Page 339 - DMGT408DMGT203_Marketing Management

Marketing Management/Essentials of Marketing

Notes be viewed as consistent and adopted as a general rule without evaluating alternative
outcomes. Here, the right or wrong is judged on the basis of whether the decision infringes
on individual rights or universal rules.

Organisational Factors

One must appreciate that people do not function in a vacuum. In most situations, choices are
made in work groups or committees, or during everyday discussions with other employees.
Interaction with associates serves as a learning process and influences how individuals resolve
ethical issues. The extent of influence of this learning process depends on the strength of an
individual’s own values, perception of available opportunity, and the assessment of others’
ethical or unethical conduct such as seniors, peers, and subordinates who influence the ethical
aspect of decision-making process. Marketing managers face several ethical issues almost every
day as a result of pressures arising from the marketing environment. A majority of managers
involved in decision-making experience constant pressures to compromise ethics to accomplish
company and personal objectives. Besides family and friends, the prevailing organisational
culture is also a significant force that influences ethical decisions. Corporate culture refers to a
set of values, beliefs, goals, norms, etc., shared by its members and expressed in every day
working through work habits, and other activities. To a large extent, the attitude and behaviour
of top management toward an organisation’s commitment to ethics in its functioning heavily
influences the ethical practices in an organisation.

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Caution The role of other company employees also influences decisions concerning ethical
choices. If others expose an individual to rampant unethical behaviour in an organisation,
it is very likely that the individual will behave unethically, particularly in ethically grey
areas. It is no wonder that marketers learn the norms of organizationally acceptable
behaviour from colleagues.

Perceived Opportunity

Opportunity refers to a set of conditions perceived as favourable that limit barriers or provide
rewards. Most managers in marketing do not deliberately take advantage of every opportunity
for unethical conduct in their companies. Of course, individual and organisational values do
play an important role. In case an individual takes advantage of an opportunity to behave
unethically and is not penalised or actually gets rewarded, the behaviour gets reinforced, and
likelihood of repetition of unethical behaviour increases as other opportunities arise.

Example: When a salesperson submits a false report of his day’s number of calls and is
not reprimanded, chances are such behaviour would be repeated in future. It may appear a
hypothetical situation, but is often true in India that good firms allow their marketing executives
to travel comfortably on company work and allow AC rail fares, but often others see them
travelling in buses or in lower class rail compartments. The reason, they offer is that everybody
else in the company does the same thing.
Sales people are known to make false promises with customers to conclude a sale. Some products
do not measure up to the claims made in the ads. O. C. Ferrell, Larry G. Gresham, and John
Fraedrich report that opportunity to behave unethically is often a better predictor of unethical
conduct than personal values. These are real life experiences but ultimately it is the organisation
that suffers and also the credibility of the concerned individual takes a plunge.

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