Ethical expertise, leadership and organisational culture (5 cr)

Evaluation scale

0-5

Content scheduling

Mandatory participation in all webinars:

12.9.2023 webinar 9-12 Finnish time (presence mandatory)
22.9.2023 webinar 9-12 Finnish time (presence mandatory) (NOTE date changed to 22.9)
24.10.2023 webinar 9-15 Finnish time (presence mandatory)

Objective

The purpose of the course is to strengthen your ethical awareness, knowledge, and skills by identifying and analysing ethical dilemmas and controversies that arise in organisations, leadership, and professional practice. The purpose is that you are able to integrate diverse perspectives and take into account the individual, social and cultural context when assessing ethical dilemmas and promote ethically sustainable activities.

Competences: Ethics, Developing working community, Professional leadership

By the end of the course, you can evaluate the impact of organisational culture and leadership on the ethical climate of social and healthcare settings and teams’ performance, and critically appraise the strengths and limitations of different approaches to ethical decision-making. You can examine general ethical principles and a set of standards adopted by professional communities in social and healthcare and recognise how they affect on different levels. You are able to discuss a wide variety of issues related to ethical dilemmas within your own expertise area. You can foster ethical awareness, accountability, and collaboration to create an organisation that supports safe client care and collaborative practices.

Content

Definitions and examples of ethical dilemmas, moral issues, controversies, and work-related problems occurring in social and healthcare.

Ethical principles and a set of standards in student’s own area of expertise.

Importance of ethical expertise and moral resilience and strategies for
developing them.

Ethical leadership and organisational culture.

Impact of leadership and organisational culture on individuals’ and teams’ ethical decision-making.

Strengths and limitations of different approaches to ethical decision-making.

Methods and strategies for creating a sustainable, ethical organisational culture.

Implications of ethical expertise, leadership, and organisational culture for social and healthcare settings.

Location and time

Mandatory participation in all webinars:

12.9.2023 webinar 9-12 Finnish time (presence mandatory)
22.9.2023 webinar 9-12 Finnish time (presence mandatory) (NOTE date changed to 22.9)
24.10.2023 webinar 9-15 Finnish time (presence mandatory)

Materials

Monrouxe, L., & Rees, C. E. 2017. Healthcare Professionalism: Improving Practice through Reflections on Workplace Dilemmas. Wiley-Blackwell. (e-Book)

Leino, K. H., & Henderson, A. 2022. Leadership: Directions for sustaining ethical practice. Journal of Nursing Management 30(7), 2105–2106.

Barak-Corren N. & Bazerman, M. 2020. Inaction and decision making in moral conflicts. Organizational Dynamics 49, 100703.

Kuenzi, M., Mayer, D. M. & Greenbaum, R. L. 2020. Creating an ethical organizational environment: The relationship between ethical leadership, ethical organizational climate, and unethical behavior. Personnel psychology, 73(1), 43-71.

Simha, A. & Parboteeah, K. P. 2019. The Big 5 Personality Traits and Willingness to Justify Unethical Behavior - A Cross-National Examination. Journal of Business Ethics, 167, 451–471.

Denier, Y., Dhaene, L. & Gastmans, C. 2019. ‘You can give them wings to fly’: a qualitative study on values-based leadership in health care. BMC Medical Ethics 20, 35.

Teaching methods

Flipped learning (tasks prior to webinars)
Active participation in webinars
Independent work

Student workload

Student's workload:

Attending webinars: 15 hours
Home tasks prior to webinars: 27 hours
Written assignment, presentation: 81 hours
Peer review and self-assessment: 12 hours

Assessment criteria, approved/failed

Pass, fail

To pass the course, students are able to demonstrate an understanding of ethical principles and standards adopted by professional communities in social and healthcare, and how they affect decision-making processes at different levels of organisation. Students can evaluate the impact of organisational culture and leadership on the ethical climate of social and healthcare settings and teams' performance and propose strategies for promoting an ethical and sustainable environment. Students can appraise different approaches to ethical decision-making and demonstrate the ability to apply these approaches in complex ethical dilemmas and controversies. Students can integrate diverse perspectives and consider individual, social, and cultural contexts when assessing ethical dilemmas and propose ethical solutions that promote safe client care and collaborative practices. Students demonstrate an ability to discuss a wide variety of ethical issues related to the student's own area of expertise, and propose strategies for fostering ethical awareness, accountability, and collaboration. Students participate in webinars and do tasks and assignments according to instructions.

Further information

Active participation in webinars
Independent work
Successful completion of assigned home tasks and a written assignment.
Feedback from the teacher, self-evaluation, peer review