Overview

The need to make not only sound business decisions, but ethical decisions is imperative to compete in a global economy. A scan of thousands of media articles identified common decision-making pitfalls that existed in organizations before a large collapse. Most of these pitfalls involved ethical considerations related to the decision. However, many organizations have unanswered questions about how to build a systematic ethical decision-making capability, like:

1. How do you assess the ethical quality of decisions?
2. What are the common mindsets that impede the quality of ethical decisions within an organization?
3. How do you build an organization's ethical decision culture?

This course will address these questions from the perspectives of two fields: decision analysis and business ethics. It will draw conclusions and insights based on thousands of media articles, documentaries, movies, organizational decisions, and case studies. The course also includes common patterns drawn from the data mining of media articles and decisions made in numerous organizations including Theranos, Valeant, Enron, Wells Fargo, VW, FTX, and many others

The 11 elements of Ethical Decision Quality include work on normative and behavioral decision-making and on implementing a sound decision process within the organization.

What you will learn:

At the conclusion of the course, you will be able to:

• Describe how to assess the ethical quality of a decision
• Explain the fundamentals of legal-ethical-prudential decision-making.
• Articulate the impediments of decision quality in an organization.
• Assess the Organization’s Ethical Decision Culture
• Build an organization’s ethical decision culture.

Key Topics Covered

The course will cover the following key topics:

• The Elements of Ethical Decision Quality
  • Awareness,
  • Motives,
  • Environment,
  • Reasoning/Rationalization,
  • Information Assessment,
  • Updating and Gathering,
  • Cognitive Biases,
  • Alternatives,
  • Well-Being,
  • Trade-Offs and Tolerances,
  • Formulation, and
  • Stakeholders
• Impediments to Ethical Decision Quality
• Decision-Making in an Ethical Collapse

Prerequisites

There are no prerequisites for this course.

Assessment & Certificate

Students will complete case study-based assessment at the end of the course. Students who successfully complete all course requirements will receive a certificate of completion.