Employability And Professional Ethics

Introduction

Contemporary Britain is riddled with a variety of professions. One of the most common professions is in the field of health and social care work. This field contains the nation’s largest employers, and this has caused massive developments to be made in relation to the health and social care profession. The developments add value to the profession, whereby professional organizations are established to put in place ethical standards to be followed by health and social care workers in their scope of duty (Itulua-Abumere, 2012). This is because, frequently, social workers play a significant role in the welfare systems which are designed to control, empower, educate and care for people. Ethical standards are necessary because the design of social work presents ethical problems and contradictory imperatives (Itulua-Abumere, 2012). The ethical standards, which are based on ethical and moral theory, underpin professional practice in health and social care work. The standards lay down a framework which can be used in systems of developing appropriate solutions to different ethical dilemmas, usually characterized with conflicting needs, interests and rights of different parties.

This paper aims at presenting a detailed critical reflection based on a situation within the social work practice which involves professional ethics while considering anti-oppressive practice, equality and diversity. This shall be done by a description of the situation, a brief review of professional ethics, analysis of the situation according to ethical and moral theory, followed with a conclusion.

Gibb’s Reflective Cycle

I was part of a medical staff team that runs a domestic violence shelter that is faced with a tough decision to make, whether to refuse or accept funding from a private firm. If accepted, the funding will be a useful contribution to the support and promotion of on-going work in the shelter concerning the welfare and safety of women in a neighbourhood that is very violent. The apple of discord about accepting the funds is that the private firm runs night clubs which provide erotic dancing services and it could gain credibility for having ties to the operation of the domestic violence shelter. I was in favour of our team agreeing to accept the funds, and this caused verbal conflict between me and my colleagues to an extent that we had an argument. They argued that the connection between the private firm and the shelter has the potential to undermine the medical staff team’s integrity and value in the long run (Banks, 2015, p. 12).

Feelings

In the situation above, our medical staff team had a difficult ethical decision to make even though I believed the right course of action is clear. Considering that the domestic violence shelter is necessary to the welfare and safety of women in an environment that puts their lives at risk, I found that urgent funding would be required to enhance its operations. An ethical problem arises in this situation because, the values of the private firm are not aligned with that of the our medical staff team, due to the fact that the private firm runs activities which are, otherwise, regarded as immoral in the society, while the domestic violence shelter is founded on moral values, which my colleagues are so adamant to support. The urgency of the funding also contributes to the problem, because, without it, the domestic violence shelter will be good for nothing until funds are retrieved from the right channels. Also, if our medical staff team was not in need of the funding, we would not be at conflict.

Evaluation

In evaluating the situation, I confer that the professional conduct of health and social care workers is underpinned by ethical and moral theories. The theories determine the codes of ethics and social work values from which I base my decision. The social work profession has grown to acquire a significant status in the society of the UK. For this reason, organizations such as the British Association for Social Workers (BASW) and the Department of Health have established codes of ethics and codes of conducts to guide decision-making and professionalism in social work (Itulua-Abumere, 2012). As they are used in the professional regulation of social work, ethical codes are developed from teachings derived from ethical theories, which are commonly developed by moral philosophers. The ethical theories will aid in analyzing the professional ethics that guide my stand-point in the situation above with my colleagues are discussed below.

Analysis According to Professional Theories

Contemporary professional ethics, as presented in modern literature, use universal and general principles for ethical conduct. Two schools of thoughts which are the deontological and consequentialist ethics will guide providing a solution to the ethical problem. Deontological ethics is associated with the philosophy of Kant (Alexander & Moore, 2007). The main principle of deontology is respect for people as self-determining and rational beings. The deontological perspective of the above situation is that actions which fail to uphold the respect for every individual person are wrong, even though it will result in a greater good. The consequentialist ethics contrasts deontology, as it will approach the situation by judging the wrongness of rightness of actions taken according to the lesser or greater balance of harmful or beneficial consequences it produces for the larger number of people. Simply put, deontology prioritizes what is right over what is good, whereas consequentialism recognizes what is right but prioritizes the greater good (Banks, 2015).

Ideally, the domestic violence shelter will not be able to progress with its social work services to the women and children in the violent environment without the urgent funds being provided. The assessment would lead to two stand-points, the greater good would be to reject the funds from the company in order to protect the reputation of the medical agency and integrity of the domestic violence shelter, and the right course of action would be to accept the funds and provide the social work services needed in the environment. Since deontology is a duty-based approach, it underpins one of the values of social work, where a social worker, as an assessor, has responsibilities and duties (Parrot, 2006). Our staff team (in the above situation) works according to the policies and procedures stipulated by the medical agency which may be in conflict with the staff team’s professional values. The staff team has the legal duty to investigate or assess the right decision they should make in their situation. The deontological point of view would back up my decision of accepting the funds as being the right course of action, over the consequentialist point of view, where my colleagues would opt to reject the funds to shield the long-term interests of the related medical agency.

These are alternative ethical theories which relate to an individual and the particular situations they find themselves in. For example, virtue ethics focus on growing good character qualities, and it is part of various traditional religious teachings such as Buddhism and Confucianism. Virtue ethics considers character qualities as a moral driver. It requires a change of one’s thinking from ‘what should be done?” to “Would a good person do this in a similar situation?” (Banks, 2015). Despite being traditionally routed, Western ethics has revived virtue ethics to be used as a replacement of complement to the principle-base ethics. A relationship-based approach to ethics is the ethics of care and ethics of proximity. The ethics of care focuses on the link between people and the particular inherent responsibilities in special relationships (such as mother and child), while the ethics of proximity considers the responsibilities present in direct physical encounters between two people (Banks, 2015).

Conclusion

To conclude, knowledge of the ethical and moral theories which underpin health and social care work is crucial in providing solutions to daunting ethical problems. For instance, in the above-described situation, the deontological approach in principle-based, as well as the relationship- and character-based approach to ethics will be necessary for ensuring that the right thing is done and anti-oppressive practice, equality and diversity are observed. The decision taken by the medical staff team in the situation is an exhibition of self-management and development while working in challenging environments.

In case this situation came up again, I would fall in with the deontological approach. This will not mean that the consequentialist approach is wrong or unethical. Instead, it is a reflection of a rational decision being made. Accepting the funds from the private firm to cater for the urgently needed services in a violent environment does appear as not only the right thing but also the most efficient and effective thing to do (Martin, 2010). Furthermore, the staff team’s decision will uphold anti-oppressive practice as exhibits the cultural competence of the social workers showing their appreciation of the underlying political, economic or social forces in the environment which the domestic violence shelter is situated.

The application of relationship- and character-based ethics in case the situation happens again results in the right course or action being taken, which is my decision to accept the funds. With a focus on the staff team as individuals, virtual ethics would suggest that as good people, we should accept the funding to fuel our operations in the domestic shelter. Also, the ethics of care and ethics of proximity would suggest that the direct relationship between our staff team and women and children in the face of a dangerous environment would require us to act responsibly by accepting the funds. Eventually, the welfare and safety of women in the violent environment will be enhanced. The disadvantage of the relationship- and character-based approach to this situation is that it ignores the long-term consequence that would affect the domestic violence shelter’s integrity and value. Also, it ignores that the funding is acquired from a private firm whose moral values conflict with the medical agency in charge.

Bibliography

• Alexander, L. & Moore, M., 2007. Deontological Ethics. [Online] Available at:
• Banks, S., 2015. Social Work Ethics. In: International Encyclopedia of the Social & Behavioral Sciences. 2nd ed. Oxford: Elsevier, pp. 782-788.
• Itulua-Abumere, F., 2012. Ethical Issues in Health and Social Care Profession. Journal Of Humanities And Social Science (JHSS), 5(6), pp. 14-18.
• Martin, R., 2010. Social Work Assessment. s.l.:Learning Matters Ltd.
• Parrot, L., 2006. Values and ethics in social work practice. Exeter: Learning Matters.

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