PROFESSIONAL RESPONSIBILITY Ethics is an important source of guidance for decision making. Indeed, ethics as a set of values is expressed and given meaning through commitments, responsibilities and obligations. The values come into play when the boundaries between correct and incorrect behaviour are not clear, especially when multiple viewpoints and perspectives co-exist. Many of the challenges are intensified in the project arena. Projects aim to solve problems or improve on the status-quo. Yet their very emergence and their rushed implementation schedule open the potential for doing harm as well as good. Given that the responsibility for deploying projects and overseeing their outcomes resides with project managers and project sponsors, their ability to act independently and make decisions, and their professional responsibility, are crucial to understanding the role and impact of morality and ethics in this area. The Oxford Dictionary defines responsible as either “liable to be called to account” or “morally accountable for one’s actions” thus encompassing two rather different interpretations. Nonetheless, the increasing focus on the certification of project managers and the development of a chartered status standard for the profession in the UK carry significant implications in terms of assumed responsibility. Employing a professional represents the transfer of risk and decision-making obligations to a better-qualified agency. It carries within it the implicit assumptions of: • trust in their professional ability; • security in the knowledge that a qualified expert is employed; and, • the comfort and peace of mind that comes from this knowledge. Employing a professional expert is akin to buying additional insurance (through a risk transfer). In return for the trust exhibited by the client, the professional project manager takes responsibility for the deployment of the agreed function, capability, or quality for the process and the product itself. This aspect of responsibility is subject to professionalism, morality, and ethics. While responsibility entails owning up to acts, effects, and consequences, one can identify distinctly different types of responsibility: Causal Responsibility: associated with bringing something about either directly or indirectly (e.g. by ordering someone else). Legal Responsibility: associated with fulfilling the requirements for accountability under the law. Moral Responsibility: associated with having a moral obligation or fulfilling the criteria for deserving blame or praise for a morally significant act, or omission, and the resulting consequences. Role Responsibility: associated with performing duties that are attached to professional, or societal (or even biological) roles. Failure to fulfil such duties can expose the role-holder to moral, legal, or constitutional censure. Moral responsibility implies being answerable for one’s actions and decisions and typically assumes some degree of causal responsibility. Therefore, a professional can also be held morally responsible for failing to act (i.e. resetting the focus and scope of responsibility from harming to not aiding). Guilds, associations, and professional bodies often look after the role responsibility aspect, thereby helping to enforce a more professional practice. Professional codes allow us to appreciate the standard, evaluate what could be expected from a member of the profession, and provide an implicit definition, at the very least, of acceptable professional behaviour. IMPOSING MORAL CODES? Invoking codes of ethics is not a new endeavour. Ancient societies have practiced various ways of introducing such principles. One example is provided by Hammurabi, King of Babylon, who recognised the perils of design and project management over 3,775 years ago and enacted a building code that clarified the ‘responsibilities’ of designers: If a builder has built a house for a man and his work is not strong, and if the house he has built falls and kills the householder, that builder shall be slain – Code of Hammurabi, 1755 BC. Modern societies are unlikely to introduce similar censure in the foreseeable future. They do, however, encourage members to consider the ethical and enduring implications of their decisions and actions. Moral codes give individuals and communities the courage to act ethically. The role of ethical thinking is to safeguard practitioners, the profession and the stakeholders. Clients, users, stakeholders, employees, and colleagues rely on the professionalism, responsibility, and ethics of professionals. Who better to remind us of the need for professionalism than Astronaut Alan B. Shepard, who whilst awaiting blast-off atop the space shuttle Columbia, commented that it was a humbling experience knowing that his fate depended on a vehicle built by the lowest bidder! Humbling food for thought for managers, and another indication of the true complexity of responsibility, ethics and professionalism in projects. FIFTY FOUR DEGREES | 33 Darren Dalcher is Professor in Strategic Project Management in the Department of Management Science. His research explores the role that ethics, morality and responsibility play in professional decisions. Ideas contained within this article are expanded upon in the chapter Morality and Spirituality: Essential to Responsible Project Management from the De Gruyter Handbook of Responsible Project Management. d.dalcher@lancaster.ac.uk
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