Response to case study scenario 1

I could decide to ignore the problem and not take any course of action since I'm a junior engineer and in a way I'm protected by the company's organisational hierarchy. Therefore, my supervisor will be blamed (assuming it's discovered by a higher authority or reported by our client ) if I'm able to provide evidence of reporting the problem to him e.g. email correspondence etc. But for the fact that I was the one who noticed the 3 failed tests and this could cause severe injury or even worse, death of the consumer, I'd certainly not ignore the problem. Also it'll be bad to lose an important client because of a problem which could have been prevented.

As a trainee network engineer whilst on placement, I've been faced with a similar situation where I noticed that a router configured and shipped to a customer was missing a crucial access-list statement in it's configuration, thus making the customer's network vulnerable to external attack. In order to solve the problem, I made my colleague aware of the situation and to my amazement he said the customer ought to have a good firewall. Instead of accepting what he said, I produced a short procedure on how to log onto the router and add the missing access-list statement and then I gave it to our customer support guys who were visiting the customer's site to install the equipment. The risk of having the equipment compromised was eliminated and my colleague applauded my decision of not ignoring the problem even as a trainee.

Obviously, not ignoring the problem will cost the company money from recalling the unsafe products and replacing them with safe one's gratis. This will be much better than allowing the problem to be reported or publicised. Also such a situation would give our product a bad reputation, result in the client loosing faith and trust in our company and products as well as possibly switching to our competitors. In addition, we might also lose prospective customers. For instance, in August 02, 2007, Fisher-Price, recalled character toys due to lead poisoning hazards. This was the 26th toy recall involving toys produced in China. There's no doubt that if you were a customer of Fisher-Price, you'd look for a different manufacturer to deal with after so many product recalls.Fisher-Price Product Recall thus causing a huge financial loss to Fisher-Price.

A legal consequence according to the Product Liability Directive 85/37 /EEC , could be that the company is sued for compensation by an injured consumer. Depending on the number of injured consumers, the company could see a great loss not only in compensation but also in court hearings. Also as an employee, I could be fined if the the court found that the hazard could have been prevented.

Surprisingly, a financial consequence to the consumer could be having to pay for their treatment if they're unable to prove that the product actually was hazardous and most importantly caused the injury.(Product Liability). I think this is because it is possible that the injury was caused by a faulty PC and not necessarily our product. I could also see a salary cut or a termination of my appointment or suspension.

In order to deal with the problem, I'll take the following course of actions.

1.) Find out how and why the failed test weren't spotted prior to being packaged. This way, the procedure we follow can be improved to prevent this problem in the future.

2.) Insist that my supervisor does something about the problem e.g. a product recall. General Product Safety Regulations After all, it'd be much better to replace the product than lose existing and potential clients to competitors, lose sales and revenue, allow our product standard to be tarnished etc. Of course this might lead to us falling out but I'll feel good because I would have preserved the image of the company, potential victims, maintained my integrity and hopefully secured my job because the end result may be that I get fired since records will show that I reviewed the report and did nothing about the failed tests.

3.) Failing points 2 and 3 above, I'd report the problem anonymously. For example, when I worked for B&Q Warehouse, there was a confidential phone line employees could ring in order to report a problem like this. Calls of this nature were investigated and actions taken accordingly. Also it was upto the caller to either provide their name or remain anonymous. Hopefully, which such a system in place, I'd be able to anonymously alert higher authorities before the company's image is affected or even worse, a consumer dies.

Being a junior engineer in the company, it might be difficult for me to compel my supervisor to act on the problem either face to face or during staff meeting due to fear of being fired, not getting promoted, being hated by my colleagues etc therefore, point 3 above will be my best line of action to solving the problem. Hopefully this will cause the product to be recalled and necessary measures taken to prevent future occurence..