Ethical Theories

Ethical Theories

            A key debate in ethical theory is whether ethics can be determined by objective, universal principles. How important the consequences of actions should be in determining an ethical position is also a significant issue.

Do ethics change over time?

            One viewpoint is that ethics do vary between time and place. Slavery for example is now regarded as wrong, whereas in Roman times slavery was acceptable. The view that ethics vary between different ages and different communities is known as ethical relativism. He opposing view is that ethics are unchanging over time and place; some courses of action are always right, others are always wrong. A simple example would be saying that it is always wrong to steal. The view that there are certain unchanging ethical rules is known as ethical absolutism.

What are consequences of decision made based on ethics?

            Some people think that society is best served by all people by adhering specific ethical principles and following them don’t matter what the consequences are. The argument is that people will undermine society if they disobey the ethical rules, even if they do so with the intention of avoiding adverse consequences. This viewpoint known as deontological ethics, developed by Kant. The opposing viewpoint is that you cannot divorce an action from its consequences, and when taking ethical decisions you must take account of what the consequences will be. This viewpoint is known as teleological ethics. If you take this viewpoint, that implies that you have to define what the best possible consequences are, the different variations of the teleological viewpoint try to do this.

What thought processes people should adopt?

            What the theories are aiming to do to complete the following sentence:

“You should act ethically because….

• People who are less ethically developed may think: 'You should act ethically because you’ll be punished if you don't.'
• People who have more advanced ethical development may think: 'You should act ethically because your country's laws say you should.
• People at the highest level of ethical development may think: “You should act ethically because it’s always right to do so, no matter what the consequences and costs are to you personally.

TYPES OF PERFORMANCE APPRAISAL

TYPES OF PERFORMANCE APPRAISAL

There are an enormous methods of appraisal persists. Under this heading we will examine in details regarding the diversified techniques used by the organization to evaluate the performance of the employees in the organization.

Critical Incident Technique (CIT)

Outstanding success and outstanding failures are the two basis of this method. The method is commonly known with the name of CIT. The main prospective of the critical incident techniques is to avoid the problems of the recency effect which can be done by keeping a log over time of incidents rather than recence at the time of appraisal. In this technique the evaluator listed down the observable behavior of the employees from time to time and assists in producing the records for the employees. CIT doesn’t follow a hard and fast rule to evaluate the performance of the employees.  In this evaluation the evaluators have specified expected responsibilities of the job of every employee. The comparison between the performances of the employees will be done by compare the list of two employees. The most dominating characteristic of the CIT is that, this method focus upon the most important aspects of a job or more precisely we can say that the method mostly emphasized on the job description and the job specification of the employees. In CIT different kinds of logs and charts are also maintain to provide very specific examples for the evaluator at the time of the appraisal. Managers and evaluators often used the charts to gauge the performance of an employee and after their assessment they present the progress before the employee with due diligence. 

Essay or Narrative Evaluations

Observation of the performance of specific job duties is described in this method. Every organization made some kind of standards to evaluate the performance of their employees in an impeccable manner. Likely, the evaluator is following some pre-determined standards and with the help of these standards evaluation of the employee’s responsibilities, strengths and weaknesses becomes relatively easy. To work on a standardized format is mandatory in order to ensure the consistency among the evaluation process. In an essay evaluation method a series of questions has been include in the evaluation form which have to be duly filled by his immediate manager or supervisors to estimate the performance of the employee. The main flaw which persists in this evaluation is the lack of writing skills of the evaluator. Another drawback of the process is that it halts the employee to viewed his/her own performance and the evaluator is not suppose to describe the performance of the employees in front of them in a proficient manner. Uncertainty in the validity in comparing the performance of the employees are also found by using this process, which is one of the major causes why a number of organizations doesn’t like this process to adapt. However the method is quite useful to direct the right part for the employee’s strengths and weaknesses, areas of improvement and career direction. One of the biggest advantages of the method is that it enhances the level of interaction between the employees and the supervisors which ultimately boost up the moral and satisfaction level of an employee.  

Rating Scales

The easiest technique or method uses by the managers or the evaluators is the rating style methods. It seems relatively easy to grade the employees as compared with the other set of measurement scale. Accumulation of the information regarding the performance of the employees become more precise and specific with the help of rating scale which excrete out a meaningful result for the employees in the end of the day because the method is totally based upon the predetermined standards. An employee’s performance has been judged through the numbers or adjectives or both can be used to rate an employee. Ethical issue arise in the utilization of this method because a numerous amount of peoples percept that estimating the performance through number seems bit impersonal. On the contrary the adjectives can provide great feedback which are totally relevant to the specific area of a job of an employee. A number of peoples still contradict the ranking method with the rating process or methods and thinks that both the methods are congenial in nature but it is not true, both the things are totally differ in nature. On of the great advantages of the rating scale method is that they are easy, to the point, quick, specific and accepted well by the managers and the supervisors as well. One thing must be bare in mind while applying the rating method to weigh the performance of the employees that the method is suitably applied in the correct manner because the overall goal can be overlooked if too many people involved in this method.