One of the most beneficial exercises in a course exploring ethics is to develop a paper that allows you the opportunity to create connections between your personal view of ethics and the theory under discussion. The nature of ethical decision making is recognition, analysis and resolution. We often don’t make a decision because it’s ethical, but rather, because it makes sense from our personal view of the situation. That is, ethical decisions happen “after the fact” as we begin to see the actual implications of the decision.
With this in mind, your paper should explore current ethical issues in the workplace that are relevant to your current career or the career that you are preparing to pursue. Your task is to begin to explore the possible issues within your workplace and choose one to focus on throughout the course as you begin to build your final paper. Please consider the following as possible approaches for this final paper:
- Illustrate the impact of organizational goals and objectives, structure, culture, environment, ethics policies, and incentive systems on ethical behavior within an organization.
- Evaluate and revise an ethics program to increase ethical behavior within an organizational environment.
- Create and systematically apply a defensible ethical moral framework to a contemporary ethics issue. To systematically apply the ethical moral framework, you must use the framework consistently as you describe the ethics issue. Explore the issue using the framework you create. HINT: This is done through the application of one of the theories we read about in Module 1.
The final paper is your opportunity to delve into a topic within the framework of ethics that you find interesting, based on your approved topic and thesis statement.
- Focus your paper on the connection between your topic and ethics theory. You must use your approved topic.
- You must support your views. While your opinions are important, they are not sufficient for a discussion for this type of paper. The academic connections are crucial.
- The paper should be 5-8 pages in length (not including the title and reference page).
- The paper should follow APA 6th Edition guidelines for all formatting:
- 1” margins
- 12-point Times New Roman font
- Double-spaced
- Use your full-sentence outline to build the paper. This creates the blueprint for the final paper.
- The paper should have the following sections:
- Introduction: State what you are going to tell me in the body of the paper. This is a synopsis of the point of the paper. The thesis statement resides here.
- Body of the paper: This is the place where you pull your research together and develop your points. It should include:
- An overview of the ethics theory you are using.
- A connection of the theory to your topic.
- A discussion about the impact of the topic and theory.
- Conclusion: Restate what you have told me. This is your last opportunity to make your point, answer your question, or argue a perspective.
- Don’t forget the importance of the transitions between paragraphs and sections. I should be able to read the last sentence of one paragraph and the first sentence of the next paragraph and see the connection. HINT: This is a good way to test whether you have effective transitions.
- Grammar, spelling, punctuation, sentence structure, and paragraph structure matter: Spend time editing your paper. This means that you need to at least give yourself a three-day cooling off period between finishing the paper and editing the paper. This really does make a difference in what you catch and correct.
Compose your work using a word processor (or other software as appropriate) and save it frequently to your computer. When you’re ready to submit your work, click Browse My Computer and find your file. Once you’ve located your file click Open and, if successful, the file name will appear under the Attached files heading. Scroll to the bottom of the page, click Submit and you’re done. Be sure to check your work and correct any spelling or grammatical errors before you post it.
Review the SBT BUS323 Individual Project Rubric located in the “Start Here” section of the course for more information on grading criteria for the final project.
