Essay Example on Organizational Success Through Ethical Leadership Practices

Introduction

For an organization to succeed within promoting ethical leadership, it must be accomplished in the presence of ethical leaders. Perhaps, having leaders who are noble in characters, behaviors, and managerial skills promotes a smooth enactment of ethical practices in all the chains and departments. In convention, it is crucial that since ethics are jointly characterized by positive integrity and behaviors, an organization is more likely to build a firm foundation with other individual-based characteristics among the employees, which in turn tends to promote ethical beliefs and ideologies, decision-making, and overall values. This essay aims to provide an overlook of how the top leadership of an organization can control its operations and employees in a manner that promotes ethics and alignment of profits and stakeholder concerns.

Is your time best spent reading someone else’s essay? Get a 100% original essay FROM A CERTIFIED WRITER!

Save 25%

Responsibility of Top Leadership

Achieving the point of balance between organizational profits and stakeholders’ concerns is useful because, it demonstrates how leaders should act ethically to ensure that they do not engage in anti-competitive practices, does not participate in illegal business operations by doing insider trading activities and also to help them govern in accordance to the laws and policies that tend to promote openness.

Ideally, it is the duty and responsibility of every leader within an organization to ensure that its employees and all other stakeholders who are afflicted on the business fully embrace the interests and values for the company that they are working for. Recent studies indicated that having leaders who can equally engage in nurture their stakeholders are more likely to improve the organization's cultural values, and that may dictate the ethical responsibility. Necessarily, through a moral leader, employees can embrace the values, mission, and vision of the company because a sense of trustworthiness and integrity have been instilled in them. Although this philosophy should be evident in any organization, its concepts should be applied deeply by those in the helm of an organization's leadership, which may be tempted to engage in corrupt activities that demoralize the self-motivation among employees and other stakeholders.

One precise illustrative incidence is that of Tyco Corporation. In this case, the managing director, chief executive officer Mr. Dennis Kozlowski, among other departmental leaders squandered the funds for the company, and utilized them for their benefits or private purposes, instead of delivering the agenda and financial goals of the company (Terris, 2005). In reality, the incidence should not be considered primarily as a vice for personal integrity, but rather the company's investors who committed their investments. They eagerly and hopefully waited for the returns in the name of profit. Typically, the leaders failed to adhere to embrace the profitability agreements and the stakeholder's interests and instead engaged in a corruptive and fraud practice, which saw them gaining. In this scenario, the two aspects of stakeholder interests and profits did not balance because the chief executive was overwhelmed by personal advantages to stakeholder interests.

With that illustration, the main idea garnered from this context is that ethical leaders should always adjust whenever they are chosen to act as front liners in managing people's investments. That way, they portray the image of respect for the company's ethical values and beliefs. This will automatically enable a leader to appreciate and acknowledge the efforts and roles played by individual stakeholders in ensuring that all metrics and activities are effectively done within the time, scope, and cost deliverables.

View of the Present Day in Business

In general, I believe that things in the current field of business have worsened or perhaps remained in the same state as they were in the past. This may be proved by examining how the current business leaders only have money-hunger, theta supersedes that overall values and stakeholder's interests in the organizations. Most leaders do not have the integrity and personal drivers that correspond to the organization's objectives. Corruption and greed are among the significant causes of underperformance or even failures of some large institutions.

As many innovations and inventions continually bump in to promote the business operations and even improve the profitability rates, it is inherently apparent that most top leaders such CEOs and Executives have concentrated so much on the means of obtaining specific benefits. This enhances the instances of greed and corruption in most organizations. In support, an example of a recent situation of Mylan Incorporated's EpiPen Pricing scandal company may be used to indicate how worsened the case has been. With Mylan Inc., the organization cornered the market using the claimed lifesaving drug, whose price was dramatically raised to about $300 for a single EpiPen (Rashid, 2017). The hiked prices were meant to increase the company's profits. However, further studies indicated that the relevant bodies had not verified the drug, which could impose more threats on patients or heal in some scenarios (Rashid, 2017).

I tend to reiterate that business ethics has grown to worse because other than the Mylan Inc. corporation, it is not once, not twice on multiple occasions when I have encountered various people who are obligated to choose between rent payments or lifesaving medications. As a matter of consequence, it can be identified that the existence of business ethics is slowly diminishing, and drastic future experiences and more severe practices are looming, based on the trends. Indeed, most organizations do not consider ethics while making critical decisions. In the presence of ethics, a company would make its decision based on the question of how the outcome may impact the consumer. Because ethical principles such as benevolence and non-maleficence are no longer practices by companies, I outstandingly believe that the situation has changed towards the negative directions.

The legitimacy of Howard Bowen Predictions Since 1953

Howard's predictions are an everyday reality in today's world, according to the information I grasped from his ideas, as depicted on page 41 (Terris, 2005). For instance, Howard predicts it accurately when he says, “Private business will be judged solely in terms of its demonstratable contribution to the general welfare” (Terris, 2005). These words are self-justified at my level, especially when I walk into various business organizations in search of jobs. I realized that salary is not the priority to consider but the additional benefits that the company will offer besides the monthly or stipulated interval's income.

In reality, for business to survive in the current market, and achieve their goals more effectively, they are obligated to offer additional services or profits, to entice their employees, before the goal is realized. Moreover, large organizations today attract qualified and experienced workers not solely by quoting large salaries but with allowances that, in turn, allows employees to spend less of their income. This is just but a single realistic manifestation, which was predicted in the year 1953 by Howard. Another idea or concept on the same page that is also present in the current world is his say, "the day when profit maximization was the sole criterion of business success is rapidly fading” (Terris, 2005). Business success has rampantly faded in the past and currently disappearing even at the highest rates before.

Howards described this as "rapidly," and indeed, failure is dominating most of the organizations. As leaders continue to embrace corporate greed, when new policies and guidelines are formulated, but in their favor, corruption scandals are witnessed every day in almost all nations worldwide. From what is known, an organization may not thrive in environments where corruption has equally dominated.

When considered in any scope, corruption and greed usually are inversely proportional to the success of a business organization. It can then be said Howard fore-saw these revelations in as many as almost seventy years ago. In the current world, leaders are more in ensuring that focusing on profit maximization, other vital components that involve ethics are underrated.

Conclusion

In conclusion, a study of the book by Terris (2005), and other sets of practical illustrative examples have been used critically to understand the topic of business ethics, and the impacts that top leadership could bring into an organization. From the studies, it has been noted that ethical leadership is necessary for any organization set-up because it ensures that the theme of profitability is achieved in a fair manner that elevates the stakeholder interests. Having said, it was also visible from the discussion that stakeholders in an organization should be considered the most significant assets and, eventually, be given much respect, honesty, and trust by their leaders to motivate them and improve their morale. By doing so, the organization will be able to achieve the stated goals and objectives in the utmost ethical manner, that finally aligns stakeholder's interest with the process and ways of making the profits.

References

Rashid, T. (2017). The EpiPen Problem: Analyzing Unethical Drug Price Increases and the Need for Greater Government Regulation. U. Miami Bus. L. Rev., 26, 129.

Terris, D. (2005). Ethics at work: Creating virtue in an American corporation. UPNE.