Chapter 4

Evaluating Ethical Concerns

Technical Communication,
13th Edition
Global Edition

John M. Lannon
Laura J. Gurak

© Pearson Education Limited 2015

 Learning Objectives
➢ Appreciate the role of ethics in technical
communication
➢ Identify workplace pressures that lead to
unethical communication
➢ Recognize common workplace examples of
hiding the truth
➢ Use critical thinking to help solve ethical
dilemmas
➢ Differentiate between ethical practices and
legal guidelines
 Learning Objectives (continued)
➢ Avoid plagiarism—either intentional or
unintentional
➢ Determine when and how to report ethical
violations on the job
 Ethics
When providing information or persuading an
audience, always ensure that your writing is
ethical: accurate, honest, and fair.
 Recognize Unethical
Communication in the Workplace
Unethical workplace behaviors are common,
but they are not always black and white. Usually
they are a result of yielding to social pressure
and blindly following the group:
 Understand the Potential for
Communication Abuse
Unethical workplace communication usually
takes on the following forms:
➢ Suppressing knowledge the public needs
➢ Hiding conflicts of interest
➢ Exaggerating claims about technology
➢ Falsifying or fabricating data
➢ Using visual images that conceal the truth
➢ Stealing or divulging proprietary information
➢ Misusing electronic information
 Understand the Potential for
Communication Abuse
(continued)
➢ Withholding information people need for their
jobs
➢ Exploiting cultural differences
 Rely on Critical Thinking for
Ethical Decisions
Keep in mind reasonable criteria (standards
that most people consider acceptable) when
faced with ethical dilemmas:
 Rely on Critical Thinking for
Ethical Decisions (continued)
Reasonable criteria take the form of the
following obligations:
➢ obligation to yourself
➢ obligation to clients and customers
➢ obligation to your company
➢ obligation to coworkers
➢ obligation to the community
➢ obligation to society
 Never Depend Only on
Legal Guidelines
Legal guidelines often do not go far enough to
measure unethical behavior. For example, the
following misleading statements are not illegal:
 Learn to Recognize Plagiarism
➢ Ethical communication includes giving proper
credit to the work of others. In both workplace
and academic settings, plagiarism
(representing the words, ideas, or perspectives
of others as your own) is a serious breach of
ethics.
➢ Plagiarism can be either blatant or
unintentional.
➢ The Internet has only made plagiarism easier
than ever before.
 Decide When and How to
Report Ethical Abuses
Whistle-blowing is reporting someone else’s
ethical abuses, but is tricky because it can
backfire on you and you will not always be
legally protected from the consequences. Think
very carefully about deciding when and how to
report unethical situations in the workplace.
 Review Questions
1. What is the definition of ethics?
2. What are the two major causes of unethical
behavior in the workplace?
3. What are five types of ethical abuses that
are common in the workplace?
4. What is the best way to make ethical
decisions on the job?
5. What are reasonable criteria and why are
they important?
 Review Questions (continued)

6. What are the six types of obligations to keep

in mind in order to make ethical decisions?
7. Why can’t you always depend on legal
guidelines to act ethically?
8. What is the definition of plagiarism?
9. What are the two types of plagiarism?
10. What is whistle-blowing?