DP6

DecisionPoint
http://proethica.org/ontology/cases#DecisionPoint

DP6

Should Engineer A, having legitimately recruited Engineer C from Firm X, treat Engineer C's anticipated departure as a permissible factual basis for communicating to Firm X's clients about Firm X's capacity, or recognize that his causal role in creating that condition forecloses its use as a competitive argument regardless of its narrow factual accuracy?

The case presents a structural tension between the principle of free and open competition — which unambiguously permits Engineer A to recruit Engineer C and solicit Firm X's clients — and the self-caused incapacity non-exploitation principle, which prohibits using the consequences of one's own competitive acts as evidentiary ammunition to disparage a former employer's capacity. The question is where the ethical boundary lies between permissible competitive conduct (weakening a rival by recruiting its staff) and impermissible exploitation (using the self-caused weakness as a factual predicate for client-facing disparagement).

Solicit Firm X's clients for Firm Y exclusively on the basis of Firm Y's own qualifications, personnel, and track record, refraining from any reference to Engineer C's departure or Firm X's resulting capacity as a basis for the solicitation, recognizing that the self-caused nature of the departure forecloses its use as competitive evidence.

Represent to Firm X's clients that Engineer C's departure is a factually accurate and material development affecting Firm X's capacity, treating the at-will recruitment as a legitimate competitive act whose consequences Engineer A is entitled to communicate to clients as accurate market information regardless of his causal role in creating those consequences.

Inform Firm X's clients of Engineer C's anticipated departure while fully disclosing that Engineer A recruited Engineer C and is therefore the proximate cause of the staffing change, presenting the information neutrally without directing clients to hire Firm Y, and allowing clients to make their own capacity assessments with full information about Engineer A's role.

Engineer A