Practice Personal and Social Responsibility (Ethics)

Ethical Choices

Identify and Analyze

Choose from the questions below to reflect on how, when, and where you have made ethical choices.

    • How will the career you are pursuing influence your virtual presence?

      • For example, will your position require a security clearance?

      • What are you doing now to demonstrate the level of discretion and maturity that will expected from you on the job?

    • How have you managed your time or other limited resources to complete a project?

    • Has your work on a project or for an organization required you to maintain a level of confidentiality?

    • Have you identified consequences of unethical conduct or recognized conflict between personal/professional ethics and the ethics of others?

    • When, where, and how have you demonstrated awareness of legal responsibilities (e.g., copyright laws, harassment, equity)?

    • Have you provided information only to authorized personnel, whether transmitted physically or via technology?

    • Have you maintained records on the distribution of information using established format and procedures?

    • What is a difficult situation you have had to overcome? How did you overcome it? What was required? Did you have to make changes or sacrifices in order to address the problem?

Evaluate & Synthesize

How do the decisions (and/or the steps you have taken toward ethical decisions) demonstrate the level of maturity you expect from yourself? Provide examples to support your explanation.

Transfer

How have the decisions you have made regarding your online presence, confidentiality, managing time and resources, etc. prepared for your similar challenges you expect to face on the job?

Practicing personal and social responsibility includes the ability to

    • practice ethical leadership;

    • recognize an ethical dilemma and apply rational decision-making in order to address it;

    • choose ethical courses of action in research and practice;

    • acknowledge and address the consequences of one’s own actions; and

    • engage in local and global civic activities.

How will you demonstrate your personal and social responsibilities?

Professional Code of Behavior

Prepare a personal professional code of behavior, a brief essay that addresses the following:

    • Select two or three of the “codes” from the attached "Traits of Professional Leaders" list that represent your current core professional values.

    • Describe what they mean and how/where you have seen them exhibited. Consider what you have learned from the small or large group discussions.

    • Describe how you see yourself exhibiting these professional behaviors in the workplace.

Virtual Responsibility

Use the Guiding Questions below to help you create a “philosophy of online communication."

Identify & Analyze

List several principles or “best practices” regarding the uses of communication technologies you are learning or have observed others applying. How are these best practices applied? Where do you see them? You may also want to identify practices to avoid.

Why are these best practices important? What are the implications of their use or of failures to apply them? What are the benefits or costs to the stakeholders?

Evaluate & Synthesize

Transfer

How do you envision your philosophy of online communication affecting your professional work? What communication technology challenges will you expect to face in your work?

*Tip: Developing a reflective response on virtual responsibility may also demonstrate lifelong learning.

Image source: ©iStock.com/stuartmiles99

Traits of Professional Leaders.pdf