Recently I had a moral dilemma... I am now in a place where I work with a lot of interns .... and at the end of the day we are always expected to recommend the good ones and get them recruited... so I have been working with these interns who according to me were a sure shot into the firm... so other than the casual questions of 'where do you see yourself 5 years from now' I did not ponder too much about convincing them to join the firm... However, late on Monday night they told me that they had been approached by a rival firm and they had accepted the offer!! I was a bit shocked and in a way a bit disappointed since I didnt understand why they didnt discuss with me first.... so there I was trying to convince them to reconsider their decision... and the one question that totally stumped me was "Is it ethical for us to change our mind once we have accepted?"...
now that is something that I had no answer to... the only answer I could mutter was "Yes it is not ethical to say something and do something else. But you need to think about whether you are making a good career choice"... ofcourse in this case it was a happy ending since they finally agreed to join us after taking into account their career prospects...and also the fact that they were barely given 24 hours by other rival firm to convey their decision...
But I still have not reconciled the answer to the question that they asked me... Is it ethical to change one's mind after you have indicated that you are going in a certain direction? Wouldnt the person you indicated this to have already made some plans based on what you have indicated? Isnt it totally unfair to do that? Is it justified under any circumstances?
In matters of the heart I have often despised persons who have mislead people.... People who promised fidelity and then did just the opposite, people who promised marriage and finally at the last moment changed their minds, people who waited for a better opportunity to come along and then changed their mind cos they suddenly had a better option.... all of this accordingly to me smacks of total lack of character.... and to this day I treat these people who misbehaved either with me or with others with total disdain... I just dont think they are worthy of any attention from me....
On the other than, I have had friends who have changed their minds about various issues such as babies, adoption, husbands, marriages as they slowly evolved through experiences... their decisions were based on their convictions at that point in time ... and while in the beginning I would wonder why they potrayed a different picture, I realised soon enough that I am not the one to live with their decisions and so I have no right to judge..... but even in such cases I do dislike it when people dont acknowledge the fact that they have indeed changed their mind... most make it look like this is the way they have always wanted to live their life... which I dont like but at the same time I recognise that as being a very sensitive issue .... it is afterall difficult to acknowledge one's failure or mistakes in public...
I guess there is no proper answer to this question... it all depends on which end of the stick you are in... so if it is you who has been mislead and lied to you are never likely to find the whole thing tolerable... at the same time if you are the one doling out such treatment to others then either you really have no character, or your hands are really tied up or you really dont mind going to hell after your life in the world....
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