Case Study-Ethics at Work

Recently your organization decided to invest heavily in network expansion. The CAPEX attributed to this
project is huge and so are the associated benefits. Time is short but there is an opportunity in this
project. You collect your team and explain that you need the equipment procured in 30 days maximum
instead of 45 days.

Being a technology company, your organization only has a couple of vendor choices so you feel you can
save the time here. You had excellent professional and business relations with the vendors, who know
that you will always go for company’s interest and won’t oblige anyone if it is going to impact the
company financially or waste time. Your team identified a certain software which is a key to successful
implementation of the whole project. If the solution is not procured at the beginning, nothing else you
will do is going to matter. Hence it is very important that you procure the solution first as the whole
network will be deployed and configured around this particular software.

While you were searching for the possible vendors you happened to discover that a distant relative of
yours is one of the three distributors of the solution in Pakistan. While you met your relative you heard
about the “passing of his mother” and also about his sick wife suffering from cancer. You also came to
know that your relative had spent a fortune on his wife’s treatment. You feel very sad for him and want
to do something.

You learned about the distribution business of your cousin and ask him about price and time of delivery.
Your relative gave a quote at the same time along with a week’s time before the solution can be
installed and configured. You feel this will save a lot of trouble for the company. Now all you need is to
expedite the procurement process.

But you had to formalize it hence you decided to go with tender float and other formalities. All three
participated, being equally qualified you had to make a choice. The price quoted by your relative and
one other vendor were the same however, the other vendor was willing to implement / configure it in
10 days and not before. The third vendor was quoting it higher and was also asking for more time. You
had another meeting with the lower bidding vendors and asked them to further reduce but both
declined.

You have not disclosed to anyone about your relation with the vendor. You thought, is it relevant to
disclose when I am following the competitive process? Since there was deadlock on price and both
vendors were equally competitive, you further checked their credentials and discovered that the other
vendor had prior experience of implementing it in large corporates whereas your relative has only
implemented it in small entities. But time is of the essence and you do not want to give up on this
opportunity.