Transcript Ethics In Design

Ethics In Design
Engineering Design
GE121
Ethics in Design
Lecture 14A
GE 121 – Engineering Design - 2009
Quiz and Milestones
Expect Quiz 5 at any time
Ethics In Design
Up to and including Lecture 10A (Estimation)
Milestones
Analysis of your 4 design alternatives should
be complete by this Friday (March 6th)

The analysis should be in enough concept
detail to allow you to compare the designs
and determine values for your metrics for
each Objective
GE 121 – Engineering Design - 2009
Ethics in Design
Ethics In Design
Design is a good place to look at ethics
Involves choices and decisions that may affect
a wide number of stakeholders
In some cases, engineers must choose
between:
Loyalty to the client
Obligations to other stakeholders
GE 121 – Engineering Design - 2009
Ethics:
Reconciling Conflicting Obligations
Ethics In Design
Ethics can be defined in several ways:
The discipline dealing with what is good / bad
and with moral duty / obligation
A set of moral principles or values
A theory or system of moral values
The principles of conduct governing an
individual or group
As engineers, we are specifically concerned with
this last one, but all the definitions are relevant to
our considerations
GE 121 – Engineering Design - 2009
Ethics: Reconciling Conflicting Obligations (cont’d)
Ethics In Design
We need to distinguish between:
Ethics, which is related to professional conduct and
obligations
Religion-based individual morals
Individual morals are an important element of
who we are as a person
As engineers, there is a set of issues and related
guidelines that allow anyone who interacts with
us professionally to know what conduct to
expect
GE 121 – Engineering Design - 2009
Ethics: Reconciling Conflicting Obligations
(cont’d)
Ethics In Design
Codes of Ethics
Arose in part to assist engineers and the various
stakeholders to understand what could or could not be
expected in terms of professional behavior
Part of this included some protection of the engineer
from being asked to do things known to be improper
Whistleblowing
A related but different issue
A person becomes aware of some sort of misconduct
and must decide how to act
Examples of Codes of Ethics
Provincial (APEGS) and National (CCPE) Associations
Some others given in the text
Highlight some of the obligations of engineers to
various stakeholders
GE 121 – Engineering Design - 2009
Ethics In Design
Obligations May Start With the Client…
 Obligations to the client include some degree of loyalty
 It is useful to distinguish between agency-loyalty (derived
from the contract), and identification-loyalty (derived from
an admiration or respect for the client or employer)
 The first type is an obligation, while the second is earned
over time
 Agency-loyalty, for example, demands that the engineer properly
maintain notebooks and logs and to document design work where
that is a legal obligation of the relationship
 Identification-loyalty, however, can lead to conflicts when the
engineer sees the employer or client clash with other
stakeholders with whom the designer may have a similar or even
greater loyalty
 Sometimes acting in ways that appear to be disloyal to one part
of the organization may have beneficial long term effects on the
organization. Careful thought should attend such decisions
GE 121 – Engineering Design - 2009
…But What About the Public / Profession?
Ethics In Design
Obligations to the public and the profession
are also important considerations
The Citicorp case
Designed columns at corners to allow church
(original owners of the land) to be built under
overhanging corner
Shows how an engineer was faced with very difficult
decisions
– Building code at the time did not consider quartering winds
(45 degrees to the side of the building) which were worse
– Joints were bolted instead of welded to save money,
creating reduced rigidity
– Result was the structure could fail in a once-in-16-year
wind!
GE 121 – Engineering Design - 2009
Ethics In Design
Had conflicting obligations to himself, his firm, his
client, users of a building, the public at large, and
even the profession
– Came out and admitted the problem, and worked to
implement an orderly retrofit after the building was
occupied, with emergency contingency plans to
evacuate in the event of a hurricane
By acting responsibly, he was able to serve
all the interests well and is now considered a
model for ethical engineering practice
GE 121 – Engineering Design - 2009
Ethics In Design
Is it OK For Me To Be Working on This Project?
Sometimes engineers are asked to design things
that they have serious moral or ethical
reservations about
Extremely important to consider the consequences of
accepting such clients
While there are no easy answers, the engineer must
realize that not all possible engineering solutions are
ethical, and not all clients who can afford to pay are
entitled to your services
Only by thinking about such matters prior to confronting
a situation can the engineer expect to behave ethically
GE 121 – Engineering Design - 2009