Ethics and Business Corruption. Siemens Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words

Ethics and Business Corruption. Siemens - Essay Example In this incident, Nick Lesson lost over $1.3 billion through engaging in speculative investments targeting future contracts while operating in the bank’s office in Singapore. The different business ethics theories will be evaluated with a reflection of these two scandals to evaluate to what extent the malpractices can be related to the theories. These include the theories of Utilitarianism, Kohlberg’s theory of moral development, Shareholder value theory VS stakeholder theory and egoism among other theories (Slater, 2008). The unethical behavior in the Siemens saga with the Greece government involved advanced levels of corruption and bribery affecting both the two parties. Siemens advanced bribes of over $100 million to the government official’s in order to be awarded the contracts in the short run and secure a chance to control the country’s electronic market. Virtues and ethical reasoning places a lot of consideration on a person’s individual character to chose the best way of performing a task in a way devoid of ethical issues. Utilitarian ethical theory compares the cost benefits ratio of a given management decision with the benefits that can be derived from such with little or no cost impacts (Matussek, 2008). This theory however does not comprehensively evaluate the situation within Siemens as it considers the gains of the decision. Any actions made by the management of the company thus affect the ethical values of the people and erodes the public confidence in it. The manage rs’ value according to this theory serves as model to other employees of the organization (Dietz and Nicole, 2012). The actions taken by a single individual can also be analysed using the utilitarianism theory to help weigh whether the consequences can be bad or good. Such an angle can be used to critically evaluate the events of baring bank and how the actions of Leeson led to the death and closure of one of London’s best merchant banks. The actions of Leeson can be considered as foreclosure as he preempted the value of contracts and invested in them hoping to raise more benefits from such an action (Mitchell, 2000). Leeson’s actions when considered in isolation can be shown as an example of utilitarian as foreclosure in this situation caused more damage and pain as compared to foreclosing. Foreclosing can however be considered as the ethical behavior of banks as they rely on this to lend money to customers and make gains from the refunds. The action of Leeson provided less social good to the business and the stakeholders and is thus considered as unethical based on utilitarian theory (Slater, 2008). The main source of unethical allegations that were levied against Siemens stemmed from lack of proper knowledge of international ethical code of conduct. Most of these claims involved Russia and Siemens German, reflecting the different social backgrounds of the two countries as highlighted in the utilitarianism theory. Bribery is considered highly unethical because it does not provide equal opportunities for other players in the industry. This applies to the German culture, a situation which cannot be reflected in Russia (Becker, 2009). This bribery case was handled by the securities and exchange commission of the United States in 2007 due to a scheme in which a $1 billion government contract in Argentina was cancelled due to the cases of bribery. This case was also blamed on the