McDonalds is trying to get research on whether health conscious individuals will eat at their restaurants. They conduct a survey on 1500 health conscious respondents and receive two different responses. The first results states that 92% of respondents would not eat at McDonalds. The next result shows that of the 1500 respondents, 89% feel that McDonalds offers healthy meal options. The question now relies on an ethical issue, which information should McDonalds market to the public? Let's think about this, McDonalds has recently spent million of dollars trying to advertise and convince the public that McDonalds can be a healthy option for health conscious individuals. They have added variety to their menu including items like; apples, salads, grilled chicken wraps, or a fruit and yougurt parfait. These items have given consumers a better variety of healthy options to substitute on a diet. Now, what would I do if I had to report this information to the V.P. of McDonalds? I would be honest with my results. I would tell him that its almost certain that health conscious individuals would not eat at the local fast food chains. But, all hope is not lost because the respondents did feel that they are offering healthy options. I would advise the V.P. to change his promotion strategy to keep targeting its healthy eating options. It's going to take more time to convince health conscious customers to dine in. You don't want to lie to your customers and try to get them to believe that other individuals that are worried about their weight are still eating fast food. You will mislead the public and you might tarnish the company's reputation. I would advise him to use these results to keep reinforcing to the public that McDonalds does have healthy options! They need to keep running commercial ads and print ads that are persuading consumers that you can still eat healthy at an affordable price. Many people still view McDonalds as the usual high calorie, high fat content fast food chain. It will continue to take time reinforcing the public about this issue. It's better to be honest with your customers and gain their trust, then to mislead them and hinder future business.

For the next case, I am choosing the ethical issue with the Home Depot. If I needed 10 people in a focus group between the ages of 45-55 and I already had 9 applicants, I would make sure the 10 person also fit that critera. It would be convenient to realize that my father would easily fall into that category and make the 10 peson. However, I would be lying to the Home Depot because my father doesn't fall between the age limit. I would be giving biased information and ultimately hurting the accuracy of the focus group. Even though the company might never find out that I cheated them with the exploratory research, it would still bother me to know that I was lying to my employers. I would pick to do the right thing and keep looking for a 10 person in Atlanta, Georgia to continue a truthful and honest survey for Home Depot.