Ethical Values and Principles of Corporate Culture - Essay Example

Business Ethics Introduction Businesses operate in different environment and needs to satisfy all stakeholders, owners by making profit and to the society under that the enterprise functions. To achieve this, they must conform to certain regulations that they abide by in the process of production known as code of ethics. These are laid down standards, rules and principles that the firm must follow in the process so that they can conduct good business relations with respect to its core objectives. These measures will create mutual existence between customers; affected societies and the organization hence provide a favorable trading environment. Ethical values and principles Corporate culture; a firm operates in a particular environment depending on the industry that the organization is trading in. Thus, it must know and understand diverse values that the industry requires before it starts operations. As a result, the organization and employees at large will be able to understand the business requirement processes well and can be good decision makers in times of business dilemmas (Davidson, & Stevens, 2012). A good decision-making complemented with excellent business understanding makes the organization achieve more in terms of output since the employees are all aware of the requirements. They know how they can compete with their competitors; satisfy the customers and society in the end. Starting and conveying the company values; a business entity sets out for the behavioral expectations of employees, management in the workplace. Certain procedures of conducts must be adhered to while on duty (De Villiers, 2011). That includes respect among the employees, good management and coordination of work, the relationship between the customers and the organization and the relationship between the business and the society. All these factors affect the profits of the firm that is its primary objectives. Thus, ethical standards provide a direct relationship between the corporate success and behavior. However, it should not negatively affect the organization in any way, but one that tries to bring in a competitive advantage to the firm in the industry. The business integrity; integrity provides standards that the organization must meet in the process of production. The company must be honest in its dealings and not merely to deceive customers into making their purchases and the society to accept them. Thus, they should be able to produce quality goods so that consumers get their satisfactions for their money. They must be able to define their operations to the community precisely so that everyone knows what they are dealing with (Davidson, & Stevens, 2012). Hence, there will be more trust in the affected parties by the company that provides for a good relationship in the work environment. Responsibilities; firms operates in societies and do meet challenges. They produce products and in the process affect the population in diverse ways. They emit gasses that pollute the environment, makes enormous profits as a result of the market that is provided by the people, they may even displace others for a healthy working environment. All these actions tend to affect the living population negatively in the surroundings. Thus, they must find ways to correct the measures or take responsibility due to their operations activities (De Villiers, 2011). Failure to do so makes them market inefficiency and may lead to various actions from both the government and community that negatively affects the operations of the business. Importance of the above values and principles Defining of corporate culture, respect and honesty of the business is a critical issue in the internal operations of the enterprise. Respectful workers have a good understanding of between the management and the staffs; employees know each other better and thus can conform to beautiful teamwork in the organization. Information flows in real and proper directions that do not affect the flow of work. Complementing this with a well stated and understands the culture of the business in a particular industry; employees can know their expectations and work hard towards the achievement of the organization goals and objectives. Integrity provides for confidence in the organization both internally and externally. The employees understand what the firm deals in during the society and the state, on the other hand, are fully aware of the organization mission and genuine output. Thus, actions, such as industrial disputes and community strikes do not exist hence interruptions are minimized. Through real dealings, consumers of the products also have a clear picture of what they are consuming and can have more of it. Thus, the organization sales increase that leads to high profits to the firm. Taking care of the responsibilities is also important. Their operations affect society and should not assume. However, they must come up with ways to make sure they compensate for the business adverse effects to the environment. This idea would provide a good working relationship between community, state and the organization. Thus, actions such as fines due to negligence, constant court arbitrations and frustrations by the members of the society are greatly minimized and as such the organization can concentrate on its principal objective of profit maximization. Training and communication plan The organization can carry out various awareness plans to aid both the employees and society to understand the effects of ethics to a business in the operating environment. The firm can organize learning programs in the company where employees are trained on various ethical issues that pertain to a particular course of action. This training can be done through different departments’ heads in connections with the top management (Kitzmueller, & Shimshack, 2012). The program involves the expected relationships among employees, coordination of work among the diverse departments, respectful relationship between the management and their juniors, quality of the products that the employees are expected to produce and the general image that the employees should portray while outside duty. These mutual internal relationships provide for a healthy internal environment that is motivated and capable of achieving the organization goals and objectives. Thus, after the training, employees can then sign the abiding forms of conduct acknowledging their usability and promise to adhere to them at all times while in the organization. The organization can also provide understanding to the community to know the products better and consequences as a result of the company operations. Hence, can use community leaders to train on various fronts and educate the society as a whole or organize open events that provide more insight of the company to the society. These measures will be able to communicate the business core objectives, repercussions and any other consequence that the corporation might incur due to the operations of the firm. Other forms of communication can also be used to articulate the issues both internally and externally. For internal conversations, the firm can always use internet, websites and newsletters that are distributed among the employees explaining to them the ethical values. For external communications, the investment can apply to the use of journals and offer speeches explaining their societal expectations and mode of relationship that would exist. Implementation plan The firm can have various ways to implement the strategies. First, the organization can have awards for most of an employee that conform to the ethics more and helps the organization to achieve its goals. By doing so, the staffs are more motivated and will always adhere to the set standards in the premises since they are well motivated. The firm also sets rules and regulations, and any person who does not conform to them is liable for punishment by the organization. Thus, the staffs will not be eligible to break cause they are aware of the consequences and thus must restrict themselves to any actions that may deem them unbinding. They are thus focused on the objectives with an explicit ethics that helps the organization to have high standards in the market. A business can also implement its ethics to society by providing samples to the community members. When they organize training events, they can always have a few of their products to the customers so that they are assured of the commodities. They should also be able to explain how they will counter negative externalities and promote the positive ones. For instance, provide employment to the locals so that they participate in the production process. Hence, a majority of the population will be aware of the operations (Epstein, & Buhovac, 2014). Thus, they will be more dedicated to helping the organization rather than major on the negative signs that provide a healthy positive environment for operations. Role of leadership For the organization to achieve its aim in ethics as required by the business, the management must lead by example. They should set the tone right from the top before employees can also imitate them. Through their directives, behavior in the organization, their actions as they try to implement key functions in the firm, should always conform to ethical values and standards that are set by the organization (Piccolo, Greenbaum & Eissa, 2012). This action helps to motivate the internal operations systems and employees follow suit making the codes be much applied in the organization undertakings. As management team, they should also be being able to evaluate how much conformity is adhered at workplace. Thus, both team from the board of directors and managers are expected to access how persons in the organization practices ethical values so that they determined how much helpful they are to the organization and identify those who do not. Thus, the team can formulate critical decisions on how much to improve them or their pragmatism. Leadership management of any business entity should also be able to detect deviations from the values already set by the firm. Thus, they ensure that no person introduces new or adopted values from other organizations that may interfere or assimilate the existing organizations values and standards (Piccolo, Greenbaum & Eissa, 2012). Hence, the firm will remain to its initial codes of conduct as they pursue their business objectives and goals. Corporate social issues As the business operates in a particular environment, it affects the community both positively and negatively. For the society to benefit from the firm, the investments must be able to provide them with opportunities such as employment so that the members of the community can have a form of income. As a result, it fights off poverty. Thus, it acts as a way of living to the nation population. The organization should also participate in community development as a result of the enormous profits they make in the environment. They can build schools that act as learning centers to the people’s young generations hence eradicating ignorance (Cheng, Ioannou, & Serafeim,2014). Construct hospitals so that health is assured to the population. This action is necessary since in the process of operations, corporations usually emit fumes especially manufacturing companies that pollute the environment. These exhausts are harmful to the population and can cause infections. Hence, as a means of compensation for the community, they can build more health centers to ensure the population is safe. A business entity can also create a social awareness and education in the community. They can be able to expose various harmful methods of producing a particular product of different companies. They can do this, by advertisements of hazards chemical produced in the process of manufacturing. Hence, they help to expose firms that hide out and do not want to meet the expenses of their actions (De Villiers, 2011). As a result, the society is more aware of various natures of businesses and can take measures for them. Thus, firms will be able to integrate into their business models the social responsibilities that conform to the applicable law of the state. Laws regulations that impact the Corporation As the business operates in a certain environment, the state usually enacts laws that affect the operations of the organization. They can decide to subsidize the costs of productions so that consumers have to spend relatively reduced amount on the commodity. This law usually implies when the prices of the final sound will be high due to high operations costs and the good is of importance to the population. Thus, any problems that might cause by the production is translated into lower prices to the consumers hence enjoys social maximum benefits of the products. The government also taxes firms much more if they cannot control their operations or take care of their actions (Davidson, & Stevens, 2012). As a result, the state imposes high taxes on their profits. This revenue collected by the state is used to provide for the inconveniences that are caused by the operations of a given corporation in a particular environment. Thus, the high taxes impacts on the prices of the final products. The manufacturer will charge high prices since they transfer the excess to the final consumers. So to recover, their costs, they will have to charge more if they are to remain in the production. High prices, however, may translate into low-income especially if it is a normal good that follows the law of demand and supply. Monitoring and auditing of ethics plans As an organization, various ways must be put in place to determine the effectiveness of ethics values and their protection against outside environment. Thus, a program must be developed that helps to protect the existing core values and detect any deviations against the odds. Thus, they contribute to averting indecent conducts but promote conformity to the current ethical procedures and legal requirements (Davidson, & Stevens, 2012). The organization also forms a compliance department through the audit. It determines the usability of the values by the employees and how set standards are helping the business to achieve its objectives. Thus, by compliance, the management can easily know or determined if the original ethics of the firm is of aid, where they need to improve and or they need to change them. Ethical considerations for working internationally Now, when firms migrate or expand to work in other countries, they usually meet various obstacles in their operations. These includes, different in the legal systems, diverse cultural practices and adapting to new working conditions (Baylis, Smith, & Owens, 2013). Thus, they might need to change a little bit for them to fit into the system. For difference in culture, it make decisions carefully and the business must be patient, remain focused and calm in the process, as they try to integrate the new systems while continuing to the principal objectives of the organization. Other states have different applications to the law to the parent company country. For instance, vices such as corruption, bribery, and illegal trades are severely punished. So the organizations can first access the unified ethical codes of conduct provided by the nation laws before they can start operations. The initiative will help the firm to identify the values and integrate into its own so that they can adhere to the legislations. The organization members can also be frustrated especially if they find out the working situations does not meet their expectations. This makes the staffs to take too long to adjust to the new standards. Furthermore, they can experience culture shock at an individual level that they cannot absorb at all. However, the employees will have to learn from the new ones if they are to succeed in the business objectives. References Baylis, J., Smith, S., & Owens, P. (Eds.). (2013). The globalization of world politics: an introduction to international relations. Oxford University Press. Cheng, B., Ioannou, I., & Serafeim, G. (2014). Corporate social responsibility and access to finance. Strategic Management Journal, 35(1), 1-23. Davidson, B. I., & Stevens, D. E. (2012). Can a code of ethics improve manager behavior and investor confidence? An experimental study. The Accounting Review, 88(1), 51-74. De Villiers, C. (2011). Code of ethics. Journal of Marketing, 36-36. Epstein, M. J., & Buhovac, A. R. (2014). Making sustainability work: Best practices in managing and measuring corporate social, environmental, and economic impacts. Berrett-Koehler Publishers. Kitzmueller, M., & Shimshack, J. (2012). Economic perspectives on corporate social responsibility. Journal of Economic Literature, 51-84. Piccolo, R. F., Greenbaum, R. L., & Eissa, G. (2012). Ethical leadership and core job characteristics: Designing jobs for employee well-being. In Work and Quality of Life (pp. 291-305). Springer Netherlands. McShane, S. L., & Von Glinow, M. A. (2015). Organizational Behavior 7/e. Read More