ing. J.P. (Jop) (Jop) Versteegt CPC MBA

Jop Versteegt is a part-time PhD student in Management at RSM’s Department of Business-Society Management.

The main research question in his PhD is: Can moral and ethical decision making in organizations be improved by using a normative ethical decision framework? And can AI also contribute to this? 

In more detail; is using a normative ethical decision framework useful to answer moral and ethical questions more in-depth? Or is a answering without a framework even successful? And is the design of the framework depending on availability of time, experience, and purpose? 

The research themes are divided in four parts: 

Part 1: A review of normative ethical decision making frameworks
A literature research study on existing ethical decision making  frameworks or even ones still under development. What is the academic fundament for these models? What differentiates them from each other? The result is an insight into the various publications on normative ethical decision making frameworks and if applicable the empirical research on the models.

Part 2: The effectiveness of normative ethical decision making frameworks
Theory vs practice (application of models vs intuitive decision-making). Empirical research will be done on the use of different decision frameworks in live situations. This is most likely one of the most challenging and interesting parts of the research. What actually happens in practice?

Part 3: Toward a new type of normative ethical decision making framework
Testing the applicability of the updated framework. Based on the first two parts of the research we can continue to test new possibilities. A new developed or updated decision framework or frameworks will be tested. 

Part 4: The added value of AI to a normative ethical decision making framework
The final part is extending to the research in the field of AI. Can AI-Robots add value by their analysing skills in improving our moral and ethical decision making? In case the earlier sub-studies show that there is added value to use a normative ethical decision making framework, we could continue to see where AI can provide support on the framework. Which aspects can AI add on increasing data analysis and thus further improvement / optimization of our the results of our decision framework? Or can AI even take over parts of the decision framework so focus is only necessary on that specific part which cannot be done by AI-Robots.

See for more info: www.jopversteegt.com