Some of the ethical dilemmas encountered by Daniel include lying about the product to customers, misrepresenting the celebrity’s opinion about it, and potentially jeopardizing that celebrity’s integrity and career.
The first ethical dilemma jeopardizes the concepts of honesty and integrity, as the company advertisement would have to commit a lie of omission in order to make the testament by the celebrity marketable. Same goes for misrepresenting her opinion about the product. While her review was generally positive, her current status as a vegetarian coupled with her decision to stop eating meat out of health concerns would damage Uber’s message (Ferrell et al., 2019). Finally, the issue of endangering the celebrity’s career by twisting her words offends all three concepts. The invited lady cooperated with the company and made her position abundantly clear. It is not fair to put her in a bad light because Uber did not think this through (Ferrell et al., 2019). It is also dishonest and lacking in integrity to not inform or obtain additional consent from the celebrity beyond the papers she had already signed, since they did not cover the intricacies of this situation.
Compliance with laws cover only some of the short-term issues associated with the situation. As an employee, Daniel has to be concerned for the well-being of the company beyond the letter of the law (Ferrell et al., 2019). Misinterpreting the celebrity’s words would likely lead to a serious public backlash, which he and Uber would suffer from. The celebrity would likely withdraw her words, and other famous people would not deal with Uber. Negative advertising would hurt sales as well, damaging the company and Daniel’s financial stability. Finally, the celebrity herself will likely suffer from a backlash, which is completely unfair towards her given her forwardness, honesty, and willingness to participate, so long her words are not misinterpreted.
References
Ferrell, O. C., Fraedrich, J., & Ferell, L. (2019). Business ethics (12th ed.). Cengage.