In this situation, I should use the decision-making process to analyze the issue.

Step 1: Recognize that a decision needs to be made

As a CEO for Google and launching the self-driving car program, I have to make some
decisions to direct my employees should design the vehicle to either kill pedestrians or kill
the driver if an accident happens while driving a self-driving car.
Step 2: Generate multiple alternatives
There are two particular decisions to select: sacrifice the driver to save many others or
sacrifice the pedestrian if an unavoidable accident may occur. However, both choices are
not ideal and will cause loss of people as well, so carefully consider before giving
alternatives is necessary.
Step 3: Analyze the alternatives
According to the article, “ When is it Okk for Our Cars to Kill Us?” Sarah Crespi shows that “it
was more appropriate to sacrifice passengers or bystanders, a quandary known as the
trolley problem in ethics...[...], one passenger to one pedestrian, about 75% of respondents
said the passenger should be saved. However, it is not the final result to a CEO make the
decision. When the number of pedestrians went up and is greater than the number of
passengers, survey-takers tend to change to their minds to save pedestrians because they
use the reflective system in the brain based on logical, analytical, deliberate, and methodical
thinking to make decisions.
In critical thinking, it is a nonprogrammed decision that is novel, unstructured, not well-
defined, and nonroutine decisions based on the textbook. If we choose to save our
passengers and ignore pedestrians’ life while using a self-driven car, it is called the
utilitarianism decision. However, because its decision violates human rights and injuries
other people, a manager should not select this alternative. If a company has enough ability
to create a self-driven car, it also can able to equip features to protect its passengers while
the pedestrians are in the passive position and do not have any protection on the road.
Step 4: Select an alternative
As the CEO of Google, I would like to decide to save both sides because they are my
company’s stakeholders, and making any bad decisions will lead to consequences to another
side. And, the highest goal, in this case, I would want to choose is saving the pedestrians.
However, I will direct my employees to program the self-driven car in the best quality to
minimize the potential risks. We should consider the decision based on the utilitarianism
approach but does not violate human rights.
Step 5: Implement the Selected Alternative
To implement my selection, our company will conduct the policies of making, testing, and
launching each item before distributing it to the drivers. We also let our customers know
that the cars will be programmed to protect the pedestrians rather than the drivers after
the cars emit warning signals. In addition, our company will equip special equipment that
can warn the drivers about obstacles including pedestrians in the foreground within an
appropriate range that helps the driver have enough time to handle or mitigate the level of
damage as much as possible.
Step 6: Evaluate the effectiveness of my decision
We will continue conducting more researches and apply new smart features that ensure
both drivers and pedestrians cannot be injured by our self-drive cars. Contacting frequently
to our customers, conducting the periodic vehicle maintenance, and making many survey
from the community are the way to help us access feedback, update the latest information,
and evaluate the effectiveness of the decision better.