Business Ethics – A Personal Moral Dilemma
Case Study 1
Liberty University
As a successful new graduate, Benji could expect to be presented with many opportunities to begin his professional career. What Benji may not have been prepared for was to have to deeply consider his own morals and values in the context of a possible workplace. Each person’s moral code can vary greatly; however, there are three main areas Benji should consider before ultimately making a decision.
At first glance, New Gen Health Sciences would appear to be an innovative, successful-and-still-growing company. Benji’s initial information that makes these assertions are from seemingly credible sources: Fortune Magazine and several news articles. However, as Benji comes to learn later, New Gen’s public relations firm goes to great lengths to release positive, persuasive pieces on New Gen. He was wise to conduct his own research to gain alternative viewpoints on the company. It is important for Benji to note that while he still must consider the source of these alternative viewpoints, as nothing he has read seems to be objective, the points made against New Gen are compelling. The New Gen CEO’s reputation for building and selling companies and the claims made on the “gripe site” could affect the company – and Benji’s-future. New Gen has been accused of forced purchase deals with distributors, which forcibly required the distributors to purchase set amounts of product, buy both unpopular products to have access to buy popular products, and pay for all of it in advance. According to the site, this practice helped contribute to many distributors being forced into bankruptcy. Assuming that this is true, it would logically follow that New Gen could make a large profit, in the short term, with this forced purchase business model. In the long term, however, if the distributors are slowly fading into bankruptcy due in part to the forced purchasing, New Gen’s profits will eventually...