My Ethical Mentality

My Ethical Mentality

Oscar Lopez- Sanchez

Brandmans University

An ethical framework can be something that you live by. I believe ethics are closely related to your morals and they coincide together. The definition of your ethical framework is decision making model that you would think about in order to reach an ethical decision. An ethical framework isn’t something that you all of a sudden create, but is something that you build from your environment and the way you were raised. This is important to me because you need to have good ethics to be able to form good relationships, and in business, relationships are the key to everything. Sometimes I believe I don’t make the best ethical decisions, but keeping in mind an ethical framework can make me think straight to see what is right and what is wrong.

Sometimes being unethical feels like the only option you have, like how the text explains. “People provide a wide range of reasons for behaving unethically. The most basic justification for behaving unethically, as suggested by Kohlberg’s theory of moral development, is to avoid punishment and receive praise”. (Collins, Denis 2011). I know I personally have had instances like that at work where I felt I was acting unethically for my own personal gain. The framework I use is something like this. I ask questions to myself such as “how will this decision make me look?” and “how will this decision impact other people?” and “how will this decision benefit me?” They are simple questions and an easy way to gauge whether its worth being unethical or not. Sometime there are instance where I think being unethical would be okay, but its on rare occasions.

I base my ethical framework on this question, “how would I like to be treated?” It’s a pretty simple question and usually works if I’m thinking about doing something unethical. I was raised in a Hispanic family, both my parents immigrated here from Mexico and im a first generation Mexican-American living in the United States. I grew up with all the traditional Mexican culture, where we need to greet everybody at family gatherings, stick together as a family and to show respect to everyone. I think those traditions have shaped who I am today and the ethical framework I have developed. My family is also Catholic, but I don’t identify to any religion, just to what is good and what is bad and spirituality. I like to think there is meaning to life, other then just living and dying and that there is something beyond this life. Growing up Catholic was really strict for me, I had to attend church every Sunday and I got baptized and had my first communion but as I grew older I started to drift away for religion as I started to see the corruption and hypocrisy in religion. I don’t have a problem with people that believe in religion straight