Decision plays an important role in what an organization has to do or is able to do.

Therefore, managers at all levels and in all area in organization play a big role on making
decision. For instance, top-level managers responsible on making decisions about the direction of
the organization. Middle and first-line-level managers responsible on making decisions about
production schedules, activities of other managers and directing non-managerial employee
discipline respectively. Sometimes managers and management educators did face ethical
dilemmas in organization and these can impact on outcomes and role stress. Many of research
and theory on ethics and decision making have needed to explain behaviour and develop models,
however many managers in organization continue to rely on learning how to do this on the job
by trial and error.
This study about practicing managers which explored experiences of and views on
decision making about actual ethical in organizations. It set out to build a theory of practice
based on the experience of ethical issues in workplaces and how manager deal with these issues
in order to understand the skill, competencies and development needs required. The ethical
issues described by participants involved complex interactions between their roles, professional
affiliations, working relationships, personal qualities and individual preferences.
Data gathering was based on a combination of an intensive case study of an organization
and in-depth interviews with senior managers and management consultant from 32 organizations
from Australia. Problems resulted in categorization of skills associated with judgement, integrity,
courage and humanity. The different ways in which these skills were integrated led to
approaches identified as a legalistic, entrepreneurial, navigation and worried modes. The findings
describe patterns of behaviour associated with this group of practicing managers to assist
understanding of decision making behaviour rather than general laws. The range of skills which
contributes to selection of these alternative approaches and implications for the development of
ethical decision making practices are discussed.



Good ethics means good business is the viewpoint of many business or organizations.
Organizations and their managers take ethics seriously. Although there is always the reverse,
where business give the appearance of success for long periods of time in spite of unethical
practices. The news today is overloaded with stories of the fallen heroes and devastated
businesses that ultimately result from deception and unethical solutions to the business problem.
When we heard about such behaviours especially after the high-profile financial misconduct or
the employees abusing organizations name, we could conclude that businesses are not ethical.
Although that is not the case, managers at all the levels, in all areas, in all sizes and in all kinds
of organization do face ethical issues and dilemmas.
Many managers say they run into ethical dilemmas because they are involved in
relationship with people being employees, peers and bosses with whom they have to work with
and on whom they are dependent. The problem is complicated because these people have needs
that are opposed to a businesss goals and competing needs. For instance, is it ethical for a sales
representative to bribe a purchasing agent as an inducement to buy? Is it ethical for employees
using company phone or equipment for personal use? How will we handle such situations as
managers that have to decisions? As managers plan, organize, lead and control, they must
consider ethical dimensions.
What is means by ethics? Many people have their own perspective defining ethics. based
on Solomon (1993) proposed that ethics is perceived as a sloppy term because it involves the
use of subjective decision making about imprecise situations, a process often confused with
personal taste and indeterminacy. In other hand, Pearce (1990) state that breaking the law is not
necessarily unethical and obeying the law can conflict with ethical values. Pearson (2014)
defining ethics as the principles, values and beliefs that define right and wrong decisions and
behaviour. Many decisions managers make require them to consider both the process and whos
affected by the result.
In this study, ethical dilemmas described as which involved conflict between personal
values, maintaining working relationships and achieving organizational goals. Ethics is also
included integrity, morality, honesty, legality, flexibility, professionalism and not equity or
nepotism. Integrity on ethics, we have to do it from our own centre, do not try to model ourselves
on someone else, try to find out who we are and be satisfied with that. Being centred is
combination of psychological and spiritual factors. If we do not have a strong centre, who we are
what we are and what we are and what our limits, boundaries are, influenced will push us off-
course. While for morality on ethics, we cannot be an ethical leader if our personal ethics is in
question. To be a leader or manager what we do privately reflects on that organization and we
must have a greater standard, a greater responsibility than the average person would have to live
up to.
Furthermore, honesty is one of ethics. We can tell a lie just by inflection in our voice, if
we emphasize something not important or de-emphasize something that is. That is still trying to
mislead people, one is a lie, both have the same outcome, the actual lie has to be worse, a worse
sin than just editing the truth. As managers they have right to secure organizations information
or privacy or it would put the organization license into jeopardy and their employment also in
jeopardy, this situation refers to legality on ethics. Next, flexibility on ethics refers to many of
our masters and political and financial would not see the conflicts or they see it as if they have
the ultimate say. The ethical issues are to do with how we as managers respond to that
conflicting situation and what are the ethics by which we operate at that level.
Besides, professionalism on ethics indicates that each person perform their task with
genuine earnest and honesty. It refers to a person doing his/ her job with sincerity and
maintaining professional etiquette and ethics in the workplace or organizations. However,
inequity and nepotism always be on ethical issues. Most of peoples nowadays really demand if
there is a rule that that compromises one person it should compromises everybody and if it
rewards one it should be reward all. Sometimes upper management making decision without
consider their employees condition and surrounding and that makes employees provoke the
organizations and management.
Psychological approaches to ethical decision making over the past 20 years have been
largely based on Kohlbergs (1973,1984) theory of moral development, emphasizing reasons
rather than a choice or consequences, with generally consistent support for his stages. Trevinos
(1986) found at a conventional level to be more susceptible to the influence of context and
principled thinkers most likely to resist, change or select themselves out of unethical situations.
While Gaudine and Thorne (2001) saw positive affect and high arousal as associated with
ethical decision making. Factors such as culture also have been found to have effects. Libby and
Agnello (2000) found younger males demonstrated a utilitarian approach with self-interest, older
males to be legalistic, combining utilitarian and justice, while females used principles of justice
and fairness.
Through this finding, four categories were identified such as judgement, integrity,
courage and humanity. Judgement in this terms mean identification of the level and extent of
information required about people and context, generating and choosing between options while
taking risks and priorities into consideration. Next, integrity is having conscious personal values
and a desire to act in accordance with these. For courage, without acting knowingly and willingly
in accordance with a choice made under uncertainty, there was erosion or substitution of options
and less than optimal action, excuses as to why a hard decision should be avoided. This could
lead to dissatisfaction, complaints, withdrawal and passive aggression. Humanity is a capacity
for understanding and forgiveness, a sense of humor, resilience, an appreciation of lack of
control over the odd, absurd and unintended.
Judgement and integrity are bases of many rational and moral frameworks. Courage
emerged for issues where these conflicted or insufficient information was available. An
additional holistic factor, humanity, emerged as the something extra that separated good decision
making from that which was merely satisfactory. This was a universal factor, a cement or glue
that held disparate values together and strengthened confidence in decision making.
Decision making could be divided into two primary types Black and White, related to
laws and rules (legalistic mode) and multiple shades of Grey, which fell into three group
groups which are assessment of consequences on self (entrepreneurial mode), consideration of
impact on others (navigation mode) and confusion and fear (worried mode) (see Figure 1).
Process of decision making as not only a conscious process but one that intuitive elements and
involved more than logical problem solving.
Means of intuitive decision making it is making decision on the basis of experience,
feelings and accumulated judgement. Researchers studying managerss use of intuitive decision
making have identified five different aspects of intuition, which are described in Figure 2.
Intuitive decision making can complement both rational and bounded rational decision making.
For example, a manager who has had experience with a similar type of problem or situation often
can act quickly with what appears to be limited information because of that past experiences.
Meanwhile, a recent study found that individual who experienced intense feelings and emotions
when making decision actually achieved higher decision making performances, especially when
they understood their feelings as they were making decisions.



Figure 1




Figure 2

Decision makers may require a range of skills in order to optimize their ability to address
ethical problems. While many day-to-day decisions may be addressed by the use of judgement
and integrity, at times courage and humanity may be critical. Classification into modes was
based on language, including words, intonation, emphasis, pauses, repetition and non-verbal
communication including facial expression, gesture and posture.
Legalistic mode included using procedures and rules to avoid viewing dilemmas as
problems as problems that needed to be addressed from first principles. Laws could be seen as a
high standard of ethics as these are explicit, to some extent impartial and can carry penalties.
In addition, navigation mode described opposing or contradictory forces, where options changed
depending on how stakeholders and consequences were viewed. Navigation was associated with
personal and professional integrity, those who had ethics training in their professional
background may have brought their managerial role. Some described Navigation as a form of
neutrality which could lead to compromise. A pure Navigation mode involved deliberate and
conscious choices that not only addressed grey issues but challenged assumptions of what was
black and white. Navigation mode could include reference to laws and rules but balanced the
spirit and letter of the law with other values and the context.
Next, Entrepreneurial mode dealt with ambiguity differently to Navigation mode. While
the initial steps were similar opportunities for maximizing personal power, gain or ambition then
became the focus. The use of the Entrepreneurial mode included acknowledgment that rules were
generally good principles for others, but may sometimes need to be ignored, bent or gone around
to achieve the most valuable outcome for the individual or organization. Moreover, Worried
mode was associated with a lack of confidence, feelings of being trapped or frozen. There was a
felt pressure to act while uncertain, leading to a spiral of increased worry and conflict related to
making mistakes and doing the wrong thing. The Worried mode could be a very lonely and
solitary experience, as failing to act or to communicate concerns could be escalate problems
rather than address or eliminate these. Worry could be detrimental when it led to confusion and
issues were not communicated clearly to others who may actually have been able to provide
advice or assistance.
These categories are not types of decision makers but a range of alternatives that can be
used. Legalistic mode was used particularly senior executives and human resource management
professional in organizations. Senior executives also used an Entrepreneurial approach, as did
human resource management consultants. Chief officers most often used navigation mode, while
a Worried approach was most frequent in middle managers. The human resource managers
consultancy group least used Legalistic mode, suggesting that they may experience ethical issues
differently to those employed in organizations, with differences in skills and values or to do with
their role as an external adviser.
However, these modes are used based on flexibility in decision making. When making
decision all factors must be considered and not only one mode is usually used. Patterns of
flexibility in the use of modes varied with role and industry. While some individuals may have a
preference for a particular approach it may possible to learn to use other modes. Some might be
using two or three modes and not impossible if there is might using all four modes. For example,
differences industry using different of modes. They tended to described general issues and
principles rather than personal experiences of decision making.
In a nutshell, the differences in decision making associated with the use of different
modes are related generation of options and assessment of expected outcomes. Those operating
in Worried mode had difficulty identifying options and focused on problems rather than
solutions. Those operating in a Legalistic mode made options from a limited basis. the analysis
of problems, generation of options and consideration of consequences may be similar or parallel
up to a point for those in Navigation and Entrepreneurial modes.
In decision making, decision are shaped by predictions, opinions and projections.
Judgement has been addressed in models with sequential steps or stages in decision making. The
quality of these judgements improves markedly as the number of people participating in the
process increase-particularly when the participants provide a variety of viewpoints. When we
have integrity, we gain the trust of our leaders, our colleagues and our team. We are dependable
and when we hold ourselves accountable for our actions, we as mangers can become role model
to our employees or others to follow. All of this, in turn, directly impacts our success in life.
People who live and work with integrity are more likely to be considered for promotions. This is
because integrity is a hallmark of ethical leadership. Nowadays, organizations want leaders that
they can trust and when we demonstrated integrity, we show everyone that we can be trusted.
Making decisions is one of the most rewarding actions you can take in business because
it requires preparation, deciding, action, and courage. Courage in decision making comes from
confidence and that confidence comes from the process we use to make decision. Courage is
dependent on confidence where it requires knowledge. We will often see that people who
struggle with making difficult decision do not have techniques for processing information about
the decision, therefore they are lack of confidence in making a decision. Courage is dependent on
confidence where it requires knowledge.
The moral person pillar of ethical leadership represents the substances of ethical
leadership and it is important to developing a reputation for ethical leadership especially
managers because managers associated with their traits, behaviours and decision as long as
others know about them. With the moral person pillar in place, we should have a reputation for
being an ethical person. We can think of this as the ethical part of the term ethical leadership.
Having a reputation for being a moral person tells employees what you are likely to do, it is a
good start but it does not necessarily tell them what they should do. That requires moral
managing which taking the ethics message to the rest of the organization.
Therefore, in managers mind, an executives ethical traits, behaviours and decisions are
automatically associated with a reputation for ethical leadership. To develop a reputation for
ethical leadership with employees, managers must make ethics and values an important aspect of
their leadership agenda so that the message reaches more distant employees. To do this, we must
be moral managers that can make a good decision as well as moral persons.
Lastly, the differences in decision making strategies and processes outlined in this study
can be used to diagnose a lack of flexibility in decision making skills. Tools and techniques to
explore preferences for different modes were developed as an outcome of this study and practical
applications of these are planned as the subject of a subsequent paper.













REFERENCES
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Approach to Business Ethics",Management Decision, Vol. 28 Iss 1 pp.
3. Stephen P. Robbins, Mary Coulter, (2014), Making Decision: The Role of Intuition,
Management, 12
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