Question

You are the CEO of Flower Power, Inc., a fast growing chain of 100 florist shops based in the Southeastern United States. The company opened for business 5 years ago with just 20 employees and now has over 1500 employees.

The company is now in the process of installing a new computer network, which will, for the first time, link all of the company’s offices and locations. The company’s Chief Information Officer has approached you with a proposal to include a number of electronic surveillance features in the new network.

The proposed features include:

- The ability of all MIS staff to view any employee emails at any time

- The ability of all MIS staff to monitor what internet sites employees are viewing at any time

- The ability of all MIS staff to “shadow” PCs of any employees, at any time, without the consent of those employees (“shadowing” allows a person, such as the MIS staff person, to monitor all a user’s activity on your PC from a remote location without the user’s knowledge)

- If a PC or laptop is issued for an employee’s use away from the office for work use, all email and activities on that PC or laptop can be monitored as well

- Cameras will be installed on PCs of every employee, allowing all MIS staff to monitor activities of every employee in their workspaces at any time

Your approval is needed to install this network and these features

The ethical dilemma:

the ethical dilemma with going ahead with this proposal is that the company will be compromising on their staff’s privacy without their consent which is against law. Also, there are chances that the monitoring allowed by the system can be misused by MIS staff for reasons that are not in good will for the organization (unwanted stalking, targeting particular employees due to personal grudges, personal agendas, etc.). Another ethical dilemma is that all the employees of the organization will be monitored except the MIS staff, which is again unfair as MIS staff will be getting a different treatment than rest of their coworkers.

On the other hand, this system will allow the company to ensure and monitor their employee actions and communications which will allow the company to make sure no confidential information leaks out of the company, all employees work during their office hours, and they refrain from misusing company’s resources.

The stakeholders affected by this decision will be the company’s management, company’s staff, and the MIS staff. The management has three options, either to select the proposed MIS system, or to reject the current proposal and ask the CIO to get the system redesigned to suit the company requirements, or to ensure that only few authorized people in the management have the right to access the surveillance that the system can offer, that too after proper approvals are taken to ensure the reasons are in company’s favor.

If the company decides to go ahead with this proposed system as is, the MIS staff will get the right to surveillance of all employees, and their communications at all times. The employees other than the MIS staff will be negatively affected, and this might affect their morale, as it will be perceived as an attack to their right to privacy. The management will be able to ensure their employees are not indulging in activity or communication that work’s against the company during their office hours, using company’s resources.

If the company rejects the proposal, it might boost employee morale, but the MIS morale will be affected as their hard work has been rejected by the company. The management will be negatively affected, as designing a new MIS system will incur more costs and time.

If the company decides to go with the proposed system ensuring proper authorization checks are in place, management will be able to assess their employees if genuine need arises. The MIS staff will be able to continue with their system they have worked on, and the employees will be content with the fact that their actions will only determine if their communications are being monitored.

Two parts to this question:

a) Who are the stakeholders (not limited to shareholders)?

b) Evaluate the stakeholders and how the various stakeholders would be affected by the dilemma indicated under "ethical dilemma"

Answer 1

A) Stakeholders refers to the employees, management staff, MIS Team, and me as I am the CEO of this company.

B)
If the MIS surveillance is being set up.

1) The employees other than the MIS staff will be negatively affected, and this might affect their morale, as it will be perceived as an attack to their right to privacy.
The company will be compromising on their staff’s privacy without their consent which is against law. Also, there are chances that the monitoring allowed by the system can be mis-used by MIS staff for reasons that are not in good will for the organization (unwanted stalking, targeting particular employees due to personal grudges, personal agendas, etc.). Another ethical dilemma is that all the employees of the organization will be monitored except the MIS staff, which is again unfair as MIS staff will be getting a different treatment than rest of their coworkers.

2) The MIS staff will be able to continue with their system they have worked on, and the employees will be content with the fact that their actions will only determine if their communications are being monitored.

3) This system will allow the company to ensure and monitor their employee actions and communications which will allow the company to make sure no confidential information leaks out of the company, all employees work during their office hours, and they refrain from misusing company’s resources.
This will in turn help out the Chief Information Officer and will make way for the smooth and progressive functioning of the company.

4) Source of leaks could easily be obtained

If the MIS surveillance setup is not being carried out.

1) This will boost the morale of the employees and will not carry out any biasing towards a respective set or a group of people.

2) The MIS team had been working on this software since a long time back and hence, they will now have to invest in more time to find an alternative software which will be working equally for all the sets of in-house staff.

3) This was a great move to nullify the wrong doings of the employess and would further boost up the proper functioning of the company.