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Moral Intelligence

Moral Intelligence is our mental capacity to determine how universal human principles should be applied to our personal values, goals, and actions (Lennick & Keil, 2005). Ethics is the set of moral principles or values, which we should follow (Lennick & Keil, 2005). We are not born with moral intelligence, we have to learn it and implement it in our life as we grow up. Most of us have an idea of our moral strengths and weaknesses. To help us focus on our moral strengths and weakness, Lennick and Keil developed MCI- Moral Competency Inventory. Moral Competency is a self- development tool which helps us guide our strengths and weaknesses. It helps us take advantage of our moral strengths and develop the skills in which we are weak.

My highest Moral Competency Strength is ‘admitting mistakes and failures.’ Willingness of taking responsibility for our own failures is an important act of responsibility and Moral Intelligence. Some people took the wise decisions of what is right for them and some did not. I was one of those people who decided to drop out of school for two years. I thought that I had my whole life to go to school, why can’t I just work and relax instead of stressing my brain? But after two years in the labor workforce, I realized the importance of education and white collar jobs. When I started my college, I realized that my friends of same age as mine were my seniors. It was embarrassing for me to accept that I was less successful than the students of my age. I realized for the first time value of two years of my life and what I could do in it. I would have graduated today if I didn’t drop out of school. To me the world was perfect being the youngest department manager and making more money than old aged people in the corporation. I feel sorry to admit that my expectations from life were same as a kid with candy. But now I realize that there is a lot to learn and implement. Some people watch others mistakes and learn, whereas I am a kind of person who falls in the dump and realizes that it was a mistake and thus learns. I work in an organization where mistakes are acceptable. For instance, when I became manager, in only one week my manager signed me up for anger management class. It was obvious that I had no idea how to deal with co-workers and make things work. But I am glad that I got that chance to learn how to communicate effectively and implement in my life. The most elusive benefit of ethics in an organization is trust (Trevino & Nelson, 2007). If we will hide our mistakes, they might be blamed on someone else. There should be fairness at work and so it is necessary for employees to be true to their work and when make mistakes, admit them before it is too late to fix them. Trust environment in an organization gives positive energy to all the employees. That is reflected with the way they deal with their customers and thus flourish in the business.

Ethical decision making process includes recognizing an ethical issue, getting the facts, evaluating alternative actions from various ethical perspectives, utilitarian approach of producing the greatest balance of benefits over harms, rights approach, fairness or justice approach, common good approach, and virtue approach.( Schulman, 1998). Ethical issue can be recognized by making sure that the decisions of an organization personally, interpersonally or socially does not damage the people or the community. Also the issues should not go beyond legal or an institutional concern. It is necessary to get all the relevant facts of the issue. Then evaluate alternative actions and its effect on community and an organization. It can be decided by having the maximum output with minimum harm to the nature or community. Ethical action dutifully respects rights of all affected. It should treat people fairly and equally. Common good approach is an approach where we think about good of whole community and not focus on just ourselves. Virtue approach focuses on habits and values of humans. Thus, my primary moral strength will have an impact in moral decision making process of getting the facts.

I hope to use my primary moral strength in my present and future work experience by making sure that I am true to myself and I realize what I am doing wrong. I should commit my mistakes instead of dragging it into more and more serious problem. It will help support my professional development by taking ethical decisions, realizing the right thing to do and if I do something wrong, I can admit it instead of dragging along.

My lowest moral competency is ‘actively caring about others’. I sometimes feel that I am not a social person. Most of the times, I get bored when I meet new people and is not interested in them. I never cared for the people I worked with, being a Manager, all I cared was work and getting maximum output of all. I did though let some of the employees leave early due to illness, family problems etc. But all I used to think was, if I were at that person’s place I would need to go home, and I would let them go. Once I was invited to a baby shower party of my co-worker. I was busy with my studies and work and thus didn’t attend it. I didn’t even call that person. After two days of party I recalled about it and felt really bad. But it was too late, and I did that lot of times due to stress from work and school. But I think that once I am done with studies, I would be working full time and that would be the best time for me to develop good friendly relationships with my co-workers. This moral competence will affect common good approach and utilitarian approach. “According to the principle of utility, an ethical decision should maximize benefits to society and minimize harms. What matters is the net balance of good consequences over bad” (Trevino & Nelson, 2007). Actively caring about others might blind me over the effects of my decision over community and people. I knew this was a weakness for me because I saw how my co-workers gradually stopped inviting me to their parties and events. I didn’t cared for them, and so they stopped caring for me. After this incident, instead of getting along with everyone, I felt hatred for others. I felt like they are mean to me and don’t understand how hard it is to work full time and study, where in fact it was my fault. Moral virus like ‘my needs are more important than yours’ (Lennick & Kiel, 2005) affects my moral competence of ‘actively care for others.’ As a professional, it will be necessary for me to take ethical decisions, keeping the community and all human beings in mind. Because I have a nature of not caring for others, it might obstruct me or blind me of the affects of rights or obligations to the community. I can try to strengthen my moral weakness by prioritizing my moral development efforts. I can plan out my moral development process by writing down the moral and emotional competencies on which I want to focus and detail the steps I can take to use those competencies. Moral development is largely a process of developing and leveraging strongest moral competencies (Lennick & Kiel, 2005). The first step would be 1) describing my self- balancing personal loyalty with what we are asked to do in our everyday life is very important. I learned that oral compass helps me think what my values and beliefs. The points on my moral compass are responsibility, courage, self- discipline and generosity. Responsibility is the ‘true north’ on my compass for I think 100 times before taking an action like depending on my parents or asking for money. I feel that being a grown-up I need to learn how to live and survive on my own. It is necessary to check priorities and timeliness of everyday things and acts. On south I have courage. Courage to cope with stress, to admit mistakes and to stand for what is right. I won’t mind blowing the whistle if I think it is the right thing to do. Courage is a power; it makes me think and gives me positive energy to succeed in my life. For west, self- discipline. In order to be successful, I need to organize my life and be disciplined, so I don’t lose the way. My definition of success is again self- centered. To me success means to graduate, get a good job and live comfortable life. Now I see the moral virus existing right in my goal. Instead of thinking about social life and community, I am moving towards individualistic approach. My south in moral compass is – generosity. I think that in order to maintain relationships and to get socially accepted it is very important to be generous. It makes other people come to us and talk, which creates positive environment for study, work, living etc. 2) Documenting goals- I can accomplish the most important goal of my life, being successful by being a part of community and not individualistic. The most significant thing I want to accomplish in all the important areas of life is to care for others, ability to let go other’s mistakes and embracing responsibility for serving others. 3) Identify the moral competencies I need the most. 4) Leveraging my strongest moral competency- I can use my strongest moral competency of ‘admitting mistakes’ by admitting that I am weak in actively caring for others and that I should try to be better. I can use my strengths in the new situation and accomplish my goal. 5) Reducing moral gaps- by an effort to strengthen my weak moral competency I can reduce the moral gap. 6) Moral development short list- to boost performance by developing my moral competence I will take following steps; i) socialize with co-workers, ii) admit my mistakes and try to start conversation, iii) be care full in my actions making sure it doesn’t not affect or harm others, iv) keep track of my progress in accomplishing this goal v) breaking bad habits of slacking parties and avoiding conversations, vi) reward myself for positive change- best treat would be ice-cream, vii) surround myself with positive people and viii) educate myself regarding moral competence through books, audio and video media. ix) Interview with someone I trust, admire, respect, and see as strong in area where I am weak. I took interview of Waymond Fong, a manager in Safeway. I admire this guy for he works really hard and once he advice me to move on with life – get education instead of being stuck in a corporation. I had a pleasant discussion of moral competency with him and also shared my weaknesses. According to his suggestions I should take some sociology classes, business ethics classes and try to implement the plan I have in order to be strong in my weakest moral competency. He also suggested me to take leadership and mass communication classes in order to be skilled in getting together with people. “Social responsibility is necessary in order to succeed the human race” – Waymond Fong. He explained me how he has to take ethical decisions and cope with moral viruses being a corporation manager on daily bases. It is not easy to have the power and not misuse it. According to him, everybody in the corporate world should be educated with ethics and responsibilities. He suggested me to get myself a reward every time I take ethical decision. He uses this strategy with his employees, rewards them when they do something right or stops someone to do something wrong- not good for community. Thus I learned a lot from this man, apart from the work I learned from him, today I learned how to use power, balance ethical issues, solve problems and be fair to everyone.

Moral means relating to principles of right and wrong in behavior; conforming to a standard of right behavior (Green, 2007). Moral incompetence takes place when personal or business goals conflict with values. We have to learn the social ethics of right and wrong. Ethics plays important role in our life and influences the way we think. Being a business student, I learned about the unethical behavior of Enron’s CEO’s and other employees. Ethical behavior is not only related to monetary values but also with the relationships we maintain with others and nature. It is something like recycling cans and plastic, we think that we don’t gain anything out of it but we have to think about the nature, community and everyone’s well-being. We have to do the ‘right’ thing in order to succeed. For my life, I have decided to follow my moral compass and avoid the moral viruses. I have also decided to go green by selling my car and getting a hybrid or electric car. As mentioned before, my moral competency plan is ready and now I have started to implement it. For my professional life, I will have to check the decisions I take, how they affect others and if it is the right thing to do. We cannot underestimate any harm to the community. My personal code of Ethics is“ conduct myself with honesty and integrity towards all people, exhibit high moral character as an individual, accept responsibilities, review my personal code of ethics periodically and learn the art of negotiation in good faith and succeed in the corporate world with moral and ethical values.” My most important life goals are to be educated, successful at work, and have a loving family. My goals fit with the principles, values and beliefs because I like to take care of people- community, have inner harmony which will help me resolve ethical issues, am honest, self- sacrificing, and self-controlled.

When we act with integrity, we agree with universal human principles. We do what we think is right; act according to our principles and beliefs, and gain moral intelligence. My personal code of ethics starts with honesty and integrity towards all people, which means I would keep in mind that I am not harming any body in anyway. Being a part of community, I have to respect everyone and avoid unethical decisions. Responsibility will make me think about the decisions and its effects on all of us. Compassion will help me self- sacrifice and help others for doing the ‘right’ thing. Forgiveness is related to my inner harmony, where I don’t keep the ill will in my mind and try to make things work out fine for everyone.

My moral compass statement is“I am going to be a responsible, courageous, self-disciplined and generous to everyone at all time.” My personal ethical code of conduct will help me solve the complex ethical issues by focusing on moral viruses, working environment, implement moral and ethical values in the organization and educate those involved in the ethical issues. We can train and educate the whole organization on ethics and moral intelligence. There are more laws and more pressure on the people working at high positions in an organization, thus they cut corners and try to take unethical decisions, in this situation a corporation should adopt code of ethics. Educate employees with business ethics, higher-order decision making and problem solving skills should be introduced to the employees. All the stakeholders in the ethical issue should be involved in legal and ethical reasoning. All levels of workers from management to entry level should be able to recognize the factors that guide ethical behavior and develop strategies for assessing their personal and organizational ethics. Take surveys throughout the organization and guide employees for their moral competency. When needed, I might look for outside guidance and support regarding ethical issues. I can educate myself more taking some more ethics classes, read books, and follow moral compass keeping values in my mind.

References:

Trevino, L & Nelson, K. (2007). Managing Business Ethics. NJ: John Wiley & Sons, Inc.

Lennick, D. & Kiel, F. (2005). Moral Intelligence. NJ: Wharton School Publishing.

Waymond, Fong. Personal Interview, November 18, 2007. Fremont, California. Interview with Mr. Waymond Fong took place in his office at the Safeway in Warm Springs. The interview lasted sixty minutes and included a discussion of Moral Competency Inventory by Lennick & Kiel. Costa, J. (1998). Imperative Ethics. NJ: De Capo Press. Schulman, M. (2003, winter). The role, responsibilities, and challenges of corporate gatekeepers, 14 (1). Retrieved November 18, 2007, from Info-Trac Expanded Academic ASAP online database.

Frame Work of Ethical Decision Making Process (2003). Retrieved November 18, 2007, from the World Wide Web: http://www.scu.edu/ethics/practicing/decision/framework.html

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