The Importance Of Locus Of Control In Ethical Decision Making

1. Introduction

Businesses are in place with the aim to make profits. It also aims towards benefitting the society as a whole. But where does this start? Christensen (2010) in his article ‘How will you measure your life?’ makes us aware that in order to think of the greater good, it is necessary that we start with ourselves. This can be achieved by understanding, analyzing and evaluating the purpose of our lives and by understanding the values that are important to us. By doing so, we will be able to make ethical decision in our lives, which will in turn benefit the business and the society.

The purpose of this paper is to discuss the importance of values with the main focus on how it can help in making ethical decisions in an individual’s

These concepts will then be used to evaluate their relevance in my future life.

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2. Locus of Control (LOC)

This paper focuses on the Locus of Control model and its impact on the decision-making process. An individual’s locus of control is where he believes the control in his life originates. Do external factors take control of your life or do you take control of it? It is also the belief about what causes good or bad results in your life (Vijayashree & Jagdischchandra, 2011). This belief has a great impact on an individual’s professional and personal life.

“It had long since come to my attention that people of accomplishment rarely sat back and let things happen to them. They went out and happened to things.”

- Leonardo da Vinci

The words of Leonardo da Vinci clearly indicate that accomplished people take control of their lives. People in this case believe that control of future outcomes resides primarily in themselves (Vijayashree & Jagdischchandra, 2011) and hence have an internal locus of control. In contrast, people who believe that control is outside of oneself, either in the hands of other powerful people or due to external forces like fate or chance, have an external locus of

A conflict in one domain can have great impact on the other. Locus of control can help ensure a happy career and family life. In terms of work life, individuals with an internal locus of control are motivated by opportunities to learn and grow, to contribute to the business and society and hence exhibit achievement orientation. They actively seek information concerning their situation. They use this information to their advantage to change the course of action, by their decision-making process. Since they have control over the environment, they take responsibility for their decisions. If a boss’s request is inappropriate, the employee is likely resist the boss’s influence (Trevin ̃o & Nelson, 2010). Thus they tend to make more ethically correct decisions ensuring that they do not do anything illegal that would implicate them or but them in