Ethics in the technology industry

Summary form only given as follows. Ethical behavior appears to be the norm, at least in the firm studied, if respondent´s indications can be taken as evidence of their behavior. The type of ethical dilemma faced appears to affect behavior with bribery being by far the most common unethical act. It is interesting to note that bribery is the only dilemma, which would appear to be beneficial to the firm, at least in the short run. The other four vignettes focused upon issues, which would tend to affect the respondent more than the firm. The analysis of the rationale for the response provided some insight into the respondents thought process. It also demonstrated that, in many cases at least, the vignettes were taken seriously by the respondents. Ethics, values and integrity appear to be important issues with many respondents. An interesting extension of this study would be to collect data from a manufacturing firm and a service firm. This would provide interesting comparisons of indicated actions and rationale among the three types of firms