Index Facts of the CaseEthical IssuesWas Wells Fargo wrong or not?What is the root cause or origin?How could it have been avoided?Works CitedIn today's society Scandals affecting large companies are discovered and discussed quickly through the use of the media. How a company responds and resolves the problem can become detrimental to profits and growth. In the following essay we will discuss the ethical issues at Wells Fargo and how or if the scandal could have been prevented. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an Original Essay Facts of the Case In 2008/2009 Wells Fargo imposed a company-wide quota for employees to open, or cross-sell services to, new customer accounts. However, it was discovered that to meet the quota, employees began creating fake accounts for customers. Those “free” accounts promised by employees to customers were actually premium accounts, Wells Fargo premium accounts are associated with high fees. Those high fees lead to excess accounts, and those excess accounts lead to bigger problems like ruining a customer's credit lines. Ethical Issues The most obvious ethical issue with the 2008/2009 Wells Fargo scandal was the loss or abuse of trust, which resulted in the loss of integrity of Wells Fargo employees. The loss of honesty for a personal incentive had an effect on the entire company. Poor decision-making problems chosen and followed by employees and not consumers lead to a lowering of Wells Fargo's reputation and morale. Was Wells Fargo wrong or not? Wells Fargo employees were in the wrong for lying, creating and opening fake accounts, as well as hiding the fact that they were doing so to receive an incentive. Piazza & Jourdan (2018) recognized that without publicity, an organization's misconduct may or may not alter organizational membership, meaning that, if undetected, employees would remain to reap the benefits on their salaries. Carberry, E.J., Engelen, P., & Van Essen, M. (2018) found that the costs of corporate misconduct begin with the cost of replacing employees and can lead to reputational penalties, which may be rooted in decline of a company's stock price and loss of stakeholders. The entire Wells Fargo account opening scandal was systemic, meaning it affected the entire company and was not caused by a single individual. What is the root cause or origin? The knowledge and distribution of incentives to employees for services and cross-selling accounts started the scandal the biggest problem of the Wells Fargo scandal. The choices made were at company level so that all participants benefited from them. How could this have been avoided? First of all by not offering incentives for quota purposes. When you create a reward, but don't track how it was obtained or earned, you begin to enable employees to engage in unethical business practices. Furthermore, when Wells Fargo executives discovered there was a problem with fake accounts, they had to shut down the program, announce the problem, and fix it before it got worse. Companies facing misconduct findings attempt to limit disclosure of problems in order to limit external damage. In an effort to rectify the situation, Wells Fargo laid off 5,300 participating employees, or about 1% of the company's 300,000 total employees. However, when there are multiple reasons for hitting certain market thresholds, it's not just your day workers who are to blame..