Human Service Assignment due by 2/23/18 6pm!!!

The main ethical problems that the organization is facing are breach of confidentiality and careless gossiping in the workplace. Although there are a few ethical guidelines that touch on confidentiality within the workplace, the firm’s confidentiality principles are not comprehensive and broad. For instance, the company discourages release of any privileged or confidential data, financial or otherwise. This practice is not allowed to any individual who does not have a legitimate need to know. These include unauthorized parties. In addition, the company states that employees are discouraged from disclosing information that is gained in the course of work or by reason of their official responsibilities in a manner that can adversely affect their relatives or people with whom they are individually or financially involved. Also related to confidentiality is gossiping about clients and fellow employees in an irresponsible manner. There have been numerous cases in which team members provide their family members and friends with confidential data that favor them so that they can work not their families’ cases when they are not expected to do this.

Gossiping in the workplace is one of the most common phenomena in organizations. However, relatively little is known about its impacts to workers. Almost all employees normally find themselves generating, hearing or otherwise taking part in evaluative comments regarding a person who is not present in the conversation (Kuo et al. 2015). In some situations, some employees often express rude levels of gossiping by blatantly talking about a client even in his or her presence. This may affect the way a client looks at the organization’s conduct in general. Gossiping may take the form of informal, casual, or unconstrained conversation or reports regarding other individuals, essentially involving details that are not yet confirmed as being true. Numerous studies indicate that approximately 14 percent of gossips take place at workplace coffee breaks. Moreover, about 66 percent of the whole conversations between employees is normally associated with social topics regarding other individuals (Kuo et al. 2015). Therefore, like this company, gossip offers a channel through which there is informal communication and information exchange, though the data conveyed in gossips may not be accurate or complete.

Breach of confidentiality and gossips have adverse effects on the wellbeing of employees and the whole organization. This is because such unethical practices trigger employee cynicism. In the same way gossips develops an environment of mistrust and hostility towards employees, thereby killing the spirit of team cohesion, cooperation, and collaboration (Dodig-Crnkovic & Anokhina, 2008). In worse case scenarios, disclosing employee or client information can be used as a tool for workplace bullying in which some people blackmail others regarding secret information that they have about them. This is because it might provide a basis of personal attacks against other people.

Recommendations

There are various steps that can be taken to promote confidentiality and discourage gossiping that is affecting the company. For instance, the company should incorporate an ethical policy and principle that supports beneficence, autonomy, and fidelity (Flite & Harman, 2013). This is because such principles are increasingly becoming hard to attain in the face of advancements in information technology. Autonomy should be addressed in areas such as bills of clients’ rights. The clients must have the right to review and make corrections in their electronic records, and such rights must also be honored particularly as states and companies develop information exchange platforms (Flite & Harman, 2013). The principle of justice might be violated while utilizing public data. This is especially true when data from classified records are presented to unauthorized parties. There is also need to incorporate the practice of moral intelligence through ethical training programs. Moral intelligence must be introduced within the greater framework of the company’s culture (Flite & Harman, 2013). This requires an interdisciplinary ethical collabo0raiton with other professionals within the company.

References

Flite, C. A., & Harman, L. B. (2013). Code of ethics: principles for ethical

leadership. Perspectives in Health Information Management/AHIMA, American Health

Information Management Association, 10(Winter).

Dodig-Crnkovic, G., & Anokhina, M. (2008). Workplace gossip and rumor: The information

ethics perspective. Living, Working and Learning Beyond, 193.

Kuo, C. C., Chang, K., Quinton, S., Lu, C. Y., & Lee, I. (2015). Gossip in the workplace and the

implications for HR management: A study of gossip and its relationship to employee

cynicism. The International Journal of Human Resource Management, 26(18), 2288-

2307.