Brex Mining Scandal: An Analysis of Ethical Breaches and Motivations

The report provides a comprehensive analysis of the Brex Mining scandal, examining the ethical violations and contradictions to the Engineer’s Australia Code of Ethics. It delves into the motivations and pressures that led to unethical behavior, including situational influences and opportunities for deceptive acts. The report discusses the company's actions, highlighting the failure to uphold integrity, honesty, and respect for stakeholders. It explores the impacts of the scandal on investors and the community, while offering recommendations for ethical compliance and improved professional conduct. The conclusion emphasizes the importance of ethical decision-making in engineering to foster trust and sustainable practices. The report also details the actions an employee could have taken to comply with the code of ethics, such as avoiding deceptive acts, acknowledging errors, and providing investors with complete and accurate information. The document emphasizes the importance of promoting community services, ethical conduct and being accountable for actions under the Engineers Australia's General Regulations.

Running head: BREX MINING SCANDAL 1
Brex Mining Scandal
Student Name
Institutional Affiliation

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Table of Contents
Tittle page 1
Executive Summary 3
Introduction 3
Ethical behaviors 3
Contradiction to the Engineer’s Australia Code of Ethics 4
Pressures and Motivations 4
Situational Influences 4
Compliance Actions 5
Conclusions 5
Recommendations 6
References 7

BREX MINING SCANDAL 3
Brex Mining Scandal
Executive Summary
This project involves an examination of a case study that involves a scandal between a
company and its investors. It consists of an excessively chain of reactions channeled at
completing the tasks on Engineer’s Australia code of ethics. It covers various codes of ethics and
how the scandal led to a violation of the code of ethics. The motivating factors that made the
company to behave unethically. It covers various prospects on how engineers behave based on
their profession and finally concludes with comprehensive findings and suggestions towards
improving the community, investors, and engineers aiming at complying with the code of ethics.
Introduction
Truth is ideal in every business as it builds trust with the shareholders, investors, and
customers and allows them to make informed decisions that eventually yields better results. The
Engineer’s Australians code of ethics requires engineers to demonstrate integrity and do what’s
right acting professionally and appropriately on things perceived by engineers to be wrong (Eide,
Jenison, Mickelson, & Northup, 2018). Hence, engineers should be trustworthy and honest in
managing perceived conflict of interest, offering proper credit to those it is due and never
involving themselves in corrupt, fraudulent and acts perceived as criminal conduct.
Ethical behaviors
The ethical behaviors that were conducted which resulted in the deceit, violating the
Engineer’s Australia code of ethics was to demonstrate integrity (Walther, Miller, & Sochacka,
2017). This involved telling the truth about the costs and risks associated with the amount and
resources in the Busang gold deposit. Therefore, the code of ethics requires engineers to disclose

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conflicts to the relevant people through correct interpretations and a balanced way of making
varied decisions.
Contradiction to the Engineer’s Australia Code of Ethics
In contradiction to the engineer’s code of ethics, this act was against the ethics of
promoting sustainability (Code of Ethics for Engineers, 2018). Engineer's Australia code of
ethics requires engineers to pay attention to sensitive issues affecting the public and inform
clients, employers, among other stakeholders on the impacts of proposed activities on the
environment and the community too. Engineers are to involve all stakeholders in decision
making and activities that may affect the environment in terms of social and economic
consequences, engineers are supposed to communicate of matters relating to costs, risks,
outcomes, and services on time, identifying outcomes that are sustainable in terms of the
economic impacts (Litchfield, Javernick-Will, & Maul, 2016).
Pressures and Motivations
Moreover, the scandal occurred due to pressures and motivations that the company was
trapped in. For instance, opportunities, and situational influences. The company had an
opportunity in that the investment was not tangible. Investors were not able to inspect, hold and
even test their perceived investments. Hence, the investors lacked securities such as warranty to
protect their investments. They only had to depend on the information offered to them regarding
the investment (Li, McMurray, Xue, Liu, & Sy, 2018). Hence, through trust in the available
information, investors had to invest.
Situational Influence
Additionally, situational influences also contributed to the course of action. The company
behaved unethically due to the powerful unrecognized effect of situational influences that

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critically affected their decision-making process (Bucciarelli & Kuhn, 2018). The mention of
money reduced the company’s ethical behavior making it act in a manner that served their short
term interest, at the expense of the associated risks on the investors and the company. The
company made decisions by focusing on the short term interest and ignored the long term risks
that would have negative consequences to the investors and the company as a whole.
Compliance Actions
Additionally, if I were an employee at the Brex Mining Company, some of the realistic
actions I would have taken to remain compliant with the Engineer’s Australia code of ethics
include avoiding deceptive acts by not receiving directly or indirectly awards that affect
investors. I would also acknowledge errors related to the project and advise the investors
appropriately on the failures of the project to enable them to shift their finances to other
profitable investments. As an engineer, I would not promote my interest as this would alter the
integrity and the dignity of the profession. Instead, I would avoid public deception and all other
statements with misrepresentation facts to the investors. I would ensure that investors get
complete and accurate information regarding the Busang gold deposit to enable them to make
informed decisions to invest or not.
Conclusion
Furthermore, the outcomes of these actions would reduce the likelihood of the investors
to channel their finances without having a clear understanding of the risks associated with the
investment, it will reduce the chances of the investors filing complaints and taking legal actions
for the company incase their investments reduces in value. The actions will reduce the chances of
investigations of the company by regulators and thus the company will not face harsh sanctions.

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Besides, it will reduce the chances of tarnishing the company’s reputation and thus enable it to
thrive in its prospects through building trust with investors.
Recommendations
Individually, the action will contribute to community services through the use of skills
and knowledge to offer solutions that benefit the entire community to achieve a sustainable
future. I will not have served personal interest, but instead, I shall have practiced my obligation
as a member of the Engineers Australia, through a commitment to practice based on the code of
ethics and also accept to be accountable for my conduct under Engineers Australia’s General
Regulations.

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References
Bucciarelli, L. L., & Kuhn, S. (2018). ENGINEERING EDUCATION AND ENGINEERING
PRACTICE:| NAPROVING THE FIT. Between Craft and Science: Technical Work in
the United States, 210.
Code of Ethics for Engineers. (2018). NATIONAL SOCIETY OF PROFESSIONAL ENGINEER.
Retrieved from WWW.NSPE.ORG
Eide, A., Jenison, R. D., Mickelson, S. K., & Northup, L. L. (2018). Engineering Fundamentals \
& Problem Solving. McGraw Hill Education.
Li, L., McMurray, A., Xue, J., Liu, Z., & Sy, M. (2018). Industry-wide corporate fraud: The truth
behind the Volkswagen scandal. Journal of Cleaner Production, 172.
Litchfield, K., Javernick-Will, A., & Maul, A. (2016). Technical and professional skills of
engineers involved and not involved in engineering service. Journal of Engineering
Education, 105(1).
Walther, J., Miller, S. E., & Sochacka, N. W. (2017). A Model of Empathy in Engineering as a
Core Skill, Practice Orientation, and Professional Way of Being. Journal of Engineering
Education, 106(1).