ETHICS Dan Briggs is an engineer at PUC Electric Co., and had been looking forward to his two-week vacation. He was assigned to help one of PUC's clients, RANDOR Power, to install equipment they purchased from PUC. He had arranged his vacation at a nearby ski resort. The installation would be completed on the 12th of December, and his vacation would begin on the 13th and ending on the 20th, a full week of skiing with three of his friends. Unfortunately, not all of RANDOR's equipment arrived on time. Eight of the ten identical units were installed by mid-morning on the 12th. Even if the remaining two units had arrived that morning, it would have taken another full day to install them. However, Dan was informed that it might take as long as two more days for the units to arrive. "Terrific," Dan shouted, "there goes my vacation--and all the money I put down for the trip." "No problem," replied RANDOR's engineer, Jerry. Jerry had worked side-by-side with Dan as each of the first eight units was installed. "I can handle this for you. We did the first eight together. It's silly for you to have to hang around and lose money on your vacation." Jerry knew why PUC had sent Dan to supervise the installation of the new equipment at RANDOR. RANDOR 's equipment had to be properly installed in order to avoid risking serious injuries to those who use the equipment. For years PUC trusted its clients to follow the carefully stated directions for installation. But several recent accidents were directly traceable to failure to follow proper installation procedures. It was now PUC's policy to send one of its engineers (Dan) to supervise all installations. Dan (PUC Engineer) was confident that Jerry (RANDOR Engineer) was fully capable of supervising the installation of the remaining two units. What should Dan do? [your view] 1. Decline Jerry's offer and stay until the job is complete. 2. Call PUC's home office and ask if it is alright to let Jerry take care of the last two units. 3. Accept Jerry's offer, and leave for his vacation. 4. Other ANSWER: Let us assume that Dan did the following. Tempting as it is to leave early; Dan decides to stay until the job is completed. He loses two days of his vacation, but he feels he has done the right thing. Sometime later Dan and PUC's chief of engineering, Ed Peters, are having a drink after work. Eventually the conversation turns to Dan's vacation. Dan: What would you have done if you found out I left before all the units were installed? Ed: Honestly? Probably nothing. It sounds like Jerry at RANDOR had everything under control. Dan: So if I had called, you would have told me it was okay to leave before the job was completed? Ed: I didn't say that. I don't think it would be wise for me to officially approve something like that. Then I would lose my job, if anything went wrong. Dan: Meaning it would have been my job if anything had gone wrong? Ed: Sure. My only point is that I probably wouldn't have done anything about your leaving early- -unless something went wrong. That's a chance you would have been taking. But it sounds like it wouldn't have been a very big risk. Dan: Would you have taken it? Ed: That depends on how badly I wanted to go on my vacation. Actually, I never have cared for skiing--it's too risky. What do you think of Ed Peters position on this matter? If Dan had known Ed's position when he was at RANDOR, would it have been all right for Dan to leave early? Explain briefly [must PRINT answer]