Professor John Hooker calls ethics rational choice for people and business professionals.

Professor John Hooker calls ethics rational choice for people and business professionals.

Ethical Decision Making

Discussion Resources

Professor John Hooker calls ethics “rational choice” for people and business professionals. Use one or more of the following sources on business ethics to familiarize yourself with Hooker’s ethical tests:

Ethical Decisions. (n.d.). How to analyze. https://ethicaldecisions.net/how-to-analyze-an-ethical-dilemma/

Hooker, J. (2008). Ethics as a rational choice [PDF]. http://public.tepper.cmu.edu/ethics/rationalchoice.pdf

TepperCMU. (2012). Rational choice part I [Video] | Transcript. YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nuDLPU85YQY&t=432s

TepperCMU. (2012). Rational choice part II [Video] | Transcript. YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UHcMnSnH5iA&t=698s

TepperCMU. (2012). Why ethics? [Video] | Transcript. YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OFIMfcjlRy8

Discussion Instructions

The Whole Person Leadership Model informs us that an effective business person and leader is aware of their own values, has a sense of purpose and control, and has an ability toward emotional regulations. Each of these areas has an impact on ethics, a very important topic in business today. Ethics can be a complicated topic, and whether in your personal life or professional life, the right decision is sometimes unclear. Some people worry that good ethics are not always good business. However, Professor John Hooker asserts that ethical behavior is rational behavior and that it makes good business sense.

For this discussion, respond to one of the following questions:

Consider an ethical issue you have witnessed personally, read about in a journal, or seen on the news. Create a post that summarizes the situation (citing sources, as appropriate), including explaining either what ethical decision or action was made, or, if none was made yet, what your recommended action is. Then, apply each of Hooker’s three ethical tests to tell whether the action taken (if there was one) was ethical or not. Reflect on the results and what action you believe is appropriate, based on your test results.

Discuss the ethical issues inherent to your capstone project. How are you covering ethics in your paper? Does the Hooker model apply to your organization in any way? What have you learned about business ethics by analyzing this situation?