Analyzing An Ethical Dilemma Relating To ICT: A Professional, Philosophical, And Sociological Perspective

Professional Ethics Perspectives

The ethical dilemma occurred in the current organization in the project of web-based financial application to be delivered to the client in 150 days. During the project timeline, the project client contacted the Program Manager to prepone the project delivery as the move will provide the client with a competitive edge in the market. The Program Manager was also willing to deliver the project as per the client’s demands to attain good feedback and response. However, the system testing could not be completed as per the new delivery schedule. The Test Manager was not willing to deliver the untested system as it could have brought up issues for the end-user. The ethical dilemma came up in front of the Test Manager to agree with the Program Manager or inform the senior management about the decision.

The professional code of ethics followed in the organization is Australia Computing Society (ACS) Code of Ethics. There are six ethical principles that the code states viz. Honesty, Enhancement of quality of life, Competence, Priority to the public interest, professional development, and professionalism.
The situation pointed in the above section caused violation of the codes of ethics.

Honesty: The Test Manager informed the Program Manager about the status of the testing activities and inability to complete it as per the new delivery schedule. However, the Program Manager was willing to keep the status of testing hidden from the project client and was ready to deliver the untested system without the client knowledge.

Priority of Public Interest: The pending testing activities could have left some of the issues remaining in the system and the end-user experience could be violated as an outcome.

Enhancement of Quality of Life: The purpose of web-based financial application was to enhance the ease of usage for the users. However, the untested system could have led to other challenges that may deteriorate the user experience and quality.

Competence: The Program Manager did not show positive competence as the resource decided to put selfish interests before the interests of the client, organization, and team.

Professionalism: The delivery of untested system without informing the client was not as per the adequate professional behavior.

Professional Development: The decision could have impacted the entire project team and their performance.
The willingness of the Program Manager to hide the status of testing activity and to deliver the untested system is a clear violation of the professional codes of ethics followed in the organization.

Theory of Consequentialism

According to the ethical theory, an act can be termed as ethical only when its resulting consequences are positive and beneficial. In case of the negative consequences for any of the entity involved, the act is termed as unethical (Heinze, 2005).

In this case, the possible consequences for the project client could have been deteriorated customer trust and engagement as the application could have usability and other issues. The consequences for the project team would also have been negative as the accountability of these issues would be put on the team members. The impact on the organization would have been negative as they would bear negative customer feedback and poor goodwill. The Program Manager would have succeeded in obtaining the good feedback with preponed delivery of the application. However, the occurrence of the issues during the usage would have created problems for the Program Manager as well (Joppova, 2018).

Philosophical Ethics Perspectives

All of the possible consequences of the decision are found as negative. Therefore, the situation is termed as ethically incorrect as per the principles of this theory.

Every activity that is carried out is bound by certain rules and regulations that shall be followed. The significance of these guiding rules and regulations further increased with the professional and business operations. In the case of web-based financial application, the rules include adherence to ethical and professional codes of conduct along with the adherence to the regulatory policies and norms (Misselbrook, 2013).
The delivery of the untested system to the client is set to bring in certain issues. There may be security risks and concerns that may emerge. The application deals with financial data and information sets that are sensitive and critical in nature. The occurrence of the security risks and the issues of data breaches, data leakages, and malware attacks may result in violation of Data Protection Act and IT Laws. Also, the attackers may misuse the information to cause severe damages to the information owners. The decision is associated with the violation of all the laws, regulations, and policies (Baumane-Vitolina, Cals & Sumilo, 2016).
After evaluating the decision on the basis of the parameters of Deontology Ethics, it has been found that the situation is ethically unacceptable. It is because it violates all of the norms and principles associated with the ethical theory.

Virtue Ethics is the ethical theory that evaluates a situation or a decision on the basis of the virtues of the parties associated with the same. If the virtues are positive then the act is evaluated as ethical and vice versa (Curren, 2016).

The parties associated in this case are the Program Manager of the web-based financial application project and Test Manager. The willingness of the Program Manager to deliver the untested system to the project client as per the expectations of the client includes virtues of selfish interests and benefits. The Program Manager will gain appreciation and rewards from the client that may assist in the professional growth. The resistance of the Test Manager to not agree to provide testing go-ahead includes virtues as primacy to the public interest, honesty, and competence. The Test Manager is aware of the negative impact that the decision may have on the associated parties.

After evaluating the attack on the basis of the norms and principles of the ethical theories, it has been found that the decision being taken by the Program Manager is unethical. There are negative virtues associated with the decision and this may cause harm to the parties involved.

The ethical theory states that the activities that are carried out must be in the interest of the society and shall assist in the social welfare.
However, in this case, the financial application may have certain functional and security issues that may cause adverse implications on the users. The confidentiality and integrity of their private and sensitive financial information may get compromised and this may lead to disturbance in harmony (Jos, 2006).
The evaluation of the decision to deliver the untested system to the client is found as unethical as per the norms and principles of the ethical theory of social contract.

Value Theory is one of the theories that may be used and applied to obtain the sociological and descriptive ethical perspective of the situation. The theory makes use of a range of approaches to determine the reason behind the decisions that are taken and to what degree the person values the things or objects.
In this case, the Program Manager does not care about the rest of the team members and the negative impact that the decision to deliver the untested system may have on their respective professional growth. The Program Manager also seems unbothered about the troubles that the users may have to go through due to the issues in the system. Upon evaluating the situation as per the principles and norms of Value Theory, it has been evaluated that the decision is unethical (Voskuijl & Evers, 2006).

Conclusion and Recommendations

The decision being taken by the Program Manager has been found as unethical from the professional, philosophical, and sociological/descriptive perspectives. There are ethical theories that have been applied to determine the ethical correctness and all of the theories have termed the decision as unethical. It is recommended for the Program Manager to re-negotiate the delivery date with the project client and maintain transparency in terms of project status and progress (Stahl, Timmermans & Flick, 2016). Also, there shall be additional effort that shall be included in the project to speed up the project tasks and activities. As a result, the team will be able to meet the expectations of the project client without violating any of the ethical principles and norms (Grundy, 2005). The Test Manager shall also present the possible set of outcomes of delivering the untested system to the Program Manager and the entire project management committee. The adaptation of such an approach will be in accordance with the ethical theories and principles. 

References

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