OUM BUSINESS SCHOOL

MAY / 2014

OUMM3203
PROFESSIONAL ETHICS

MATRICULATION NO:

850206125505001

IDENTITY CARD NO.

850206125505

TELEPHONE NO.

0168297301

E-MAIL

roddnym85@oum.edu.my

LEARNING CENTRE

TAWAU LEARNING CENTER

Content
1

1.0

Introduction

2.1
2.2
2.3
2.4

Family Influence
Peer Influence
Life Experience
Personal Values and Morals

5
6
7
9

3.0
3.1

Law as a Guide for Moral Choices

Act Of Law

10
11

4.0

Conclusion

14

Reference

16

1.0 Introduction

The field of ethics or moral philosophy that involves systematizing, defending, and
recommending concepts of right and wrong behavior. Philosophers today usually divide ethical
theories into three general subject areas; metaethics, normative ethics, and applied ethics (Fieser,
2013). Metaethics investigates where our ethical principles come from, and what they mean. Are
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they merely social inventions? Do they involve more than expressions of our individual
emotions? Metaethical answers to these questions focus on the issues of universal truths, the will
of God, the role of reason in ethical judgments, and the meaning of ethical terms themselves.
Normative ethics takes on a more practical task, which is to arrive at moral standards that
regulate right and wrong conduct. This may involve articulating the good habits that we should
acquire, the duties that we should follow, or the consequences of our behavior on others. Finally,
involving in examining specific controversial issues, such as abortion, infanticide, animal rights,
environmental concerns, homosexuality, capital punishment, or nuclear war.
By using the conceptual tools of metaethics and normative ethics, discussions in applied
ethics try to resolve these controversial issues. The lines of distinction between metaethics,
normative ethics, and applied ethics are often unclear. For example, the issue of abortion is an
applied ethical topic since it involves a specific type of controversial behavior. But it also
depends on more general normative principles, such as the right of self-rule and the right to life,
which are important factors for determining the morality of that procedure. The issue also rests
on metaethical issues such as, where do rights come from? and what kind of beings has
rights?
People sometimes appear similar have completely different sets of individual ethics.
These are because there are four most common factors that can influence a person's individual
ethics. The first factor is family influence. Certainly, family influence is the strongest influence
in our lives when we grew up. Our parents characteristics, the behavior of our siblings, our
familys socioeconomic status, their education, the place they lived in will shaped the childrens
most vulnerable time.
The second factor is peer influence. Peer influence is the influence applies by an
individual or a peer group to encourage other individuals to change their behaviors, values, or
attitudes in order to comply with individual or groups norm.
The third factor is life experience. From the day we were born till now we must have
gone through a lot of life experience which is good, the bad and the ugly which is normal in a
person's life. The person will become wiser through his experience.

The forth factor is personal values and morals. Personal values and morals are a standard
that we set for ourselves to live by. These values vary by individual and are very personal that
may involve culture, tradition and religion. There are no absolute moral values, what is wrong
for one may not be wrong for another.

2.1

Family Influence
An infant is a piece of blank paper when they are born. They will be learning and gaining

experience and information that being sent to them. The first influence would be their parents.
My parents were what made a person and who that person is today.
They taught us such as values, love, confidence, communication, culture, beliefs and
many other topics that develop the self and how to behave towards society with our culture,
tradition and religion. My mother taught me how to grow up with a strong and helpful family
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members and she was always there for me. She taught me how to care for sick members of a
family. I learn from my mother how a grown child cares about their parents, siblings and there in
laws the way my mother cares for her elders. She would say that it is a familys voluntary
sacrifices and love forever rather than creating debts to be repaid. They taught me laughter is a
good family medicine. Humor is an escape valve for family tension. They showed me how to
pursue a good work ethic, and how to treat others the way I want to be treated.
Next, I learn about being independent. At the age of adolescents, I was taught to do my
own laundry and other necessities to my life. I was rebellious at the beginning and that my
friends are not being told to do so but I was force to do even though I am their only son! But
years later, it was a great advantage for me when I was on my own.
Not all family influence is good for their children. I am an example of this negative
influence. I have been a smoker for too many years, started at the age of 17 when I was in Form
Five. Smoking all the while then suddenly in the year 2005, I almost burn down my house
because the cigarette falls on my sofa and it caught fire. I realize smoking is bad. I quit a few
years after. And the auspicious day was February the 14 - Valentine Day. My wife and family
were very happy. But the question is how do I become a smoker? The World Health Organization
(WHO) has defined adolescents as a persons between 10 to 19 years age group and their
research confirms that children whose parents smoke are more likely to pick up the habit
themselves between the age of 13 and 21.
My father was a role model for me. I grow up seeing my father smoked around me. My
house was full of ashtrays everywhere. He used to send me to the store to buy his cigarettes or
ask me to pick up the packet from his car. My fathers smoking tempts me to smoke behind or in
absence of my parents. My father disapproves and warned me of teenage smoking, but he
continues to smoke.
The evidence is clear from this research, that if parents don't want their children to start
smoking, it is important for them to stop their own smoking. Now, I do not allow any visitors to
smoke in my house or car, and if they do smoke, they should not do it, in front of my children. I
also do not allow my children to handle smoking materials. In this way, I am taking care of their
health and as well as theirs well-being.

2.2 Peer Influence

Peer influence exists for all ages and there are two types, negative and positive influence.
To be a member of a peer group, an adolescent must accept the values and behavioral norms
even though these may be undesirable. Mostly Peer influence harms you in society for example,
smoking, drinking, drugs, fighting, vandalism and rebellious against society.
Azman, 29 years old, is a university student. Azman was a prominent school bully in
Tawau area. Gangsterism took over his life at the age of 15, while he was studying in form 3.
During form 3, most of his friends became gangsters and his academic achievement started to
flow down the drain. When asked why he joined gangsters, he replied, 4 out of 5 of my friends
are gangsters. I would be left out and feel isolated if I dont join them and also I couldnt stand
my friends persuasion and taunting. Another reason why he joined gangster groups is to gain
popularity and recognition in school.
Peer influence is not always bad. It can help you reflect on yourself. Peers may teach you
good things and encourage you to follow them. My organization is big and being part of a larger
group of peers, I am exposed to the variety in human behavior. These make and reflect my
behavior and where I stand. I am fortunate enough to get a good peer group. My peers influence
me into shaping my personality in a positive way. It's not influence every time, sometimes its
inspiration, which makes you change for good. Most of my peers are taking or having their own
degree programs and they would always encourage me to follow their footsteps or examples.
I remember a friend once told me which I cherish and hold on to until today, Some
bridges are build by ones self and some are build for someone, which ever bridge that u have
remember that u decide what to do with it. Dont burn your own bridge. With this, I started to
build my own small business from scratch and build it up into what it is today, a good source of
income for me and my family.

2.3 Life Experience

A few years back, I attended a funeral of a family member who died in an accident in
Kota Kinabalu. The thing that touched my heart was the action of the family members that had
consented on donating his organs. Although the deceased had not consented into donating his
organs during his life, his family members made that decision for him.
Having to experience this heartwarming action, I myself went to Tawau General Hospital
to register as an organ donor. I believe that everyone with a conscious mind has an ethical
obligation to do everything possible to improve the health of the public and to meet the needs of
the patient population.
But not many people agree that taking organs from the dead person is a justifiable
practice within certain ethical boundaries. The main restriction came from religious objections,
lack of publicity and awareness education to the public.
Every year hundreds of people have their lives saved as a result of organ transplants.
However, every year thousands of people die who would have lived had they received a
transplant. Indeed, the majority of people waiting for a transplant never receive one; they die
first.
Now, I am a proud organ donor and had done my part to the community. Ethical organ
donation may help change the lives of others who are suffering from organ failure and someone
in desperate need and one day my organ may help change the lives of others. Give them the
priceless gift of life!
I remember the time that I was once at least 100 kilograms in weight constantly. My
weight never had been an issue for me since I was healthy as a horse all my life. On day, a close
friend of mine who was also overweight like me was diagnosed with diabetes and had
implications with his health. He was hospitalized to almost a year due to unhealthy diet in the
whole of his life. Consuming high fat and high sugar food and the only exercise he had was
walking around the office and his house. I almost had the same routine like he had.
Not long after his release from the hospital, he passed away from his diabetes
complications. That was a wakeup call for me and I had to change my way of life. Now doing
regular exercise of at least 3 times of running in the park, I manage to reduce my weight below

100 kilograms and still going down. It is a continuous effort in my daily life until I can get into
my ideal weight.
Another life experience that I am a shame of is my life experience with alcohol. This
incident happened after a night out in a local pub, I couldnt find my way home and I was
hovering and that was when I was caught by the police after a chase and accident. Big arguments
happen between me and my unclear drunken mind and the policemen; they arrested and took me
to a hospital for a urine and blood test to charge me for drinking and driving. The doctor who
performed the procedure recognized me by my cousin which we meet in a social party at my
house not long before. He contacted my cousin, which my cousin than informed my family. This
has become a big embarrassments moment my family and me and I become fully aware of the
negative effect of alcoholic drinks. From that day onwards, not a single drop of alcohol had
touched my lips.
As there is a saying, Sometimes its the mistakes that turn out to be the best parts of
life. What can I say, it proves me right from the past experience.

2.4

Personal Values and Morals

Personal values provide an internal reference for what is good, beneficial, important,

useful, beautiful, desirable, and constructive. Values generate behavior and help solve common
human problems of survival by comparative rankings of value, the results of which provide
answers to questions of why people do what they do.
Wyatt Woodsmall points out that "criteria" are used to refer to "the standards on which an
evaluation is based. " Values relate then to what one wants and in what order one wants them. To
this point, criteria act as a comparative standard to evaluate whether goals and values have been
met.
Without personal values, there would be no cultural reference against which to measure
the virtue of individual values. As a consequence, cultural identity would disintegrate.
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During my early stages of school, I was thought the importance to respect the elderly at
home, school and anywhere I am at. At the beginning of any class, the students are to greet the
teacher who are about to teach us in class. This repeated daily routine for the last 11 years in
primary and secondary school had implanted the need to greet people that I meet socially.
Although it seems like an unimportant act for someone, it actually reflects ones morale
values in society. Nowadays, teenagers barely greet their elders or even respect them. This
personal and moral value is important and should be implemented back into society before the
cultural identity is disintegrated.
Walking around town, there were a lot of baggers loafing around the town of Tawau.
Some sat by the road sides, some outside shopping complexes and some outside or banking
centers. In my right mind, I was to donate them money so that they can buy food to eat and
survive. I continue to do so for some time until I meet an older lady that changed my attitude
towards the needy. The lady instead of giving them money took the bagger to a restaurant and
ordered as much as food as he wanted and the lady paid it for him.
Seeing this, I approached the lady and asked her why did she acted so, and her answer
amazed me. She said that it is more sincere to help the needy to get food than to give them
money to get the food themselves. Since that day, whenever I encounter the needy bagging for
money, I bring them to the closest restaurant instead.
Another experience where moral values and personal values play an important role in the
formation of individual ethics in my life is religion teachings. There are a lot of religions all
around the world, but I believe that there is only one true meaning in all religions, that is to
create a better person in everyone.
In my religion, Roman Catholic, I am taught that hate is an act that one should not
commit. My parents thought me that hate only brings hate in a circle. For an example, when
someone hurts me, it brings up a feeling to hurt him or her back which then turns into hating
them. Then when they are hurt, they tend to return it back to me which completes the cycle. So,
instead my parents taught me that I would be the bigger person in heart if I forgive those who
hurt me and for sure the cycle will stop.

Taking this advice into my personal value, it has made me a better person and made me
loved more than hated in society.

3.0

Law as a Guide to Moral Choice

David Friedman (1979), in his introduction, describes the function of the law thus: If

there were only one man in the world, he would have a lot of problems, but none of them would
be legal ones. Add a second inhabitant, and we have the possibility of conflict. Both of us try to
pick the same apple from the same branch. I track the deer I wounded only to find that you have
killed it, butchered it, and are in the process of cooking and eating it.
The obvious solution is violence. It is not a very good solution; if we employ it, our little
world may shrink back down to one person, or perhaps none. A better solution, one that all
known human societies have found, is a system of legal rules explicit or implicit, some
reasonably peaceful way of determining, when desires conflict, who gets to do what and what
happens if he doesn't.
As a guide, the law might be expected to reflect our moral beliefs. So without implying
that its every jot form the basis of ethical decision making, I think it's possible to say our laws
point to underlying ethical principles, and therefore might guide us in making ethical decisions.
But, for the same reasons we don't try to squeeze milk out of a steak, attempting to distill ethics
from the law could quickly become a practical exercise in futility. If it's moral milk you're after,
look no further than the utters of the ethics cow.
Often in fact the rules that guide us are at the same time both moral and legal. Inflicting
grievous bodily harm on another is both against the moral law and also the law of the land. The
same goes for murder, perjury and dealing illegal drugs. Racial vilification, false advertising and
driving in a dangerous manner are offences against morality as well as against the civil law. So
often enough the moral law and man-made law overlap.
The important difference between morality and law is that laws of the state come from
outside us, from the legislature, so that the source of law is external to those upon whom it is
imposed and carries sanction for non-observance. As earlier pointed out, the justification for
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coercive laws in a democratic state like Malaysia is the upholding of public order. Public order,
with its three requirements of justice, peace and public morality, justifies the limitation of
individual freedom which coercive law entails. Public order requires the guardianship of
acceptable standards of public morality.

3.1

Act of Laws
It must be mentioned that the first vision of the nation in Wawasan 2020 (Vision 2020) is

to have, among others, a developed nation which is persistent in moral and ethics values.
Furthermore, the observance of decency is enshrined in the fifth pillar of Rukun Negara, the
Malaysian national ideology. Though Rukun Negara does not seem to have a binding legal effect,
it has been acknowledged in a number of cases. For instance, the court recognized significant
role of Rukun Negara in the system and dismissed the application to enforce a judgment against
a gambler as gambling is injurious to public welfare and it is against the pillar in Rukun Negara.
In the Malaysian legal history morality, law and religion are interrelated. This is obvious
in a Malay proverb, which says, adat bersendi hukum, hukum bersendi syarak, (custom stands
on law, the law stands on Shariah). Another Malay proverb that gives a similar implication on the
relationship is that, adat bersendi syarak, syarak bersendi adat (custom stands on Shariah and
Shariah stands on the custom). As being preserved in Malay proverb, the principles contained
therein may be regarded as forming part of the traditional and indigenous Malaysian philosophy
and ideology that should not be abandoned only for the sake of a change. It shall not be bent to
conform to the so-called universal standard of personal freedom, as there is no such universal
standard in all matters. Huttington (1996) argued that there is no universal standard, including
in matters regarding human right. The states themselves shall determine the standard in
governing the nation. In the same breath, the European Court of Human Rights, while deciding
on the grounds of restrictions to freedom of expression guaranteed by art. 10 of the European
Convention on Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms 1950, expressed the view that it is up
to the individual states to adopt and to apply any limitations to freedom of expression. By
analogy, morality thus, should be measured according to the standard of each society by taking
into consideration the history, legal or otherwise, and the circumstances in a particular state, such

11

as the custom, religions and social structure. The so-called universal standard of human right or
personal freedom in particular, may not be suitable to our local society.
Based on my personal experience, under the Road Transport Act 1987 section-44,
(1) Any person who, when driving a motor vehicle on a road or other public place
(a) is under the influence of intoxicating liquor or drug, to such an extent as to be incapable of
having proper control of the vehicle; or
(b) has so much alcohol in his body that the proportion of it in his breath, blood or urine exceeds
the prescribed limit,
and causes the death of or injury to any person shall be guilty of an offence and shall,
on conviction, be punished with imprisonment for a term of not less than three years and not
more than ten years and to a fine of not less than eight thousand ringgit and not more than
twenty thousand ringgit.
made me stop drinking any alcohol drink what so ever. It had brought me much hardship and
shame to me and my family personally and legally. Im glad to say that I am no longer drinking
and had been sober for the last 10 years and counting.
I am living in Apas Road Mile 4, Tawau. This area that I am living in is marked as a black
area in Tawau. So much illegal activities are committed around the area that I live in. lucky for
me that the illegal activities does not extend to the place of my home. But living in the same area
in Mile 4, the authorities tend to do their routine operation until the area that I live in. Thus it
affects the daily lives of teenagers close to my house.
Once there was a narcotic operation to catch individual who are under the influence of
any drug. Living in a kampong surrounding, teenagers are active during the evening to do sports
and outdoors activities. So the teenagers who were walking to their usual spot to have their
activities were caught for further investigation, arrested as suspects doing drugs. At the end of
the process, they were finally released due to be negative during the test for drugs.
Although this conduct seems to be unfair, but under the DANGEROUS DRUGS ACT
1952 section- 49
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49 - Drug Enforcement officers to be deemed public servants

Nothing done by any officer of the Government in the course of his duties shall be deemed to be
an offence under this Act.
teenagers in my area are scared to do drugs and hence created a free drug society.
As mentioned before, my friend Azman who was involved in gangster and violence
activities is currently in prison doing his time for the crimes he committed. Under the
PREVENTION OF CRIME ACT 1959 section 17,
Double penalties for crimes of violence
17. Any registered person who is convicted of any offence committed after the date of the entry
of his name on the Register under the provisions of any law specified in the Second Schedule
shall be liable to imprisonment for a term of twice as long as the maximum term for which he
would have been liable on conviction for that offence, and also to whipping.
As I told stories about Azman to younger teenagers, they tend to avoid any gangster or
violence act in their daily lives.

4.0 Conclusion
Personal ethics materialize at an early age, and evolve throughout a persons life based on
many internal and external influences. These internal and external influences form the basis for
each individual ethical system and determine how that system will interact with all the other
individual ethical systems in which it will contact and interact within and outside of the
professional environment.
Most individuals ethical system will be similar but not a carbon copy of immediate
family and friends because they have a strong influence on belief development and share many
common experiences. Social interactions over a lifetime of associations in many diverse
13

communal environments formulate the basis of the individual morals, norms, and beliefs. The
closer the relationship the more likely it is to have a lasting effect on a persons beliefs and
morals.
In the modern increasingly mobile workforce this makes the possibility of a group of
employees with identical morals, norms, and beliefs remote. This causes management to be more
sensitive to these differences when writing company policies ensuring they specifically dictate
expectations instead of assuming the employee will already knows the proper behavior and
consequences of his or her actions in an ethical situation. The workforce is only becoming more
diverse, which makes understanding cultural differences between employees, management and
company policy so vital when trying to establish an ethical work environment.
Ethics is personal not some abstract theory. Individuals have hundreds of social
interactions every day. Most are casual with little subtenant interaction. The influence that
determines a persons moral compass does not come from these interactions.
Implementation of Rule of Law can enhance the formation of individual ethics towards a
better end. Rules and regulation are legislated in the content to create a better society and finally
creating a nation of good and morally great. As the former Prime Minister of Malaysia encourage
the nation of Malaysia to be a nation that is

Cemerlang, Gemilang dan Terbilang

(Outstanding, Glorified and The Best).

[4 300 words]

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Reference

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Charles S L. (1944). The Ethics of Language. New Haven: Yale University Press
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Fieser J. (2003). A Historical Introduction to Philosophy. University of Tennessee at Martin
Harris S. (2010). The Moral Landscape: How Science Can Determine Human Values. United
States: Free Press
Huntington S. P. (1996). The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of World Order
United States: Penguin Classics
MacIntyre A. (1984). After Virtue: A Study in Moral Theory. (Second Edition). United States:
University of Notre Dame Press
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Woodsmall M., & Woodsmall W. (2009) Author Personality Language(tm): How To
PERSUADE And INFLUENCE Virtually ANYONE ANYTIME United States: Next Step Press

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