Value_and_Ethics_Paper

Professional Value and Ethics May21, 2010 Sally Benazzouz Professional Value and Ethics There are several methods for an organization or for an individual to measure the level of achievement and contribution they have accomplished. Key components include professional values, ethics and career success. In order to achieve true and honest career success, an individual must exercise professional values. This means they perform their assigned duties in a manner that promotes success to the overall company mission and strives to improve the complete experience for all employees and consumers alike. Values are the rules by which one makes decisions on what is right and wrong, should and should not do, or what is good and bad. Values are rules that one sets to distinguish things that are right and wrong. Values also help individuals determine what projects are more important than others. Dictionary.com defines values as “A principle, standard, or quality considered worthwhile or desirable: The speech was a summons back to the patrician values of restraint and responsibility" (Jonathan Alter)” (Dictionary.com, LLC., 2010). There are several forms of ethics professional ethics, medical ethics among others. Ethics are moral values individuals live by. Professional ethics can be described as a set of rules or codes a group of individuals live by in a professional setting such as the office or at the work place. Accusing a person of being unethical is actually calling that individual unprofessional and is considered as an insult. Dictionary.com defines ethics as: “the rules of conduct recognized in respect to a particular class of human actions or a particular group, culture, etc.: medical ethics; Christian ethics. (Dictionary.com, LLC., 2010). Professional values, without strong work and personal ethics are nothing more than a blatant lie to everyone, including that individual not practicing them. Ethics are the true and faithful practice of doing what’s right no matter what. It means performing assigned duties the right way, even, when people aren’t watching. It means not telling lies to cover up mistakes, to cover up other lies, to not distort information or intentionally steer a situation in a direction for personal gain. Ethics are an absolute must in order for there to be true professional values practiced and, there must be superior professional values in practice to achieve true and honest career success. Whether working for a mom and pop coffee shop or an international corporation, an employee would find himself sitting with the owner or the Human Resource representative to review policy for the business. Inner-twined with policy, each company has a set of values they bring to the table, be it good customer services or answering the phone by the second ring. The notion of professional values and ethics sets the expectation and standard for employees to work from. For instance, when a doctor takes the Hippocratic Oath, he swears he will uphold a high moral and ethical set of standards not causing harm to patients. Likewise, as women and men enter the military, they are challenged to take the Oath of Enlistment. In this example, soldiers swear to defend the Constitution, swear allegiance to the United States, and obey orders by the President and the officers appointed over them. At the head of each Catholic Church stands the priest. To become a priest, the student must first go to seminary, second, becomes a transitional deacon and then must be ordained by the bishop. Once this is achieved, he is there to manage the daily operations of the church, oversee daily and weekly mass, and listen to parishioners concerns and needs. Each of these example shares the common thread that these people must maintain high ethical standards and morals. To succeed in any professional endeavor, including academic success, a person must adopt personal standards and always be cognizant of their professional values and ethics. The result of unprofessional or unethical behavior could be devastating to a career. Professional values can depend on individual circumstances and situations to properly define. One example would be to conform to established rules and regulations by a governing body or board. If an organization that solicited security guards entered into a contract to provide licensed security guards but delivered unlicensed warm bodies to fill posts, that behavior would be unprofessional. The standard is that you will deliver licensed security and the person who sold the account would lose his reputation in the business arena, and credibility with regulators or boards. Another example would be to allow an individual to complete a students academic studies and papers because the online learner in an unsupervised environment. This behavior is cheating the student out of the learning experience, and deceiving future employers into thinking they are hiring a qualified individual. This will eventually be exposed, and the student will fail in their career and ultimately in life. The successful career individual believes that their inner, most personal feelings, guide them to always do a greater good. Their character, or what people can see externally from actions and statements, will not allow them to be unethical, dishonest, or deceiving for personal gain. Career success, whether measured by the individual or that individual’s organization, can only be determined by his or hers personal performance—good or bad. Works Cited values. (n.d.). The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition. Retrieved May 19, 2010, from Dictionary.com website: http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/values Dictionary.com, L. (2010). ethics. Retrieved May 18, 2010, from Dictionary.com, LLC: http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/ethics