Susan Kim finds herself in what could turn out to be a lose-lose situation. If Susan does what her boss wants, she will find herself breaking her own ethical code and misrepresenting herself to competitors. Not only does this behavior feel morally wrong to Susan, it could also hurt her career and reputation if her school finds out what she’s done or if any of her company’s competitors learn that she’s misrepresented herself. Susan is interested in working in cybersecurity and may one day want to work with one of her current company’s competitors. By misrepresenting herself, she could degrade her reputation in the cybersecurity community for years to come. However, if she voices her concerns to her boss, Susan could lose her internship or be viewed as somebody who is difficult to work with, which could also hurt her reputation and her career.
To minimize the potential fallout from this lose-lose situation, Susan should use something like the framework outlined in “How to Speak Up When It Matters.” First, Susan should mentally prepare herself for the challenge of confronting her boss about her ethical concerns with his request. Clearly this job is important to Susan, and she does not want to jeopardize her employment, so pushing back so early in her internship will be difficult for her. Second, in order to lessen the social threat of her speaking out, Susan should think carefully about how to frame her discussion. At least initially, she should not try to speak to the company’s CEO about her concerns. She should directly speak with her boss who asked her to complete this task and outline why she is worried about his request (using “we” language and without accusing the boss of being unethical). As mentioned in the case study advice, she should also be sure to propose several alternative solutions to further reduce the social risk (she will show she is a problem solver, not merely a problem finder, who is able to get work done even when there are boundaries). Finally, she should set up a time to speak with her boss and think through how she will handle different possible responses. If her boss does not accept Susan’s concerns, then Susan could consider speaking to somebody further up the chain of command (like the CEO) or her colleague in Amsterdam. She should consider whether she is ready to leave the job or do something she finds unethical if she does not find anybody who understands her ethical concerns.
