In honor of it’s one year, below is a post from last year right after the tragic event. It has been incredible the support and diveristy inclusion that has resulted. Orlando Strong….People Strong.
Thinking about ethics in the workplace this last week has become a tough situation to handle. I live in Orlando. About fifteen minutes away from where I live a mass shooting happened; this has changed a lot of things about life here. At first everyone has their initial thought on why it happened, how it could have happened and the sadness or anger it may bring. Then it sinks in and becomes a topic that is talked about in all circles of life. You cannot escape it. But how do you handle it in the workplace? This brings up an ethical awareness that is crucial for navigating how a workplace handles an issue or event like this.
Many places showed support in the most heartfelt way. We united as a city and the support from around the world is inspiring, including Penn State University, my school states away. But there are many ethical issues that come up with this tragic event. There are so many opinions, many emotions, and many ideas that have to be considered when talked about in the workplace. Religion, guns, gays, people, rights, freedom, loss, support. You have to be careful to keep some personal feelings separate from your work environment with respect that we all are allowed to feel our own emotions. What we talk about in the workplace relating to this event can be a gray line of ethics and can serve how our workplace ethical climate is defined. You cannot not allow personal opinion to influence how you treat people just as the APA Code of Ethics (2010) inspires us not to harm others and with one ill directed comment on this situation could possibly lessen one’s integrity by harming a person with one hurtful or prejudice comment.
There are a lot of issues in this one act of terrorism that brings ethical issues such as nationality, race, sexual preference that a workplace place will not tolerate in this diverse culture. Although it sounds simpler to just have sympathy and even empathy for each other there is a lot of other emotions that have been cognitively developed over the years we individually cannot let go of. They are part of our self. The cognition arousal theory mentioned in the Penn State (n.d.) lecture states that not only is there cognition awareness but also an arousal that motivates certain emotions such as fear to occur and this event is influencing the workplace mood and performance as people deal with their emotions and feelings on the event. This event has stemmed people to voice their opinion and feeling to reach out for support from others to help guide through the hardship and healing. This can be difficult though in maintaining a diverse and ethical climate for the workplace as we all have our own views.
So what do you do? Do you ignore the event and not acknowledge it? Do you reach out and extend helping hands? It is different for every workplace and consideration depending on what field and what business you are involved in can affect how you handle it. For us in the auto industry we must be delicately balanced in how we deal with it as we have a diverse environment not only with employees but also our customers. Our HR manager took steps in guiding us how to handle everyday business. Our organization acknowledged the tragic event and provided support for those who needed it. She asked we all be aware of what and how we talk about the tragedy and to hold our personal opinion and feeling to a high ethical manner and have respect for all those around us. She pointed out for us to use our best judgment when discussing and that our company will not tolerate any negativity or derogatory comments or jokes. I was proud the way it was handled. It made us aware before anything was said we could not take back that could have harmed another.
Sometimes the best way to handle a tragic event that will stem so many ethical debates and issues is to keep it simple. Our ethics teach us to be mindful in order not to present unfair discrimination and to have respect for people’s rights and dignity (APA, 2010). You have to adhere to your own ethical code of what you would want said or to be surrounded with, the golden rule. You have to want to influence those around you to have compassion for each other in order to create a high ethical environment in the workplace. When such a tragic event takes place it makes you adjust and focus even more on doing the right thing.
Orlando Strong. Nation Strong.
American Psychological Association. (2010, June 1). Ethical principles of psychologists and code of conduct: Including 2010 amendments. Retrieved fromhttp://www.apa.org/ethics/code/
Penn State University. (n.d). PSY 533 Lesson 4. Retrieved from Pennsylvania State University Campus Website: https://psu.instructure.com/courses/1778551/pages/l04-cognition-and-emotion?module_item_id=20918293
Here is the original post published at Penn State:
http://sites.psu.edu/psy533buban/2016/06/16/keeping-ethics-strong-during-tragedy/
Shop Amazon Devices- $10 off Kindle for Kids Bundle
