Respect for Persons:
This principle implies that one considers others as worthy of high regard.

Autonomy:
This principle implies that the client's role is not a dependent one. The client seeks assistance because of a real or perceived need. The role of the consultant is one of power. Power is based on knowledge.

Is the client's role a dependent one? How can you, as the consultant, assure that independence is maintained?

Beneficence:
This principle requires the consultant to act in ways that benefit the client. This lays the foundation for trust.

Veracity:
This is the practice of telling the truth. Lying or deception creates barriers between people and prohibits both meaningful communication and the building of relationships.

Recognizing that communication is the cornerstone to the consultant / client relationship, an argument can be made that consultants must be truthful in order to effectively communicate with clients.

Is the truth sometimes harmful? Can you think of a situation where telling the truth would be harmful to the client?

Confidentiality:
This is the principle that requires non-disclosure of private, secret, or proprietary information.
Maintaining confidentiality is an expression of respect and is essential to the consultant / client relationship.

Justice:
This is the principle that relates to fair, equitable, and appropriate service in the light of what is owed to persons.

Fidelity:
This is the principle or concept that relates to faithfulness and the keeping of promises. IMC has granted consultants the right to us the designation CMC. The authority to practice consulting is based on a social contract that acknowledges professional rights and responsibilities as well as provides a mechanism for accountability. To be a CMC means that you keep your promises to perform ethically.

Situation:
You have a human resources focused management consulting practice. Part of your work is executive searches and the other part is HR systems work like developing job descriptions, compensation systems, and performance appraisal systems.

You have been engaged by a client to conduct a search for an internal HR Director. You know that the new HR Director will be in a position to re-hire you to systems work for the organization sometime in the future. Your obligation in the search assignment is to provide the client with a pool of 3 semi-finalist candidates, all of whom must be fully qualified. The client will chose the finalist and make the job offer.

Question:
Do you chose the best candidates from your screening process to be presented as the 3 semi-finalists?

Since the interview process is about navigating your way around lies, omissions, and exaggeration, the best predictor of future success or performance is past performance. Therefore, by choosing to promote candidates (to a semi-finalist position) with whom you have had past some past experience, the better able you are to predict their probable future success.

You have a candidate for the open internal HR Director's position that you know is qualified. You also know, because you have a history with this person, that they will probably not hire you in the future when HR systems work becomes available. In their present position they rejected your proposal for systems consulting about 18 months ago. If you promote this person to a semi-finalist postion and she is selected by the client, you are effectively cutting yourself away from this client.

You have other candidates that you have worked with in the past. You know that when opportunities for system consulting come up in the future they will recommend that you be selected.

Question:
Do you / will you promote the qualified candidate who has not used you in the past? What are the ethical consideration in play? What are the other (non-ethical) considerations in play?

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