a stickler for
citation methods, but if you are looking guidance you can’t go wrong by going online, looking at APA
formatting standards, and using those. Then, write up each of the sections discussed in this document,
with a separate section for each. Your recommendations should also serve as the paper’s conclusion,
though you are encouraged to write one short concluding paragraph at the end.
Rubric: I will use the following rubric to assess the paper
CRITERION
Writeup of surveys covers key areas of uniqueness and provides clear justification behind
them in a clear and plausible manner by correctly applying course concepts. Self is compared
effectively to peers.
Personal ethical problem is conveyed richly and provides clear justification behind them in a
clear and plausible manner by correctly applying course concepts.
Write-up of weekly dilemmas integrates actions, rationales, and underlying principles in a
clear and plausible manner by correctly applying course concepts. Self is compared
effectively to peers.
Self-analysis portrays a holistic and accurate view of self by integrating all inputs. Personal
strengths and weaknesses flow naturally from this holistic view. Course concepts are applied
throughout self-analysis.
Recommendations build on above sections. The section builds effectively from principles of
management by objectives and SMART goals, and identifies specific, implementable actions
the student can do to meet these goals as well as clear and practical methods for assessing
goal attainment.
Paper shows high degree of insight and creativity, goes beyond most obvious/basic points.
Score / possible
points
/10
/10
/15
/20
/15
/10
Paper in general applies appropriate course material at a high level of understanding and
application. Concepts are integrated such that they do not dwell on definitions but are
employed clearly and transparently, and make sense of inputs, reflections, analysis, and
recommendations. An array of concepts are applied, not just the same few over and over.
Paper in general is clearly and effectively written with solid grammar, composition, and style,
and complies fully with guidelines including a complete and accurate appendix.
TOTAL (out of 100)1
/10
/10
/100
Note that the way the criteria are written they tend to build on each other. Thus, if a student does poorly
on the some items, it may prove hard to score maximum points on the later criteria as well.
1
This is the percentage score.
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Appendix A: Survey & Dilemma Results
Fill out and attach to back of Ethical Reflections Paper
Instructions: Type in your scores from the Intro Survey, the Defining Issues Survey, and your
Ethical Dilemma Response Forms. The number after the slash is the class average (averages have
changed slightly to reflect recent data).
Your Score
BE-O
BE-I
PE-Pre
PE-Conv
PE-Post
CSR
Enviro
Sustain
Your Score
/20.0
/7.3
/5.7
/6.6
/7.5
/16.4
/24.3
/15.2
L1: Obedience/Punishment
L2: Exchange
L3: Relationships
L4: Social System/Conscience
L5: Social Contract/Utility
L6: Universal Ethical Principles
/1.3
/1.7
/1.9
/2.7
/2.5
/2.0
For the in-class Ethical Dilemmas, you were to allocate 100 points across the Kohlberg ethical
levels to reflect their relative influence in your decision-making. Please type those results in
below. You only need to do this for the 4 dilemmas you’ll write up in the paper, but are
encouraged to write in all results.
Criterion
Drug
Test
Term of
Friend
Cust
Advice
TE Rpt
Admin
Costs
Program Obs.
Rights
Product
1. Obedience/Punishment.
2. Personal gain/exchange
3. Expectations of others close to
me
4. Societal/cultural
norms/expectations
5. Stakeholder rights/freedoms,
social contract, utility
6. Ethical principles (see Byron).
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