Self-Regulation

Self-regulation is the process that determines how one identifies, conceives, analyzes, plans, directs, manages, evaluates, and adjusts what one does. Self-regulation precedes the development of intrinsic motivation, which in turn energizes the appropriate use of reflective judgment. Ethical dilemmas are often personal and paradoxical problems that need to be solved using a decisionmaking process that frequently involves choosing between two or more viable options. Hence, selfregulation in the ethical decisionmaking process guides how one processes information that is involved in resolving difficult and complex problems that call into question our values, experiences, and prior learning.

Individuals can either be governed by external forces, such as laws and community norms, or through self-regulation, led by our own sense of values and ethical commitments. To balance between societal norms and personal commitments requires the ability to process well-conceived options and weigh the ethical consequences of various solutions. Failing to develop this skill portends risky consequences for individuals, businesses, and societies as effective leadership and survival requires that all in the community be able to evaluate novel and emerging ethical situations.

The premise of self-regulation in the ethical decisionmaking process is that one can learn and become better at the evaluation of ethical dilemmas and ways of resolving the problems surrounding the principles of conduct governing an individual or group. Acknowledging that learning to make effective ethical decisions is a developmental process and can be improved through the learning process opens the door to how people utilize self-systems and regulate the way they think about ethical problems. The developmental process allows improvement in the clarity of thinking about the problem, the heuristics about how one solves ethical problems, what values of conscience one will weigh as the problem is solved, and the continued belief that one is competent and consistent in the control of the decision and outcomes of these decisions. The assertion is that the more we develop our ethical [Page 1890]decisionmaking process the more effective we are as leaders, whatever our positions in an organization.