Legal & Ethical Issues that Arise in Business In today’s business world there are numerous ethical issues that have a chance of arising which may turn into legal battles. This is why organizations should strive to give their employees a clear comprehension of the company’s overall vision and mission. This will help employees in practicing the proper code of ethics as well as procedures and policies in the workplace. Companies must also strive to deliver the highest level of ethics in a continued basis which provisions customers, employees, and applicants that are entitled to them in under fair business practices. The focal point for businesses it to uphold the values of responsible and fair business practices. This paper will examine the ethical and legal theories that apply to the business situation in order to broaden the insight of how it could have been avoided. The company that is taken into consideration is Coca-Cola in which the company was recently sued for racial discrimination workplace environment.
The Situation
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According to various newspapers reporting on the issue, several black and Hispanic workers in the Coca-Cola plant located in New York had filed a lawsuit against the company alleging that they worked in an environment that was racist. Many of the workers had labeled the working environment as a “cesspool” of racial discrimination (Cabrera, 2012). The recent lawsuit was filed under the federal Brooklyn Federal Court. It is accusing Coca-Cola Corporation of downgrading its minority employees to lower wages and unfavorable duties. By refusing such duties or complaining these workers are then exposed to unjust corrective action with an added amount of retaliation when these workers voice their issues or concerns to the unjust treatment in the work environment (Marzulli,
One of the issues in the case EEOC v. Target Corp. is that the EEOC alleged that Target violated the Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 by engaging in race discrimination against African-American applicants who were interested in management positions. It is argued that Target did not give the opportunity to schedule an interview to plaintiffs, Kalisha White, Ralpheal Edgeston and Cherise Brown-Easley, because of racial discrimination. On the other hand, it argues that Target is in violation of the Act because the company failed to retain and present records that would determine if there was reason to believe that an unlawful practice had been committed.
The concept of discrimination is complex in the case of “The Big One” in this case, corporations in the United States of America such as Nike, Spalding, Microsoft and AT&T are not willing to change their ways of manufacturing their goods in third world countries and American detention centres, and this causes perfectly able bodied employees in the United States to become unemployed as more and more companies apply this measure to make additional profit for themsel...
This is a complex case, involving multiple parties and several variables that need to be examined thoroughly. The parties mentioned include Knarles operator of the facility maintenance company, his son Barkley, their employee, a licensed plumber, and Mr. Chetum. Although in the end Chetum is suing the facilities maintenance firm for a breach of contract, all factors must be examined to determine proper fault.
However, many consumers of Coca-Cola products are unaware of the number of problems that Coca-Cola has had with the subject of racial discrimination, the most significant of these issues being a class action lawsuit filed against the company in 1999. This lawsuit was filed by four current and former African-American employees, alleging to have “suffered discrimination in pay, promotions, and performance evaluations” (Business & Human Rights Resource Centre). These individuals, along with over 2,000 other African-Americans employed by the Coca-Cola Company, had “statistics showing that the median salary for African American employees was about one-third less than that of whites within the company” (Business & Human Rights Resource Centre). As a result, Coca-Cola eventually agreed to pay $192 million in settlement charges, which stands as the largest settlement met in any corporate racial discrimination case (Business & Human Rights Resource
Nearly every aspect of law enforcement has a court decision that governs criteria. Most court rulings are the result of civil lawsuit towards a police officer and agency. However, currently, there is no law that mandates law enforcement driver training. When it comes to firearms, negligence by officers has resulted in a multitude of court rulings. Popow v. City of Margate, 1979, is a particularly interesting case that outlines failed firearms training by an agency. In this case, an officer chasing a suspect during a foot pursuit fired at the suspect, striking and killing an innocent bystander (Justia.com, 2017). The court ruled that the agency was “grossly negligent” of “failure to train” (Justia.com, 2017). As a result, nearly every agency requires annual firearms training and has written policy concerning the same. Officers must show proficiency in firearms use every year to maintain their certification. Many states even impose fines on officers for
In today’s world, the American still has barriers to overcome in the matter of racial equality. Whether it is being passed over for a promotion at the job or being underpaid, some people have to deal with unfair practice that would prevent someone of color or the opposite sex from having equal opportunity at the job. In 2004, Dukes vs. Wal-Mart Stores Incorporation was a civil rights class-action suite that ruled in favor of the women who worked and did not received promotions, pay and certain job assignments. This proves that some corporations ignore the 1964 Civil Rights Act, which protects workers from discrimination based on sex, race, religion or national origin.
Ethical behavior, in a general sense, is a definition of moral behavior in regards to lawfulness, societal standards, and things of that nature. In the business world, ethics commonly refer to acceptable and unacceptable business practices within the workplace, and all other related environments. The acceptance of colleges regardless of ethnicity, gender, and beliefs, as well as truthfulness and honesty in relation to finances within the company are examples of ideal ethical business conducts. Unethical business behavior would include manipulating procedures based on bias or discrimination, engaging in activities that promote political gain, as well as blatant fabrication of monetary factors within the company and “can affect organizational performance and is costly to employers, employees, shareholders, and other organizational stakeholders” (Cox 263). When a corporation practices proper ethics, it is representing not only itself in a positive manner, but its partners, shareholders, and clients as well. On the other hand, when an organization partakes in unethical activities, all parties are negatively affected. The collapse of Enron is a major case of unethical conduct in the corporate world, because the circumstances surrounding the firm’s chaotic plunge where so scandalous that it left “creditors wrangling over Enron's skeletal remains” (Helyar) long after the company had seen its demise. There are numerous instances to be mentioned, including deliberate failure to properly report fiscal losses, insider trading, and overall relentlessness. The inclusive purpose of this paper is to further explore the underlining factors that contributed to the downfall of the once powerful Enron, and how a new way of approaching business ethi...
Spokane Industries has contracted Franklin Electronics for an 18 month product development contract. Franklin Electronics is new to using project management methodologies and has not been exposed to earned value management methodologies. Even though Franklin and Spokane have worked together in the past, they have mainly used fixed-price contracts with little to no stipulations. For this project, Spokane Industries is requiring Franklin Electronics to use formalized project management methodologies, earned value cost schedules, and schedules for reports and meetings. Since Franklin Electronics had no experience with earned value management, the cost accounting group was trained in the methodology in order to bid for the project.
In today’s workplace, African Americans continue to be subjected to overt discrimination. This can take the form of ethnic jokes, racial slurs and exclusionary behaviors by Euro-American co-workers and managers. Even more disturbing is the verbal abuse, calculated mistreatment and even physical threats experienced by some African Americans while on the job. African Americans have also faced overt acts such as being reassigned to lower level projects, not receiving a promotion even though they were equally qualified and receiving less wages than other employees, even less qualified new hires. The discrimination can be so pervasive that African Americans feel uneasy and threatened, demotivated and disrespected, eventually feeling forced to leave to search for other employment.
The term “ethical business” is seen, by many people, as an oxymoron. This is because a business’s main objective is to make as much money as possible. Making the most money possible, however, can often lead to unethical actions. Companies like Enron, WorldCom, and Satyam have been the posterchildren for how corporations’ greed lead to unethical practices. In recent times however, companies have been accused of being unethical based on, not how they manage their finances, but on how they treat the society that they operate in. People have started to realize that the damage companies have been doing to the world around them is more impactful and far worse than any financial fraud that these companies might be engaging in. Events like the BP oil
To provide an example of a breach of ethical conduct in the workplace, we may remember the case of a financial manager in a corporation that decided not to pay overtime to some employees. After a deep outside investigation, the company was summoned with thousands of dollars to remedy the payment that was supposed to be paid to all employees who worked more than forty hours per week. Again, it is needed more than just a booklet stating that the company adheres to the code of business ethics. It is needed serious managers that can run the company with the most seriousness as possible. Consequently, any written codes of business ethics, regardless of how well it has been crafted, need people that adhere to its internal content with a serious desire to do the right thing.
Ethics in business is a highly important concept, as it can affect a company’s profits, salaries paid to employees and CEOs, and public opinion, among many other aspects of a business. Ethics can be enforced by company policies and guidelines, set a precedent when a company is faced with an important decision, and are also evolving thanks to new technology and situations that arise due to technology usage. Businesses have a duty to maintain their ethical responsibilities and also to help their employees enforce these responsibilities in and out of the workplace. However, ethics and the foundation for them are not always black and white. There are many different ethical theories, however Utilitarianism, Kant’s Deontological ethics, and Virtue ethics are three of the most well known theories in existence. Each theory is distinct in that it has a different quality used to determine ethicality and allows for a person to choose which system of ethics works best with both the situation and his or her personal ethical preferences.
(iii) Suppose that Sarah buys the building. Now how much will the business have toearn in order to break even in economic terms?
Work plays an important role in our daily life, it is considered much more huge part of our personal life. During our daily work we make many relationships throughout our career history. Sometimes these relationships become lasting, and sometimes employment discrimination might happen. This relationships that we thought it last could be cut off by the devastation of claims of discriminatory treatment. Discrimination in the workforce has been an issue since the first people of workers in United States in the present day and as well in the past. Some employees were subjected to a harsh working conditions, verbal abuse, denial of advancement,, and many other injustices. There was also the fact that certain employees were being treated differently than other employees.
Ferrell, O. C., Fraedrich, J., & Ferrell, L. (2011). Business Ethics: Ethical Decision Making and Cases. Mason, Ohio: South-Western Cengage Learning.