The matters of ethics 3

[TheRambler]

I began my present job back in 1999 because of Y2K problem. The billing system of this company was developed in 1989 using Clipper, then in 1993 it was modified to be used as a multiuser system. It was developed by a third party from another city, who were not available anymore in 1999 when they contacted me.

After studying the source code for some time I was able to compile the system in FoxPro for MS-DOS, and the users didn’t notice much changes in their software. Originally the system was conceived for only one service, despite the fact that the tables were not in normalized form it was working without problems. Also, in 1999 regulation laws changed and the company offered a new service which had to be billed using the same system, so, being short of time, I used the same tables to hold the data of the new service. I knew the design was not optimal, but I didn’t want to build a new application using Visual Fox (for example) because it meant a lot of work which I didn’t know if I could finish by the end of 1999.

While I was refactoring my co-workers took care of rehosting, they moved from NetWare 3.11 to WinNT, all this work was done successfully and the users didn’t complain much. The next move was to buy a new integrated system using Oracle as the back-end, so my system and others were to be replaced after all.

After Y2K part of the board of directors changed and they changed the manager (my first boss was also changed eventually). They had other ideas and thought Oracle was too expensive and suspended that project. But new services were still offered and I had to support them with my poor designed legacy. I complained to my second boss that I had to put too much effort just to add a new service, I said things could be done better with a new system or a new design, if we were not going to buy a new system then it would be good if I started to develop a convergent billing system with Visual Fox at least.

My boss answer was: “don’t write a single line of code anymore, when the managers ask for a new service, report, or whatever, say you can’t do it” I told him I couldn’t say that, I could say I don’t have enough time or repeat the “poor design” story which they don’t understand. Since then I didn’t participate in meetings, I let my boss do the lying and arguing to buy a whole new system. After some time not paying attention to their requirements they accepted the need of a new system and bought a good one with our approval, and some time next year it will be deployed.

So what troubles me was my boss attitude, ethical or not, he got what the company needed while looking after me. If I kept saying the truth: “yes, I can do it” I would still be overloaded with work. Now I have time to spend in this forum and learn from other people, which is good to me. What do you think? Was my boss right? Is it good to act like that when managers or directors don’t understand technical reasons?

 

[SgtJarrow]

In my opinion, yes. I don't see anything inherently wrong with what you boss did. He basically stood up to the managers and told them that your current equipment just couldn't handle the workload.

You had poor and outdated systems, software innefective or at least unoptimized, and no additional manpower to correct the software. New services were being added and you were not in a position to inform managers who do not understand the technology.

It is the responsibility of the IT manager/director/whatever title, to attend coporate managment decision sessions and inform the management on technology issues. A company's senior managers typically do not understand what technology is available and what it can do. An IT directors job it to inform them.

Ultimately, the management will begin to see the beneifts of thier investments...be it in more revenue, fewer support calls, or generally a happier customer. You played an integral role in that by informing your boss of the downfalls and letting him/her hanlde it as he/she did.

=======================================
People think it must be fun to be a super genius, but they don't realize how hard it is to put up with all the idiots in the world. (Calvin from Calvin And Hobbs)

Robert L. Johnson III
MCSA, CNA, Net+, A+
w: rljohnso@stewart.com
h: wildmage@tampabay.rr.com

 

[TheRambler]

Thanks for answering, I appreciate your opinion.

My trouble is that my boss asked me to lie.
Years ago another boss also asked me to do so, but in that case it was not about coding or generating reports, it was about an affair he had at work. I didn't cover him and he eventually got a divorce, and moved to another city with his secretary. That was a bad experience for me.

In this case, the results are good. Then my boss was right, and I am wrong, although I refuse to accept it.

Maybe a better question would be: Is it correct for bosses to ask their workers to lie? no, of course not.

 

[BJCooperIT]

Actually, saying "I can't do it!" does not sound like a lie to me. Your boss told you not to do it - so, in truth you could not do it. If pressed for a reason why, you could have pointed them to your bosses office so that he could make the explanations. Your boss certainly was with his rights to determine how you spent your time.

^{Beware of false knowledge; it is more dangerous than ignorance. ~George Bernard Shaw}
Consultant/Custom Forms & PL/SQL - Oracle 8.1.7 - Windows 2000

 

[lespaul]

That's what I have to do when a user comes to me directly. We have to have prior approval from my boss before starting anything. And while sometimes this is a pain in the a$$, it covers mine! Anytime I'm asked to do something, I refer them to his office and if he says OK, I'll do it!

Les

 

[TheRambler]

Well, users are used to be turn down on their requirements, but what about if the manager asks for something?
If I tell him "I can't do it" then he might think about getting someone else who can! But my boss had no trouble facing managers, and as I mentioned, he succeded.

Sometimes seems to me truth is relative to the point of view from which it is perceived.

Thanks for your feedback.

 

[SemperFiDownUnda]

Sounds like a good manager.
Yes you could do it (support new services) but lets look at the facts.
You told him it was outdated/poor design.
He weighs up the risk/benfits.
Decides it is not worth it.
Risks are things like what happens when you keep kludging the system to work and if falls over and everyones is up the creek.
Overall with the future work it would cost more to keep with the current system.
Eventually 1 and 2 will both meet and your in even more trouble.

He, your manager, probably didn't want to have to try to explain the details to others for a number of different reasons. 1) It isn't their decision to make. 2) it isn't their @$$ on the line if it does fail. 3) They probably don't care of the why, ie if it could be done they would want it done even if it was to high of a risk.

Lots of factors here but as BJ says you where told you can't do it. So I don't think thats a problem for you to pass on that answer. Most things can be done. I can write a GUI OS using QBasic on a DOS 3 286. But if asked by my employer if I can do it I would say "No, can't be done" Yes its a lie but in IT "No it can't be done" most often means "Yea, we can do that but we'd have to be brain dead to go down that path and if I explain to you why it will be like a french man swearing at a china man.....You wouldn't understand a single thing"

 

[CajunCenturion]

One one hand, this sounds like a classic case of the "Does the end justify the means?"

I agree completely with BJCooperIT. It is not a lie for you say "you can't do it", because your boss told you not to do it. You can't dis-obey your boss' instruction.

Be thankful that you've got a boss who, in your own words, "he got what the company needed while looking after me."

I do not think that it's appropropriate for a boss to ask his/her charges to lie. In the case of cheating boss, you were asked to lie, and you did what you thought was right. In this case, I'm not even sure your boss asked you to lie.

There is nothing wrong with your boss giving you the following instruction not to write any code and say you can't do it. But I do think there are better ways to handle the "can't do it". Upon receiving the request you can say, "thanks, I'll bring it up and see if we can get is placed into the master schedule", or something similar.

I think people tend to confuse "can't do it" with "won't do it", and then you leave off the why you won't do it. There are many reasons why something should not be done, not the least of which is it's not practical to do so (like Semper's GUI in QB). Your boss said "can't be done", when he meant "won't be done" and then left out (on purpose and with good reason) "because the senior management does not understanding technological implications of the situation they're in, and it's my job to insure their long term IT requirements are met."

Good Luck
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As a circle of light increases so does the circumference of darkness around it. - Albert Einstein

 

[SQLSister]

Much as it may be bad to lie ever in an ideal word, it is oftern a managers' job to lie. Managers are privy to a great deal of confidential information and sometimes must lie in order to preserve confidentiality.

I wouldn't even classify this as lying though, He told you you could nto work on the program, therefore he didn't ask you to lie when he told you to tell them that you couldn;t do what they wanted. In his case, he omitted information to avoid a pointless and unproductive argument. The company won and you were protected, so there was no one hurt by his actions. To me this is the evaluation you need to make, was harm caused or not?

If you want an example of how telling a lie might cause less harm than telling the truth, let me use an example form a company I used to work for. One employee was dissatidfied with his eval and got somewhat aggresive and threatening in the meeting to discuss it. He was, as is appropriate, suspended for a week. Now why do I know this since I wasn't the employee or the supervisor or the HR person? Because the HR person (who is also supposed to maintain confidentiality) told everyone in the office. The boss, not knowing she was hoing to do this, responded to questions about where the person was with "He's on vaction." While this is strictly speaking a lie, it was far preferable from the employee's point of view than having the whole office know he had been suspended for cause.

 

[TheRambler]

I don’t remember how I found this forum, but I am glad I found it. Most of the time I like to learn coding issues, yet ethics is maybe more important. Allow me to quote the Bible: what good is it for a man to gain the whole world if he loses his soul? I believe the purpose of the programs I write should be to serve the most people, not profit.

Sometime ago I accepted I am faulty in my actions, although usually I try to do what I consider is right. In the dilemma with my boss I was confused as to how ‘bad’ actions could lead to good results. Now I see you all agree with him, looking from a wider perspective gained by experience:

I don't see anything inherently wrong with what your boss did

saying "I can't do it!" does not sound like a lie to me

sounds like a good manager

It is not a lie for you say "you can't do it", because your boss told you not to do it.

it is often a managers' job to lie

I really appreciate your opinions and the time you take to answer, you have helped me to reconcile my way of thinking with my boss actions. This morning in the middle of a conversation I told him “you are right in many aspects”, he looked surprised, didn’t answer but smiled.

You all deserve stars from me, but I give it to SemperFiDownUnda for his QBasic analogy which I understand very well and his sense of humor. Once again, thanks to all.

Finally, I would like to end this thread with this quotation:

It is not the possession of truth, but the success which attends the seeking after it, that enriches the seeker and brings happiness to him.
MAX PLANCK

 

[AnanthaP]

Its all so relative. Long back, I had a co-worker who would always go against the practices that were freely agreed and accepted by the rest of the development team.

She would independently develop small applications for the users without any concern for systems, standards or even continuity. Worse, she would come to the rest of us for support. Since she was only telling the users that everything is possible in the language, what was wrong with it? You be the judge.

Eventually, her husband got a job in another state and she took a job there. (God bless her current employers).

mlv1055, I appreciate that you probably had no peer to advise you, but I have found that if you stick your neck out for a classical and formal approach and are consistent in this, then users appreciate your problems and views. I think that your new boss had done this.

I don't see any direct ethics question. Whats an office if there's no consistency of action or best practice? Particularly it isn't a debating society.

Ethics comes in giving one's best to the team's goals and doing what the boss man asked you to do unless it violates constitutes some bigger, wider law.

End

 

[Spirit]

I struggle to understand why lying is an issue here?

Both my boss and I lie on a regular basis to other users / managers and directors. We have an agenda and you have to do what ever can to meet that end.

We currently run a NT4 network does it work? Yes.
Does it meet the compnaies needs? Yes.

So why would we be given the finances to upgrade to a 2000/2003 network? We wouldn't. So we bend a few truths here and there to get the budget approved for a project that will benefit the company.

When dealing with office politics you need to cheat, lie and steal to get your way. Your boss sounds like he knows what he is doing I would learn a lot from watching how he deals with politics.

Its admirable that you feel the need to feel guilty about not telling the truth but I wouldn't lose a seconds sleep over it. Means to an end I think is the case here.

Just my Two Pence worth...

Iain

 

[GwydionM]

When lying has become the norm, it is in the interests of most people to tell the occasional plausable lie.

The trouble is, ordinary people persuing ordinary goals then get more and more into lying, and are no longer trusted when they are telling the truth. This is a determioration of business culture, and of culture in general.

What's the end point? Either a general breakdown in which no one bothers with truth and no one trusts anyone else. Or a turn back towards more trust, which will be expensive for those who begin it.

 

[CajunCenturion]

Spirit - that is scary. I've gone back and re-read all your posts, which I now take with a grain of salt, thanks to your candid addmission that your agenda is more important than the truth.

Especially the following post from another thread in this Ethics forum. "Lets put a point to this we - as "IT'ers" - are amoungst the lowest of the low. We rank along side cleaners, no one even notices the cleaner until your bins not been emptied and there's not enough room for another plastic cup previously full of coffee and your empty bag of crisp (used to be full of AOL CD's too but they don't seem to be arriving as often LOL!)."

I feel alot better now, knowing that you were probably just lying to meet some agenda.

On the other hand, in that same post, you also said: "We do a thankless job, we are seen as a burden on the asset sheet. Its always why have we got so many IT staff when everything runs fine and they don't do anything all day? Or 'why do we have so many IT staff when everything is broken all the time any way'." In your case, I can fully understand why management would feel that way.

Good Luck
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As a circle of light increases so does the circumference of darkness around it. - Albert Einstein

 

[Spirit]

I had to be a bit creative some years ago with my mail system. We were running cc:mail which didn't really do anything we needed and didn't have any virus protection or management.

So we were "hit" by a mass mailing "virus" which was actually from a phantom account that my boss created we sent it round every few minutes and ran about with our sleeves rolled up looking worried.

And bobs your uncle we got the funding for Exchange5.5 and anti-virus software. Now perhaps this was wrong but Exchange was a great jump for people in terms of functionality and for IT in terms of management.

I honestly believe that MLV's boss did the right thing. He knew what was in the best interests for the long term of the business and he got there using the only way I know how to get money out of the owners, by taking a situation and manipulating to present it in a very negative way.

But yes I am cynical and a lot of my posts in ethics should be taken with a pinch of salt BUT when was the last time people in the Accounts department were made redundant BEFORE IT or other departments? A third of the IT team where I worked were recently made redundant... yet accounts are taking people on funny that!

MLV, don't feel guilty. Welcome to life in the private sector!

Iain

 

[jsteph]

<<and Bob's your uncle>>
...had to look that one up in Google...
jsteph

 

[MasterRacker]

If you're not in the management circles, you don't know all the issues that are being balanced. There may be a very good reason for not funding an IT project even though it would be beneficial and have good ROI.

IT is not the only department that might have an agenda. What happens when every department puts their own aganda ahead of everything else and lies to the hilt to try ang get it through? Doesn't sound like a successful business model to me.


Jeff
The future is already here - it's just not widely distributed yet...

 

[SemperFiDownUnda]

I'm a firm believer in &quot;If it gets the job done you better have a good reason to upgrade.&quot;

Cost of upgrading should be covered by the savings that it causes. To often in IT you find a trend to want the best toys. This is kind of understandable from us. Most of us are a bit geeky at heart and want to deal with the latest and greatest for a number of reasons. This doesn't mean it should happen.

I came to this contract and they gave me a celeron 1000 with 256meg of RAM. Fine computer for most office needs but running SQL Server, IIS, Interdev, VB and a slew of other tools at 1 time it grinds to a halt. I made my case that they should try upping the ram to atleast 512m because 20% of the time my computer is grinding swapping out to disk. I'm getting a new 2.4ghz 1g machine soon. The cost benifit was large when they are paying $85/hr my down time can be expensive.

I include avoiding a risk as a cost saving but only if the chance of that risk is large enough to warrent the change.

I guess I'm saying if you make the decision to lie then you better sure be able to tell the truth and be able to justify your action at the end of the day. I'm all for telling the truth but sometimes these white lies that save you large amounts of time explaining things are needed.

That and if you constant correct other people unacurate statement, if it was a concious lie or not, you'll find yourself not a very well liked person. Save the corrections for times it is really needed.

 

[TheRambler]

Spirit
Guilt is a useless emotion, I learned that from Dr. Wayne Dyer, in his book &quot;Your erroneous zones&quot;, so I don't worry about it.
I was rather questioning about our behavior in judging what is good or bad. Since the result is good, our actions to get there must have been good too. So it is good to bend a few truths, cheat, lie or steal for the benefit of the company.
Is that pragmatism? Is the benefit of the company a socially desired result? That is the matter of ethics. You express it clearly to me, like CajunCenturion did too:
&quot;Does the end justify the means?&quot;

GwyndionM
I guess most of the opinions here are relativists.
SQLSister: the evaluation you need to make, was harm caused or not?
AnanthaP: Its all so relative.
SemperFiDownUnda: I'm all for telling the truth but sometimes…
My worldview seems similar to yours as I think that if you lie at work then you might also lie at home or wherever, so the ethic behavior should be not to lie, absolutely. Is that idealism? Does the change in society starts with the change of oneself? That is the matter of ethics.
Here is a book you might like:
The Moral Society by John David Garcia

http://www.see.org/e-ms-dex.htm

MasterRacker
As I am not proclive to lying and other suggested 'tactics' I might never get to the management circles. But I realize that most of the problems our company has, were caused by managers (and directors). In this particular case, we all knew regulation laws were going to change, the process started in 1999 and ended in 2001; so there was plenty of time to adjust our systems accordingly, we didn't do it while the rest of the industry did. It was not a matter of funds, it was the lack of understanding. For example, after I fixed the Y2K problems of the billing system nothing bad happened with the data; then one manager told me: you see? nothing went wrong, all this Y2K buzz was a delusion...

 

[CajunCenturion]

The whole purpose of &quot;the end justifies the means&quot; is to prompt you to question your means, and to not blindly allow your goal to be a rationalization for using inappropriate means to obtain your objective. It is a question, not a statement!

There are certainly cases where some action, while wrong on its own, may be acceptable in certain situations, depending on the heirarchy of ethics in play at the time. Each situation must be evaluated on its own. To say that &quot;So it is good to bend a few truths, cheat, lie or steal for the benefit of the company&quot; follows from &quot;the end justifies the means&quot;, fails recogonize the proper relationship between the two. Not only is way too broad to be meaningful, but neither dos it have a context in which it can be judged. Without that all-important context, there is not way to determine whether or not the means are ethical or not.

I do not -- repeat not -- consider lying, cheating, and stealing, to be acceptable means in almost all situations. The bar is extremely high to justify a violation of these behaviorial foundations. The ethics of every situation is indeed relative, specifically, relative to the ethical heirarchy governing the current context.

Lying and tactics have nothing to do with management. They are qualities of personal behavior at every level from the mail room to the board room. What will help you in management is not by realizing the problems were caused by management, but realizing that you don't know a lot of details of why management made certain decisions. You may not agree with the decision, and you may not understand the decision. But neither of those mean that the decision is wrong. Management may have chosen an option that you consider to be evil, and so you blame them. What you don't know is that the option was the lesser of two evils, and that you're luckly they chose the one they did, thus allowing you to still be there to blame them for making an evil choice.

The one issue that has not been brought up is the notion of trust. One would have to question the use of suspect means to achieve a short term goal against risking the loss of long-term trust. Once people know you've lied to them, then nothing you say will be accepted as truthful at face value. Everything will be viewed with suspicion, as nothing more than a means to support your own agenda.

Good Luck
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As a circle of light increases so does the circumference of darkness around it. - Albert Einstein