In any situation, the right thing to do is what a virtuous person would do. A virtuous person is one who has and exercises those character traits considered as virtuous including honesty and kindness (Velasquez et al., 2008). In the case presented concerning Jim Smith, he is a brilliant accountant who has been in the company for twenty three years. Considering his approach to maximizing profits, he us creative and makes the shareholders and other stakeholders happy. However, from a virtue ethics perspective, there are some virtues in stake.

One of the virtues is integrity. To maximize profits, Jim lowers the outstanding insurance claims from all the departments of the insurance company by 10 percent. This in turn lowers quarterly claims expenses which increases the profits. Jim does this not only to benefit the company but to benefit himself because his quarterly bonus is based on the profits. So he is increasing the profits so that his bonus can be high. This is neither ethical nor virtuous. Jim is not being true to the company because even though these are just estimates, they might turn out to be low and high and in the end, the correct profits will be realized. So by his maximizing profits he is just benefiting himself and not the company.

Another virtue is honor. Jim is compromising the honor people accord to him. Everybody in the company considers him to be a brilliant accountant mostly because of how he manages to maximize profits. However, he is using unethical methods to maximize the profits thus compromising the honor accorded to him. By reducing the outstanding insurance claims, he is not being socially responsible.

Reference

Velasquez, M., Andre, C., Shanks, T., & Meyer, M. J. (2008). Ethics and virtue. Markkula Center for Applied Ethics. Retrieved from http://www.scu.edu/ethics/practicing/decision/ethicsandvirtue.html

 
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