Posted: November 28th, 2015

BUSINESS OPERATIONS 1767

Question
Activity 8

Section 3: Business Operations: Financial Issues
The most frequently occurring ethical violations in finance relate to insider trading, stakeholder interest versus stockholder interest, investment management, and campaign financing. Businesses in general and financial markets in particular are replete with examples of violations of trust and loyalty in both public and private dealings. Fraudulent financial dealings, influence peddling and corruption in governments, brokers not maintaining proper records of customer trading, cheating customers of their trading profits, unauthorized transactions, insider trading, misuse of customer funds for personal gain, mispricing customer trades, and corruption and larceny in banking have become common occurrences. The idea that human beings can be honest and altruistic is an empirically valid assumption; it is not hard to find examples of honesty and altruism in both private and public dealings. There is no reason this idea should not be embraced and nurtured.

To assist businesses in this respect, The Sarbanes-Oxley Act was enacted in 2002 to restore integrity and public confidence to the financial markets. The law was passed in response to the horrendous corporate disasters that had occurred including Tyco, Enron, Worldcom, and Adelphia (Kessel, 2011). The implementation of effective business ethics became essential and the new law required the publication of corporate codes of ethics. However, it did not mandate their content.

We conclude this final section and the course with an example of subprime loans and the measures undertaken to prevent market failure again. We then examine measures such as the Sarbanes-Oxley Act that attempt to increase accountability. We conclude with an opportunity for you to conduct your own case study analysis.


Required Reading:
Please refer to the Activity Resources section within each activity for the required readings.

Assignment 8 Signature Assignment: Case Study Presentation
Unfortunately, there has been a plethora of unethical cases in business in recent times with numerous CEOs accused of misdeeds in recent years: those at Tyco International, Enron, WorldCom, and HealthSouth just to name a few. Businessman defrauding billions, such as Bernard Madoff, a former American businessman, investment manager and financier, who duped investors of up to $50 billion dollars in a Ponzi scheme considered to be the largest financial fraud in American history. Mega-corporations have been investigated for a host of ethical, negligence, and environmental issues, such as BP as related to an oil spill. The list seems almost endless.

Activity Resources
Review previous readings as necessary
Main Task: Interpret the Implications of Unethical Behavior
Now is the time to place all of the pieces together that you have learned in this course into a comprehensive case study analysis. Assume you are an instructor presenting an unethical case study to your graduate students. Develop a PowerPoint presentation on the person/business of your choice. It may be one of those named previously in preparation of an assignment, or one found in your own research. Be certain to address the following key components for your student audience:

Brief historical summary on the individual or organization
Unethical behavior/event examined
Reflection on ethical standards
Influence of leadership
Social responsibility response (both actual and appropriate)
Related cultural, environmental, and legal implications
Impact on stakeholders
Outcome of event with a comparison of the consequences
Fairness of punishment
Your own recommendations for action, including recommendations for your students while completing their studies
Incorporate appropriate animations, transitions, and graphics as well as ?speaker notes? for each slide. The speaker notes may be comprised of brief paragraphs or bulleted lists.

Support your presentation with at least seven (7) scholarly resources. In addition to these specified resources, other appropriate scholarly resources may be included.

Length: 15-20 slides (with a separate reference slide)
Notes Length: 200-350 words for each slide

Be sure to include citations for quotations and paraphrases with references in APA format and style where appropriate. Save the file as PPT with the correct course code information. Upload the completed assignment in the Activities area of the course.

Learning Outcomes: 4, 5, 6
Assignment Outcomes
Assess the extent to which social, ethical and public issues must be considered in internal and external stakeholder relationships.
Interpret ethics in an academic setting, especially in regard to academic integrity and the code of conduct.
Compare and contrast the consequences for ethics violations