ACQUIRING GOOD ETHICAL JUDGMENT SCENARIO 1 THE AGE-OLD DILEMMA se not told to cheat, but your job may be on the line. The Situation ne Striker, a staff accountant recently hired by AccuSuccess accounting firm, is participate participating in the audit of E-Z Company. She has to check 60 loan files against 15 different criteria, to draw a conclusion in each case about E-Z Company's assessment of collectibility. The senior accountant for the job, Will Smythe, has a similar job. Over the course of a week, Will consistently gets through his work and is able to leave on time every day. Suzanne has been working late to finish the job on time, but even then she is falling behind. Suzanne begins to think that she is too slow at her work and that she risks being reprimanded. At the rate she's going, it will take her 80 hours to do a job for which 40 hours were budgeted. One evening late in the week, Suzanne catches up with Will after work at the local watering hole. "How do you do it?" she asks. "Your loan files are even bigger and more complex than mine. I can't see how to get through this work on schedule." "I guess you don't get it," Will says in reply. "The real risk assessment for this job has already been done by the audit manager and partner. We're here just to make sure the work papers look good. What do those guys really want? They want the job to be done on time and within budget." Suzanne was trying to take this in. "I'm not saying you shouldn't look at all the files," Will added, firmly, "But it should take you a lot less time to get through them. The loan portfolio isn't material anyway. If you keep taking nearly twice as long as budgeted, they won't keep you." Suzanne couldn't help thinking that the implicit message was: I'm not looking at every file. I'm sampling them and making my own risk assessment. Question What should Suzanne do? After this conversation, which both relieved and disturbed her, Suzanne called some friends and asked their advice. Should Suzanne dismiss any of this advice as unacceptable? And, as regards that advice which is acceptable, which is the best alternative