Hi,

You are a computer programmer working for a small business that provides specialized financial services to local, mostly small businesses. You have been working for Company X for about 6 months. Recently, X has been occupied with reengineering the inventory system of a local hardware chain, ABC Hardware. The objective is to enable ABC to keep better track of their inventory, to be more responsive to changes in customer demand, and to adopt a just in time strategy to reduce inventory.

Your supervisor calls you into his office. Do you know of any existing software products to help ABC keep better track of its inventory? You mention a particular product that you have worked on within another job and point out that ABC could use it without any modification. The only drawback, you point out, is that this software is somewhat expensive. Your supervisor leans back in his chair, puffs on his cigar, and says, Thats no problem. We have the software. Why dont you just install it on ABCs computers?

You diplomatically indicate that this would violate the licensing agreement X has with the developers of the software. Do it anyway, your supervisor says. Nobodys going to find out, and ABC is a very important client. We need to do all we can to keep them happy.

QUESTIONS:

Answer the following questions in a report format.

1. What is going on? [3 Marks]
2. What are the facts? [3 Marks]
3. What are the issues (non-ethical)? [3 Marks]
4. Who is affected? [3 Marks]
5. What are the ethical issues and implications? [3 Marks]
6. What can be done about it? [3 Marks]
7. What are the options? [3 Marks]
8. Which option is best and why? [4 Marks]

REPORT FORMAT

1. Provide a general introduction to the case study.
2. Discussion of each question. Provide explanations and/or examples of your answers.
3. Summarize your report.
4. The report should have at least 3000 words.