After looking into professional Ethics, I have come to the conclusion that it has as much to do with your own personal ethics as anything else. We are given the guideline of what is expected of us in our workplace and rules that cannot be broken without consequences, but mainly I feel it all comes down to what we know is right and wrong as a person.
Virtue Ethics explains how I feel, focusing on what kind of person you are rather than how to react to situations and how you should act. If you compare your personal virtues to your professional ones, they should compliment each other and there should also be many similarities. Honesty, loyalty, confidence are all things that apply to both yourself personally and professionally.
I was very interested when I read Ross Dunning's blog about his thoughts on lying and when it is acceptable as a "little white lie" or whether it shouldn't be acceptable at all. I have never lied on my CV, although I would probably change my height to get me into an audition if required. I am 5'2" and alot of auditions have a minimum height of 5'4", and I don't think I would give a second thought about changing my height if it managed to get me through the door so they could see me audition. Is this wrong? As I am lying, but what's the worst thing that could happen? They see me, I'm too small and they send me home? I feel like it's worth a try...
There is also another point that Ross made that I found very interesting, about teacher's in college's suggesting certain people that are performing well are more likely to get jobs straight away. Although this isn't always a lie, it's more their personal opinion, but is it giving students a false sense of security? Most of the "under dogs" from my college have worked constantly since leaving and have really thrown themselves into auditions attending as many as possible after being told they would struggle to find work where the students with the better grades haven't attending as many, and some aren't even working very often. So are teacher's setting people up with the hope that they will walk straight into work after college without giving them a realistic view on how hard you really have to work, and how many auditions you really have to attend until your finally successful in one?
Are teacher's being ethically wrong by lying and telling students they will have no problem getting a job, or is this just their personal opinion? I feel as a professional now, my personal virtues would be telling me it is wrong to suggest someone will have no problem finding work, as you just can't be sure how many people will actually find work as there is so many dancers and performers now. So I would much rather promote persistence and how to deal with rejection and picking yourself back up ready for the next audition. If you really don't have anything to worry about I guess you will walk straight into your first job but for just about everyone else it would be much more useful to promote hard work and persistence with auditions, don't you think?
Within my workplace, on a ship, I feel ethics are quite a big deal. Both professional and personal ethics. Our professional ethics and our code of conduct are probably just the same as any other professional theatre but our personal virtues really need to be strong on a ship. Since normally everyone comes together and leaves together as a cast, it's important to build good relationships and be trustworthy and compassionate to each other. You literally spend almost 24/7 with these people as they're the people you work with, but also the people you socialize with too which can sometimes also be a bad thing. If there's tension between people or bad atmosphere it's harder to separate as you never really get a break from each other. There's rarely somewhere you can avoid people on ships. So this makes personal virtues every more important to me on ships, it is important to treat people right, and be reliable for your cast and also your friends.
I feel what I've learnt about ethics with relate to my inquiry as I'm looking into communication and what makes a successful Dance Captain. Someone that has authority over the rest of the cast and can also be someone people turn too in personal situations must have strong professional and personal virtues. Hopefully I can successfully research what people believe are great qualities to have and to express to other performers.
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