Professional Values and Ethics
Eneditra M. Johnson
Hung Nguyen
Redrick Jones
Jose L. Carreon
GEN/200
February 8, 2011
Dr. Marie D. Senegal
Professional Values and Ethics
What does professional values and ethics mean? Do they relate to family, education and employment? How important are they? Decisions are based on values and ethics. Sources are available that can help develop professional values and ethics, and the success of a career is caused by values and ethics.
What are values and ethics? Values are the principles and beliefs, which a person makes decisions about right and wrong. A person’s values can be considered as the structure, and help shape individual elements of ethical behavior by determining what is good, bad, beneficial and important. It answers the question to why does an individual do what they choose to do? Ethics, the concept behavior is either right or wrong, deals with how individuals behave toward each other (Post, Lawrence, & Weber, 2002). A right and wrong for ethics does not exist. For people ethics are based on the foundations of rules created by society through religious, laws, family and organizations.
Three sources that can help develop professional values and ethics are family, educational institutions, and the business organizations. “We all wake up one day and realize we just said something that our father did. It’s scary, but we really are a little bit like our parents” (Hodge, 2011, para. 2). Ethics and values develop at an early age. Family members, especially the parents begin the molding process of one’s thinking, between what is right, and what is wrong. This foundation leads us to the next source of professional ethics and values, which are the educational institutions. Teachers, counselors, advisors, and instructors always refer students to the...