215_202 Assign1 S23

Case Study Assignment 1 PHIL215 / ARBUS 202 General Information 1. Due Date: Friday, June 9, 2023 at 11:55 PM 2. Late Penalty: 10% per day. No exceptions without a documented excuse of sufficient weight (e.g. a medical emergency). 3. Be aware that passing off the work of others as your own constitutes plagiarism and is a serious offence. All suspected cases of plagiarism are referred to the Associate Dean's office. See the Faculty of Arts webpage on Ethical Behaviour for important information on plagiarism and other academic offences. General Instructions 1. Read the Specific Instructions below. 2. Do not put your name anywhere in this document. 3. Keep this Assignment Sheet in the document you submit. Do not delete. 4. Keep the Setup and Question in the document you submit. Do not delete. 5. Keep the Decision Making Model in the document you submit. Do not delete. 6. Keep the Decision Making Worksheet in the document you submit. Do not delete. 7. Do all of your work in this document. Specific Instructions 1. Read Chapters 2 and 3 of the textbook. 2. Review the online materials for Chapters 2 and 3 in LEARN. 3. Read the Setup & Question below. 4. Read the Decision-Making Model provided in this document. 5. Use the Decision-Making Model to fill in the Decision-Making Model Worksheet. 6. You must make explicit use of course concepts from the lectures in LEARN and from the readings in the text. 7. When completed, save and submit this document to the Case Study Assignment 1 Dropbox, accessed under the “Submit” tab on the course Homepage in LEARN .

Setup and Question Setup FlimFlam Facebook Faux Pas Sofia is a student at the University of Waterloo. She is nearing the end of her first work term at FlimFlam Financial. Although she has enjoyed certain aspects of her job, she has been uncomfortable with some of the requests made by her supervisor, Krueger. For instance, Krueger approached her cubical early on in the term and asked her to “selectively” find financial data to support claims he wanted to make in a letter to his clients. Although she had not been asked to do anything explicitly illegal, Sofia felt uncomfortable cherry-picking data that would support her supervisor’s claims, while ignoring any data that might not fit his claims so well. In her mind, clients need good information in order to make rational investment decisions. She ended up doing what Krueger asked her to do, but she felt bad about it, since she thought she was helping Krueger hide important information from his clients. But now something else has cropped up, making Sofia even more uncomfortable about Krueger. With two weeks of work left, Krueger asked Sofia to come into his office to discuss her performance evaluation. Sofia felt like things were going well until Krueger mentioned that he could really use her help with something. Krueger then asked Sofia if she would be willing to friend another co-op student from uWaterloo on Facebook. Krueger was thinking of hiring the other co-op student, but wanted to make sure that the student would be the kind of person he’d want to work with at FlimFlam. Krueger asked Sofia if she would be willing to snoop around the co-op student’s Facebook profile and report back to him with what she found. Sofia is really uncomfortable with Krueger’s request, but fears that she will receive an unfavourable work term evaluation if she does not comply. Question What should Sofia do about Kreuger’s new request—i.e., his request that she check and report back to him about the student’s Facebook profile? (Answer this question using the Decision Making Worksheet.)

Decision-Making Model (Step by Step) Step 1: Determine the facts  State the morally relevant facts. ( Who? , What? , When? , Where? , How? )  Remember, you are listing the facts of the case. You are not trying to define the ethical issue just yet. You are not making any value judgments just yet. Step 2: Define the ethical issue  Who are the stakeholders, and what is at stake for each one? Which stakeholders have proximate and genuine interests in the case?  State what the ethical issue is and explain why the issue is an ethical issue (and not just a prudential issue).  Examples of questions to ask: o Is someone being harmed? Is there a conflict of interest? Are someone’s rights being ignored? Is someone failing in his or her obligations? Is it an issue of fairness? Honesty? Promise keeping? Acting in good faith? Step 3: Identify values  What are the stated or unstated values of the relevant stakeholders? Why might they act as described? If a relevant stakeholder is not described in the case, consider what about the case would likely matter to them. o A value is something of importance, worth, or usefulness. o Things that are valued are desired or pursued. Values motivate and direct action. o What do the parties want to preserve or gain? What are they willing to give up? What might they value differently if they had more information?  Example: o Value: money o Action: work toward increasing efficiency of production Step 4: Specify the alternatives  Set out the status quo— what would be (or has been) done in the absence of alternatives. Quite often the status quo is to do nothing.  Identify three to five possible plausible alternatives to the status quo. Explain what values the alternatives involve and how the alternatives address the moral issue while giving appropriate consideration to the values of the relevant stakeholders. (Fewer than three unnecessarily limits your options; more than five makes it hard to distinguish a best option.)  What can be done differently to achieve a compromise or to limit negative effects of the status quo?  For each alternative, state short and long-term consequences, and positive and negative consequences for the relevant stakeholders.

Step 5: Compare alternatives  Which alternative will best resolve the ethical issue? (This isn’t the status quo.) Take into account any “dirty hands” that may result.  Identify the relevant prudential, legal, and regulatory constraints (time, resources, reporting, etc.). Which alternative, including the status quo, is the most plausible given the prudential constraints? Which is the next best? (This may be something completely different from the most plausible.) Step 6: Make your decision  Decide on a course of action that best reflects your assessment of the alternatives.  Give reasons for your decision, making reference to short and long-term consequences, and positive and negative consequences for the different stake- holders.  Does your decision pass the “light of day” test? (For example, would you be okay with your decision being at the top of the CBC News web page?) What features make the course of action acceptable in the eyes of the public? Now apply the above decision-making model by filling out the Decision-Making Model Worksheet below!