Warhead Case

I believe that Bryson Corporation has to act ethically, because given the sensitive nature of the faulty product, lives might get endangered. Moreover, the company has to act ethically to fulfill the following reasons: they have to meet the demands of the business stakeholders. 10 country US poll shows that 90% of general public places business ethics standards above traditional corporate goals. Therefore, making faulty cables for the defense customers will likely ruin their reputation hurdling them into legal disputes even! They also have to enhance their business performance, and that means not producing faulty products that might lead to endangering other people lives. Research has shown linkage between ethically responsible behavior and favorable corporate financial performance. Therefore, they have to keep their performance up to par so as not to lose their business and their reputation. In addition, they have to comply with legal requirements, and as such Bryson being a US company, it should comply with US rules and regulations. Such as US Corporate Sentencing Guidelines and the Sarbanes-Oxley Act. The last two reasons why it should act ethically is to prevent harm or minimize it and to promote personal morality. This will increase vigilance in the company and prevent harmful damage to others. Moreover, as stated in the book, people want to work for companies that do the right thing. If they didn't act ethically, then the negative repercussions can prove disastrous. In which, the faulty product is a set of cables that are used in manufactured fuse missiles that could if defected prove to be lethal since it might misfire and injure people.

Q2

I believe that Stanton Wong is at the mature adulthood stage 5 and 6, where it is believed that people move beyond the specific rules, customs, and laws of their own societies. They are capable of basing their ethical reasoning on broad principles and relationships, such as human rights. Both stages use principle centered reasoning. This is evident in which Stanton is afraid of endangering the innocent civilians and the military soldiers if a missile backfired. Moreover, he's also thinking about solving the problem by trying to think of someone from corporate who could help him report the faulty cables.

For Harry Jackson, I believe he is at the adolescence, youth stage (stage 2) where self-interest is emphasized and the person is always reward seeking, merely considered with their own pleasure. This stage uses ego centric reasoning. It can be proved by his intentionally ignoring the result of the product test and not taking immediate action to correct the problem. Only waiting for Jane, the source inspector, to find it herself, and knowing that she doesn't conduct the self heating test herself she may never find out. Therefore, this shows that Harry does not think of the well being of the people and the soldiers because he is more concerned about delivering the cables on time to the customer, therefore not getting any punishment from his superiors.