Ethical dilemma:
Ethics and tendering
April 2005
Your company has submitted a tender to manufacture a high-tech product for use by the military. The success of the tender will depend, in part, on being able to demonstrate sufficient progress in the design and testing of the product.
Unfortunately, the testing program has not delivered the good results that were expected, but your company's engineers are absolutely confident that the bugs will be sorted out in due course.
However, the military requires immediate assurance that the company's work has proceeded to the required level of development. The success or failure of this tender will make or break your company.
It is suggested to you that the current results might be ‘massaged’ before being presented to the military. This will keep the tender alive and provide time for development and testing to either match or exceed the results disclosed to the military.
Everyone is confident that, in time, your product will be seen as offering leading edge technology – well in advance of the competition.
Ethical questions:
- What are the issues?
- Who are the stakeholders?
- What should you do?
- What would you do?
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