Dr. Aftab Maroof & Mr.

Naveed Iqbal
FAST-NU, Islamabad
(Lecture Slides Weeks # 1 & 2)
 Effective Performance and Growth
 Technical Knowledge
 Non-Technical / Broader Context
▪ Organizational Structures / Setup
▪ Professional Roles
▪ Professional Codes of Conduct
▪ Legal and Ethical Issues
▪ Social Impacts
▪ Technological Change – Society and Law

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 Introduction
 Professional Aspects
 Ethics
 Codes of Conduct
 Professional Bodies
 Legal Aspects
 Basics of Law
 Legal System
 Relevant Laws
 Regulatory Affairs

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 Organizational Aspects
 Organization Types and Structures
 Legal Status of Organizations
 Financial Aspects of Organizations
 Social Aspects
 Human Resources Issues
 Miscellaneous Topics

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 Lecturing / Discussions
 Assignments
 Case Studies
 Reviews
 Industry Seminars
 Marks Breakup:
Quizzes: 5% Case Studies and Presentations: 5%
Mid-I: 15% Assignments and Reviews: 5%
Mid-II: 15% Arranging Industry Seminar: 10%
Final: 40% Class Participation: 5%

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 Regularity
 Punctuality
 No entry after 5 minutes from class start time (N/A for habitual late
comers)
 Discipline
 Positive Attitude
 High Level of Class Participation
 No Plagiarism, Cheating …
 No Change in Deadlines
 No Usage of Mobile / Other Devices
 …

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 No Single Definition
 Who is using?
 What is the Context?
 Characteristics:
 Expert Knowledge
▪ Special Technical Knowledge, Skills
▪ Substantial Education and Training in order to Practice
 Autonomy
▪ Independence in conducting Professional Practice
▪ Members themselves decide Training Nature and control Entry
▪ One or more Professional Bodies
▪ Codes of Conduct
 Internal Governance
▪ Controlled by its Practitioners
▪ No External Authority
 Service to Society

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 Is Computing a Profession?
 Expert Knowledge
 Autonomy
 Internal Governance
 Service to Society
 Exercise:
 Name a specific area in the field of computing that would
involve above-mentioned characteristics and elaborate
how this area involves expert knowledge, autonomy,
internal governance, and service to the community.

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 Assignment # 1
 Deadline: 1st Class of 3rd Week
 Description:
 Suppose a job opening of your interest and you are going
to apply for that position:
▪ What do you think which Personal and Professional Traits your
Potential Employer will be interested in?
▪ Write your Profile for that position (Max. 200 words).
▪ Your Expectations from the Potential Employer/Company:
Remuneration, Environment, Career Planning/Growth, Health and
Safety etc.

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 Origins of Professions
 Revolutions -> New Professions
 Professional Requirements:
 Set of highly developed skills and Deep knowledge of the
domain
▪ Skills developed through experience
▪ Skills must be backed-up by well-developed knowledge base
▪ Shallow knowledge could be damaging
▪ Decisions require understanding, analysis, and adoption of concepts to suit
the environment
▪ Technicians vs. Engineers / Scientists

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 Professional Requirements:
 Autonomy:
▪ Professionals provide either products or services
▪ Power Balance – Provider vs. Receiver
▪ Professional:
▪ The Power Play is in favor of the Professional
▪ Lawyer and a Client
▪ Physician and a Patient
▪ Engineer and a Customer
▪ Non-Professional:
▪ The Power Play is in favor of the Customer
▪ Auto-Mechanic and a Client
▪ Varying the way – Professional vs. Non-Professional:
▪ Marked differences in the way the service is provided

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 Professional Requirements:
 Observance of Code of Conduct:
▪ The Professional Code
▪ Set of Guidelines – What a Professional ought to do and not to do
▪ Protects – Image of the Profession and that of Professional
▪ Professionals are required to adhere the Code
▪ The Personal Code
▪ Individual Moral Guidelines
▪ Mostly acquired from the Cultural Environment
▪ Supplement the Professional Code Significantly

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 Professional Requirements:
 Observance of Code of Conduct:
▪ The Institutional Code
▪ Imposed by the Institution / Organization
▪ Meant to build and maintain the public’s confidence in the Institution
and its Employees
▪ The Community Code
▪ Developed over a period of time
▪ Based on either the Religion or the Culture
▪ May be imposed by the Civil Law

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 Professional Requirements:
 Observance of Code of Conduct

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 Professionalism is Supported by Four (4)
Pillars:
 Commitment
 Integrity
 Responsibility
 Accountability

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 Commitment
 The person making the commitment must do so willingly
without duress
 The person responsible must try to meet the commitment,
even if help is needed
 There must be agreement on what is to be done, by
whom, and when
 The commitment must be openly and publicly stated
 The commitment must not be made easily
 Prior to the committed date, if it is clear it cannot be met,
advance notice must be given and a new commitment
negotiated

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 Integrity
 State of undivided loyalty to self-belief
▪ Honesty, Un-compromising self-value, Incorruptibility
 Three Maxims of Integrity:
▪ Vision
▪ Capacity to anticipate and make a plan of action
▪ Sign of Good Leadership
 Initiative, Autonomy, Authority
▪ Love of what is doing
▪ People do better if they love what they do
▪ Commitment
▪ Bonds until it is done

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 Responsibility
 Deals with Roles, Tasks, Actions, and
Consequences
 Various Types: Professional, Personal, Communal,
Parental etc.
 Responsibilities vary depending on age/role
 Professional Responsibilities as a Provider:
▪ Service Responsibilities
▪ Product Responsibilities
▪ Consequential Responsibilities

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 Accountability
 Obligation to answer for the execution of one’s assigned
Responsibilities
 Process:
▪ Setting Measurable Goals, Planning what needs to be done to meet those
Goals, Reporting Progress towards Goals, Evaluating the Reports, and
Using that feedback to make Improvements
 Three Key Elements:
▪ A set of outcome measures that reliably and objectively evaluate
performance
▪ A set of performance standards defined in terms of these outcome
measures
▪ A set of incentives for meeting the standards and/or penalties for failing to
meet them

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 “Goodness without Knowledge is
weak. Knowledge without Goodness
is Dangerous”
Paul Tillich

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 What is Ethics?
 Ethics is concerned with human conduct, i.e., behavior of individuals in
society
 Ethics can be defined broadly as a set of moral principles or values
 The systematic study of rightness and wrongness of human conduct
 Derived from the Greek word eché which means character
 Ethics is a collection of heuristics that, when followed, improves our way of
life. E.g. always tell the truth
 Why Ethics Important?
 Happy Life  Conditions that create happiness
 Each society establishes rules and limits on acceptable behaviour, these
rules form a moral code
 Sometimes the rules conflict. In general they are beliefs or conventions on
good and evil, good or bad conduct, justice and injustice
 The rules sometimes do not cover new situations

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 Ethical Principles:
 Beneficence – active goodness, kindness
 Non-maleficence – preventing harm
 Autonomy – right of self-governance
 Veracity – habitual truthfulness
 Fidelity – loyalty
 Justice – fairness, impartiality, equity
 Privacy
 Remember!!
 Knowing what is right, does not mean much unless you
DO what is right!!

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 Why People Act Unethically?
 The person’s ethical standards are different from those of society as a
whole
 The person chooses to act selfishly
▪ Person A finds a briefcase containing important papers and $1,000. He
tosses the briefcase and keeps the money. He brags to his friends about his
good fortune
▪ This action probably differs from most of society
 In many instances, both reasons exist
 Most people who commit such acts feel no remorse when
they are apprehended because their ethical standards differ
from those of society as a whole

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 Different Views about Ethics:
 Ethics vs. Feelings
▪ Feelings frequently deviate from what is ethical
 Ethics vs. Religion
▪ Ethics cannot be confined to religion nor is it the same as religion
 Ethics vs. Law
▪ Laws, like feelings, can deviate from what is ethical
▪ Objection to Fighting
▪ Capital Punishment
 Ethics vs. “Whatever Society Accepts”
▪ Standards of behavior in society can deviate from what is ethical
▪ An entire society can become ethically corrupt
▪ E.g. Pirated CDs
 Ethics vs. Morality:
▪ Ethics is study of morality
▪ Morality is a system of rules for guiding human conduct, and principles for
evaluating those rules

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 Comparison: Ethics, Law, Morals
 Ethics:
▪ Group application, control within group, enabled by a code,
punished by expulsion
 Law:
▪ Political subdivision controlled outside the group, by way of
legislation, punished by fines, prison
 Morals:
▪ Applied by individuals, controlled by conscience, enabled by
religious or cultural standards, punished by shame or guilt

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 Professional Ethics:
 Publicly displayed ethical conduct of a profession,
embedded in a code of ethics.
 The principles and standards that guide members of the
profession in their interactions with internal and external
stakeholders.
 Why Professional Ethics?
 Awareness of professional ethics is gaining importance
with time as the decision-making process in the work
place keeps on increasing in complexity
 The professional ethics provide a way of simplifying that
decision making process

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