What is your personal ethics "quick test"?
What is your personal ethics "quick test"?
(OP)
I have to make decisions daily that affect my ultimate customer - the end users flying on & off aircraft carriers. Everytime I make a decision that affects my customer, I ask myself if it's the best decision that I could make on the customer's behalf & will I regret it later. Would I be willing to go up in the plane with hardware affected by my decision? Would it bother me if I saw a write-up of my decision in the newspaper the next day - or if my mother read about it in the paper? (even at my age, I still care about my mom's opinion)
So, what are your "quick tests"?
So, what are your "quick tests"?





RE: What is your personal ethics "quick test"?
Is it right or wrong?
If you can't answer that question, seek help or turn the problem over to someone that knows the answer...
As engineers, we can not afford to be wrong..If we are, the public suffers the consequences....
BobPE
RE: What is your personal ethics "quick test"?
I'm afraid I assumed this as a given - considering the question was about ethics. However, sometimes there is not a clear right or wrong answer. How do you make those decisions?
As engineers, we can not afford to be wrong
I believe we are in agreement here...If I'm not willing to go up the bird with my equipment on it, a pilot should not have to either.
RE: What is your personal ethics "quick test"?
Of course, the first question doesn't say much; if somebody's out to get you, they'll conjure something up. The second question is the one that makes me check myself. If I can't answer that question confidently, I often bring in somebody else whose opinion I believe in. I also then make sure I document what and why. (I admit that this is a pretty tough standard, but I'm fortunate that I don't have lives in my hands as directly as many others).
Brad
RE: What is your personal ethics "quick test"?
Is it always right vs wrong? You can't always give a guarantee. Perhaps it's about risk. The key thing is the people who are at risk need to be as aware as practicable of that risk.
Maybe it's a good thing to examine if your work has been compromised by factors imposed by others not so concerned with safety??? Management wants the job finished and installed by end of business today, no excuses! Does that eat into your time to test? At what point do you reject management's demands?
Maybe management should be sent up in the plane first :)
I'd like to see more of that.
Cheers,
John.
RE: What is your personal ethics "quick test"?
I think your test 'Would I be willing to go up in the plane with hardware affected by my decision?' is probably the best test, for you and probably your customer as well although they might not realise it. Say you fitted systems to civil aircraft and asked passengers about risks from systems, talking about probability of failure on demand, redundancy and diversity in systems would not make much impact on how they perceive the risks arising from your decision.
The problem with any decision based on perception of risk is that usually expert appraisal of risk does not accord with 'public' appraisal. I work on a nuclear licensed site, live about a 15 minute walk away and am concerned as much as anyone that the risks from decisions that I make are as low as reasonably practicable. However that does not stop the public demonstrating about discharge levels that are a minute fraction of the variation in background count across the UK.
The point, (I do get there eventually...) is that as engineers it is our DUTY to consider the safety of the end user even though some end users will never agree with the decision that you made. We have to be true to ourselves and our experience. If we are being pressurised to make a decision that we are unhappy with then we MUST walk away. If all engineers acted this way then eventually people would actually begin to trust us.
Regards, HM.
PS Get a clairvoyant with 20/20 hindsight to participate in your design process!
No more things should be presumed to exist than are absolutely necessary - William of Occam
RE: What is your personal ethics "quick test"?
LOL I know I could never revert back to aircraft design, they would be bulletproof, hammerproof, and works of art, unfortunately, they would never leave the ground........
RE: What is your personal ethics "quick test"?
Would I use it?
Would I let my family use it?
How long will it last?
What would happen if it fails?
Should I get an independent opinion?
Regards,
RE: What is your personal ethics "quick test"?
Rick Kitson MBA P.Eng
Construction Project Management
From conception to completion
www.kitsonengineering.com
RE: What is your personal ethics "quick test"?
RE: What is your personal ethics "quick test"?
It is really easy to design something beautiful and robust, but totally ignore what a pain it will be for the guy trying to fix it when it breaks.
I also ask myself "Does my (insert various areas of anatomy) smell?"
As far as ethics vs. morality:
From Dictonary.com:
ethics (used with a sing. or pl. verb):
* The rules or standards governing the conduct of a person or the members of a profession: medical ethics.
mo·ral·i·ty (m-rl-t, mô-) n. pl. mo·ral·i·ties:
* The quality of being in accord with standards of right or
good conduct.
* A system of ideas of right and wrong conduct: religious
morality; Christian morality.
* Virtuous conduct.
* A rule or lesson in moral conduct.
The proper question to ask is not "Am I doing anything wrong?" (abstract), but rather "Am I breaking any rules?" (concrete)
RE: What is your personal ethics "quick test"?
My test is this: Is the mechanical design executed along classical engineering lines incl. load analysis, stress analysis, fatigue analysis, thermal analysis, dimensional range considerations, correct functional datums, thoughtful selection of materials, tested functionally under reasonable conditions, etc.
I cringe when I find that engineering designs are being created by other than qualified engineers.
RE: What is your personal ethics "quick test"?
Military officers are trained professionals who are qualified to take some extraordinary risks. It is not a fair question to ask an untrained civilian whether he is willing to take the same risks.
RE: What is your personal ethics "quick test"?
RE: What is your personal ethics "quick test"?
RE: What is your personal ethics "quick test"?
RE: What is your personal ethics "quick test"?
RE: What is your personal ethics "quick test"?
Can you give me an example... something to 'chaw' on... I think a Code of Ethics is like a PR Department... If you need one, you're likely doing something wrong.
RE: What is your personal ethics "quick test"?
Any time ethics are questioned in court.
See definitions in rhodie's post. By definition, ethics are quantified and shared.
RE: What is your personal ethics "quick test"?
RE: What is your personal ethics "quick test"?
A person's own ethics are not likely to be at issue in court. A person or company's actions with respect to accepted industry ethics could be.
RE: What is your personal ethics "quick test"?
"Synonyms: moral, ethical,
These adjectives mean in accord with right or good conduct. Moral applies to personal character and behavior, especially sexual conduct: "Our moral sense dictates a clearcut preference for these societies which share with us an abiding respect for individual human rights" (Jimmy Carter).
Ethical stresses idealistic standards of right and wrong: "Ours is a world of nuclear giants and ethical infants" (Omar N. Bradley). "
Likewise:
"eth·ic
n.
A set of principles of right conduct.
A theory or a system of moral values: "An ethic of service is at war with a craving for gain" (Gregg Easterbrook). "
The end result is that there should be no conflict or confusion between morals and ethics. Ethics is a an attempt to codify "wrong" behavior through a series of examples.
We, in society, like children testing limits, ignore the principles behind the ethics and basically decide that "if it's not forbidden, then it's OK." That's the equivalent of seeing a series of data points and assuming that the ethical function consists only of points instead of the curve that runs through the points.
TTFN
RE: What is your personal ethics "quick test"?
Been pretty lucky, I guess... any firm I've worked for has given me a pretty wide latitude... and, I haven't done many things that could be called into question... and I take a pretty strong position on my integrity, ocasionally to the chagrin of a client...
RE: What is your personal ethics "quick test"?
Leanne, my father was a test pilot in the military, and refused to allow any mechanic to work on his aircraft who was not willing to sit in the cockpit and fly with him after the repair had been completed. If the mechanic refused, then he was replaced. Sometimes the code of ethics that we work to are not chosen by us, but are imposed upon us. Although yours appear to be self-imposed, it seems to me that you are asking yourself the correct questions.
Maui
RE: What is your personal ethics "quick test"?
We have an official code of ethics at work as do many companies. It's called the Standards of Conduct. It covers legal compliance, respect for others, safety, trust, meeting commitments, conflicts of interest, business courtesies, global responsibility, fair trade, inside information, intellectual property, resources, being a good corporate citizen. Some of it spills over into legal responsibilities. Some does not.
Not all decisions are black or white - those are the EASY decisions. Ethics has a lot of gray areas & therein, lies the ethics challenge. Some decisions are hard to make. If you haven't been faced with a tough decision yet in your career, count your blessings. Sometimes you have to make the choice between the lesser of two evils (after you identify which one is which) and minimize damage - there is no RIGHT answer, but there is a bad answer & a worse answer.
In the light of recent corporate news, the folks most visible these days in the ethics arena seem to be the ones with access to the money - going out or coming in - the beancounters - used to be the purchasing folks, but the ethics of financial audit records seem to have stolen the limelight. Often when people make egregious ethical decisions, it results in laws being written. We are seeing this today with respect to the business world of corporate audits & such. CEOs must now sign a paper personally validating financial records & they go to jail if they violate the shareholder trust by allowing manipulation of the books.
TI has a code of ethics because the company thought it made good business sense. I spent 14 years of my career there. Our Ethics program was an industry benchmark and first written code of ethics for TI was developed in 1961. I used to team teach procurement ethics classes with staff from the Ethics office. The ethics office part of the team focused on the macro ethics for the morning session & the afternoons were mine focused on micro ethics - procurement specific.
http://www.ti.com/corp/docs/company/citizen/ethics/benchmark.shtml
The quicktests we used in our Ethics training program at TI are at http://www.ti.com/corp/docs/company/citizen/ethics/quicktest.shtml
RE: What is your personal ethics "quick test"?
just my thoughs....
BobPE
RE: What is your personal ethics "quick test"?
Engineers also make ethical decisions which are not specifically engineering related.
Walking away can be a wrong answer as well.
One of the worst things an engineer can do, IMHO, is to not learn from past engineering decisions.
What went right?
What went wrong?
What can we do better next time?
RE: What is your personal ethics "quick test"?
take care
BobPE
RE: What is your personal ethics "quick test"?
LOL. I have a pocket protector - somewhere...I also have a slide rule or two. I drive a Durango, but long for the days when my resto project 65 ragtop pony is in driveable condition, and I don't drink beer - cheap or otherwise - yech!
I have to deal with all kinds of non-engineering types. I have often gone to meetings outisde my normal realm of influence where noone even knew (or cared) about my engineering background, because nothing techy was under discussion.
JackJill of all trades, master of none...