Worldcom Ethics

3 Pages 746 Words

The recent scandal at WorldCom is only one of many prominent examples of a fundamental lack of ethics amongst the corporate environment. Subsequently, the internal ethical values of all business entities are now the locus of stakeholder concerns. The core interests of the operation - such as product development, increasing sales revenue, and attracting stakeholders -- are no longer the dominant consideration in decision making; ethical interests are increasingly important as aspects of the organizational structure. However, this new development has only come about after the revelations of major accounting fraud in companies such as WorldCom. Good ethical values consist of honesty, trust, and fairness, in addition to compliance with legal standards. In retrospect, these are the major values that seem to have been lacking in the accounting division of WorldCom.
The major ethical dilemma in the WorldCom scandal is an overall lack of fairness to stakeholders, which includes stockholders, customers, suppliers and employees. It is impossible to determine the extent of the impact of accounting fraud on each of these segments. Though it is also impossible to diminish the affects the scandal has had on any one of these groups of stakeholders, it is arguable that the stockholders were most affected by the scandal at WorldCom. Following the disclosure of accounting fraud, WorldCom stock values fell by over seventy-five percent. This loss of monetary value is easily identified and measured, and the financial losses of stockholders are undeniable. In addition, suppliers have recently found themselves with much less revenue than anticipated prior to the fall-out. This has certainly made it difficult for suppliers to match budgeted numbers and, thus, keep their own stakeholders happy. However, the ramifications of this scandal are much more widespread than financial numbers can affirm.
The intangible losses caused by this scandal are unimaginable...