The Case of Competitive Intelligence Theft
Discuss about the Business Ethics for Management and Transmission.
Business ethics is a form of professional ethics which examines the moral and ethical principles and issues which arise in the business environment. Ethics is defined as a set of principles which are used to determine what is right when it is about the behavior and conduct of an individual. Nowadays, technology is changing the way in which business operates. Data storage, gathering, management and transmission are developing the spread and utilization of data (Hartman, DesJardins and MacDonald, 2014). In addition to this, the modern technology is creating issues for the business and its managers. In this report, an ethical issue faced by Michael Vasquez is discussed. The report includes the issue that Michael‘s boss has gathered the confidential information about its closest competitor. It was the competitive intelligence report of competitor that makes Michael very uncomfortable about using these materials, understanding that the information is illegally obtained. This report answers the questions related to the case study.
By reading the given case study, it can be stated that Michael Vasquez is facing the situation of competitive intelligence theft. Michael Vasquez, a new product manager for a technology firm was given a competitive intelligence report of competitor. This information is handed him by his boss that contains confidential and proprietary information which can give competitive advantage to Michael’s firm. The case study shows that the data is obtained by using an illegal tap into the servers of competitors.
In this situation, Michael is very uncomfortable and wondering that what to do with the data given to him. It shows that it is the ethical issue of stealing the competitors’ confidential information that includes product plans, pricing strategies and partnership agreements. In this way, this is the ethical issue related to competitive intelligence. Competitive intelligence theft is the approach of boundary spanning and it includes obtaining the important and confidential information of competing brands (Laube, and Böhme, 2016). It is an unethical way to grasp the data about competitors. Moreover, this issue put Michael in a difficult situation as his boss told him to use these documents to the benefits of company. In this state, Michael is not able to make the decision that what he should do with this information about the competitors.
In this situation, Michael can take two actions to overcome this ethical dilemma. Under the first option, he should confront to his boss and make him understand that he is not comfortable with how unethically the competitive intelligence is obtained and what proprietorship of them states about the culture of company. Michael should try to clear to his boss that it will be an unethical action done by the company of it will use competitors stolen data into own company’s benefits. It should try to change the perception of his boss towards competitive intelligence. In addition to the question of legitimacy of utilizing the data, he should make his boss understand that it is public relation nightmare waiting to occur. In this option, the virtue theory of ethics can be implemented (Chonko, 2012). Virtue theory is an important ethical theory that judges a person by his or her character rather than by an action that may differ from his or her normal behavior. In this case, Michael will be making a perception about his boss according to his action like he has been engaged in corporate intelligence predicament. It takes the reputation and morals of a person into account when rating an irregular and unusual behavior which is considered unethical. According to this theory, Michael should judge his boss’s behavior by his action and make efforts to change his perception by confronting him (Battaly, 2015).
Overcoming the Ethical Dilemma – Two Options
Another suggested option is that Michael should talk to the legal counsel of the organization and competitive intelligence professionals so that they can guidance over this ethical dilemma. These bodies will guide Michael how he can manage this issue that is related to competitive intelligence aspect. After discussing with them, they should act accordingly according to the guidance. These bodies can give the knowledge about the imposed laws and regulations to Michael (Neubert and Dyck, 2016). This option can be understood by implementing the deontology theory of moral ethics. According to this theory, the individuals should comply with their duties and obligations when engaged in decision making. Under this option, after discussing with the legal counsel Michael should take any action. It should follow the related policies and regulations related to competitive intelligence predicament. In this case, deontology theory will assist Michael to make consistent decision.
By analyzing the situation given in the case study, the actions of Michael’s boss can be perceived as unethical because it is the case of theft of competitive intelligence. He has obtained the confidential data of closest competitor from the internet servers. This information includes the product plans, pricing strategies and partnership agreements. In this situation, when Michael asked his boss that where he obtained the data from, his boss told him that he had gathered them from the servers of competing brand. He said that he got into the private section on their intranet and downloaded this private data. It indicates that Michael’s boss has stolen this information from their intranet by having unauthorized access to their system. It clearly shows that he has broken the passwords of company (Luu, 2014). Evaluating the information is an important part of competitive intelligence. Getting confidential information via illegal practices is regarded to be extremely unethical or illegal. The case clearly indicates that the deeds of Michael’s boss are unethical because they can copy this information and practice in its operations. After some time, when Boss realized that Michael is suspicious about his act, he has changed his statement and said that he had got electronic access through a colleague and he had not hacked the passwords (Murphy, 2016). Thus, it can be perceived that the behavior of Michael’s boss is unethical in company’s business.
As discussed above, it is the case of competitive intelligence theft in which Michael’s boss has obtained the proprietary and confidential information about its closest competing firm by accessing its intranet servers. It is unethical to get the information by accessing the passwords of other companies. First, Michael should confront his boss about the wrongful act done by him. According to virtue theory, he should have a conversation with his boss and he should tell him about the negative consequences of this unethical issue of competitors’ data theft. If Michael is not able to convince his boss to change his perception then he should blow the whistle the organization (Battaly, 2015).
Ethics in Business Decision Making
Whistle blowing is the act of informing the authorities or the public that the company in which one is working for is engaged in some illegal and immoral acts. In an organization, whistle blowing is the practice of informing about someone or placing a stop to something wrong. Whistleblower is the person who has and provides the insider knowledge of wrongful acts and activities happening in a workplace. Whistleblower is an individual that gives the information about the misconduct of an employee to higher authorities (Henik, 2015). There are various laws which safeguard the whistleblowers from being mistreated and fired for informing the wrongful act.
In an organization, there may be various factors which motivate the individuals to engage in whistle blowing activities. One of the major motivations to whistle blowing is an intrinsic sense of integrity and justice. When looking for the justice the whistleblower seeks to hold the wrongdoers responsible for the misconduct. Another factor that motivates whistle-blowing is self-preservation (Turteltaub, 2014). There are some individuals in every organization who fight for ethics. These people work as whistle-blowers and their internal values motivate them towards whistle blowing. In addition to this, there are various whistleblower reward programs which are conducted by company’s management and government officials that encourage the organizational people to bring the unethical or wrongful act which they see at work to light.
There are some circumstances where whistleblowing is justified. These conditions are given below:
- When an employee recognizes a serious challenge of harm to employees, customers, other stakeholders and acts against his/her ethical concern.
- When there will be proper reasons to believe that revealing the unethical act to public will change the organization are essential to overcome the situation (Singh, 2014).
- Moreover, there will be the situation of product or policy which can harm the public considerably.
In this given case, Michael should blow the whistle and discuss boss’s wrongful act with legal counsel and other people (Vandekerckhove, 2016).
Ethics plays an important role in the business as it assists the organization to make rights decisions in right situations. On the basis of given case, it can be analyzed that ethics concerns to the moral judgment of an individual about the right and wrong. The decisions which are made within a firm may be taken by the individuals, but who makes them they will be affected by the company’s culture (Trevino and Nelson, 2016). The given case study shows that Michael is not comfortable with the unethical act done by his boss. There are various reasons which show that ethics are relevant to the business. Four reasons are given below:
One of the major reasons to develop ethics to business is that it communicates to employees that their organization is committed to operate the business responsibly. It enables company’s employees about ethical expectations and standards. In the given case, Michael’s boss is unable to develop an ethical environment and he encouraged his people to use stolen data of competing brands. Michael’s boss needs to develop an ethical culture and establish code of ethics that will grow among employees across the firm (Teulon, 2014). The company needs to understand their responsibility towards society and its stakeholders including competitors.
Importance of Developing an Ethical Culture
Ethics lays the business to make strategic decision for the organization. Ethics are relevant to the business as they assist leaders and workers to develop ethical behavior so that they can make effective decisions (Iphofen, 2016). These ethical decisions will be acceptable socially. In addition to this, ethics in business enables stakeholder to contribute in decision making process.
In addition to above, this is one of the most significant reasons behind business ethics relevancy. Establishment of business ethics makes the employees and customers feel that the organization values its integrity. It will assist the organization to develop an environment of honesty and responsibility.
In the absence of code of ethics, the organization may face the situation as Michael has faced. It can lead the Michael’s organization to public relation issue and it can harm its brand reputation. For a business, it is very important to develop right ethics so that it can maintain and enhance its brand position among society and stakeholders (Lefkowitz, 2017).
Conclusion
From the above analysis, it can be concluded that ethics plays a significant role in the growth of an organization. The given case study shows that company is engaged in the issue of competitive intelligence. The utilization and obtaining of competitive intelligence is becoming very important in every industry. It is very important for an organization to develop right ethics at right place so that it can make strategic decisions for business. By having code of ethics, a business can avoid the possible threats and address the issues when they arise in the workplace.
References
Battaly, H. (2015) A pluralist theory of virtue. Current Controversies in Virtue Theory. Routledge, 7-21.
Chonko, L. (2012) Ethical Theories, Available from https://www.dsef.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/07/EthicalTheories.pdf. [Accessed on 8 June 2018].
Hartman, L.P., DesJardins, J.R. and MacDonald, C., (2014) Business ethics: Decision making for personal integrity and social responsibility. New York: McGraw-Hill.
Henik, E. (2015) Understanding whistle-blowing: A set-theoretic approach. Journal of Business Research, 68(2), 442-450.
Iphofen, R., (2016) Ethical decision making in social research: A practical guide. Springer.
Laube, S. and Böhme, R. (2016) The economics of mandatory security breach reporting to authorities. Journal of Cybersecurity, 2(1), pp.29-41.
Lefkowitz, J. (2017) Ethics and values in industrial-organizational psychology. Taylor & Francis.
Luu, T. (2014) Knowledge sharing and competitive intelligence. Marketing Intelligence & Planning, 32(3), 269-292.
Murphy, C. (2016) competitive intelligence: Gathering, Analysing and Putting it to Work. Routledge.
Neubert, M. J., and Dyck, B. (2016) Developing sustainable management theory: goal-setting theory based in virtue. Management Decision, 54(2), 304-320.
Singh, A. (2011) Competitive Intelligence: What’s Unethical About It? Available from https://www.cnbc.com/id/41989038. [Accessed on 8 June 2018].
Teulon, F. (2014) Ethics, moral philosophy and Economics. Financial Economics, pp.28-8.
Trevino, L. K., and Nelson, K. A. (2016) Managing business ethics: Straight talk about how to do it right. John Wiley & Sons.
Turteltaub, A., (2014) Why Risk It? The Motivations of a Whistleblower, Available from https://complianceandethics.org/risk-motivations-whistleblower/. [Accessed on 8 June 2018].
Vandekerckhove, W. (2016) Whistleblowing and organizational social responsibility: A global assessment. Routledge.
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