Human Resource Policy Analysis - Code of Conduct and Ethics - Case Study Example

Human Resource Policy Analysis: Code of Conduct and Ethics Student’s Name Institutional Affiliation Human Resource Policy Analysis: Code of Conduct and Ethics Code of conduct or ethics (CCE) is commonly incorporated in regulations that govern the acts and omissions of employees, managers or employers in carrying out responsibilities affiliated or assigned by an organization. Having a code of ethics governing the way in which business is carried out in an organization prevents business malpractice or members of a given organization use unscrupulous methods to achieve the goals set in the organization (Amanda, 2006).Business and cooperates are as concerned with this concept as governments all over the globe including the Australian government seeking to deregulate the sector. Therefore, in the modern era, corporate management ethics becomes vital if an organization is to survive in the long run. However, some questions still remain unclear and unanswered by many human resource managers that include; what is considered good in business? What is considered wrong in human resource management practice? Finally, what is the impact of ethics in human resource management? These are sample questions that continuously influence and streamline ethics as a human resource element but have not been put into perspective fully and actuated in many organizations, Foxconn Technology Group (FTG) been one of them. FTG's Code of Conduct and Ethics Violation FTG is one of the largest producers for Apple among other companies dealing in electronics. It majors in manufacture and supply of electronic devices. The company has its factories in Chinese towns including Taiwan (Gabbat, 2012). The company has lately admitted to violating its code of conduct by allowing and in some cases demanding that student interns work overtime and in night shifts. This was against the company's code of conduct for employees and student interns. This was dominant and conspicuous at the company's Yantai campus (Duhigg & Barboza, 2012). A university was alleged to have conspired with senior managers at Foxconn to compel its students to enroll in Foxconn’ Yantai internship program before graduating. Even during the internship program, students were forced to perform tasks not related to the areas they had majored all for the benefit of the company (Duhigg & Barboza, 2012). Student, who failed to abide by work-line instructions or deemed it necessary to quit, were threatened to be denied their diplomas, therefore, risking discontinuation of their studies. Such threats posed on the student were an overt violation of the company's CCE. Apple has a universal code of conduct that applies to all its suppliers including FTG. The code requires that employees work in a safe environment and that they should be handled with utmost respect and dignity in addition to a requirement of the manufacturing process to be environment-friendly (Kaiser, 2012). However, some employees in both Apple and its suppliers have raised concerns over long working hours under unsafe working conditions. The latter included unavailability of sufficient face masks that are significant in shielding the workers from the quantities of toxic industrial gases or fumes released in the course of the company’s operations. The management team at FTG had been informed of the the wanting conditions under which their employees work but had ignored. Moreover, most of FTG’s employees have also complained of low pay something not envisaged in Apple’s code of conduct and ethics. Employees have been noticed to work for hours longer than 12 hours per day and more than 60 hours against the provision in Chinese Labor laws (Kaiser, 2012). Long working hours is an issue that was even identified by the China Labor Watch, an organization that protects the rights of employees in China. Literature Review on Codes of Conduct and Ethics Ethics in human resource management is an issue whose discussion has been ongoing with agreeing and conflicting arguments as noted by many authors (Pinnington, Macklin & Campbell, 2007).Standards, values and morals bordering on ethics have not been firmly bonded in the corporate culture in management of human resources in the postmodern era (Pinnington, Macklin & Campbell, 2007). Zoffer and Fram (2005) recognize that the ethical tools involved are based on utilitarian and relativist principles that are strongly interlinked to corporate social responsibility. The authors also assert that all the human resource practices and principles are based on a firm ethical foundation (Zoffer & Fram, 2005). CCE in businesses or organizations is to ensure that profits are made without violating any laid down CCE, something that some organizations trying to maximize profits against stiff competitions may fail to adhere to (Zoffer & Fram, 2005).Institutions, which implement their CCE in their organizations to the latter, have a good reputation among its employees and the outside world. Therefore, a number of economists, researchers, academicians and political leaders have expressed their support for compliance to the set code of ethics by different organizations for the success of such organizations. However, some researchers like Schultze and Stabell (2004) oppose this assertion and argue that business and morality cannot coexist, and it is difficult for an organization to make profits as well as be ethical. This allegation is because maximization of profits has been broadly linked to overexploitation of employees and violation of some of an organization CCE. Violation of the HR code of contact like it happened in Foxconn had glaring CCE issues such as work stress, long working hours and off-shoring and use of cheap labor. The company violated the business code concerned with hiring and human resources. The company had established rules and regulations that facilitate and guide recruitment and management of employees (Kaiser, 2012). Nevertheless, unscrupulous managers still proceeded to disregard the laid out CCE. This is despite many corporate and businesses focusing on CCE compliance especially in the management of human resource. Pinnington, Macklin and Campbell (2007) and Amanda (2006) have demonstrated an increasing growth in organization matters relating to CCE. The major issues under discussion in these literatures are largely based on the employment relationship that covers both employees’ rights and duties (Weaver & Trevino, 2001). Most of the operations in Foxconn, for example, were a violation of the employee rights and general policies employment of minors. Thus, as noted by many researchers, there is a wide gap between policies and real practice in various organizations. This disparity needs to be addressed to bridge the gap between existing policies and the implementation of these policies. The HR department in organizations has been the one tasked with advocating employee rights including their conduct and ethical considerations, therefore, it is a suitable agent to aid in streamlining practice to be in accordance with practice (Schultze & Stanbel, 2004). From a universal ethical standpoint, people understand what is wrong and avoid such mistakes and this forms the root source of rules and regulations. For insytance, the managers at Foxconn knew that engaging minor in employment is against the Chinese Labor laws inspite it being a well know worldwide issue. In addition, human beings perform well in conducive and supportive environment something that the managers at FTG understand. However, they still squeezed employee in tiny rooms that were poorly aerated even predisposing them to health risks (Kaiser, 2012). The violations experienced at Foxconn might have been initially overlooked by the company's management team, but ethical issues are clearly visible. Despite the assertion, that ethical issues are complicated and tenuous, the organization may have to pay a hefty penalty for violating the ethical code of conduct (Velaquez, 2006). Human resource managers have a critical role in making labor related management roles that maintain a high level of credibility. Critically evaluating the research by Amanda (2006), she emphasizes the fact that “in any organization morality exists and people understand the decent way to behave as it is a social responsibility of every employee, this is because some people have made the initial choice of suffering if something wrong is committed” (Amanda, 2006).This is the ideal that summarizes the role of the human resource managers in an organization that is guided by norms and values of a given society. According to Amanda (2006) the freedom and moral decision of human resource managers are governed by the norms and morals of the wider society. This is contrary to Velaquez’s (2006) perspective that proposes that the ethically based actions in human resource management are more determined by the instinct of a person acting within the societies’ context rather than the roles generated by rational principles of philosophy. Different theorists like Weaver and Trevino (2001) in their seminar papers on ethics and corporate management point out the various theories and HR practices that influence human behavior in the workplace. The theories identified relate to the social and political influence of work on the society. Many academicians agree that the government and the society shape the code of ethics; the socio-political framework that applies here also affected Foxconn as a corporate. The political theories found to have complete influence reflect more on unitarist and pluralist theories (Pinnington, Macklin & Campbell, 2007). The major distinction in the theories is that under unitarist theory there are no ethical issues that may arise if the employees comply with the set codes of conduct. The ethical dilemma at FTG was as a result of non-conformance to the norms set by the authority hence, jeopardizing the productivity of the business (Kaiser, 2012). The latter statement is supported by the fact that the shares of FTG had dropped by almost 2% in Taipei that consequently led to a deterioration of up-to-date to an 18% low. Furthermore, Apple, the company which FTG is a major supplier of its products experienced the collateral damage caused by FTG as the ongoing negative publicity and strikes led to a decrease in its shares in Germany by 1.3% (Bloomberg, 2012). From an economist perspective the strike experienced at FTG’s branches is a case of severe employment relations whereby the labor was being overexploited making the company the owner of the resources (Kaiser, 2012; Velaquez, 2006). The company employs an authoritarian unitarian form of management that excludes employees from most decision making processes assuming the employees to only factors of production for exploitation while maximizing profits. As a result, most of the workers ended up losing motivation to work and were converted to commodities of wealth creation by the company. This was based on the profit motive spurred by the materialistic objective of the company that led to a social conflict (Wiley, 2000). To solve this issue the company had first to admit the violation of CCE before embarking on strategies to mitigate further disconcert with employees and even civil organization against such employer malpractices. Communist ideologies on ethics are not as applicable to human resource management as the advanced neoclassical and liberalism theories. Hence, new corporate policies that aim at establishing legislative framework and ensuring proper employee representation in the company boards and trade unions were also established to prevent the experienced violations from reappearing and enhance appropriate efficacious working relationship between employees and employers (Kaiser, 2012). This perspective on the efficient working relationships assists human resource managers in a critical analysis of better approaches to implementing the ethical code of conduct. In the recent times in human resource management, there has been a lot of interest by researchers on legitimacy of social entities with an argument that can satisfy the organizational and individual needs (Weaver, 2001). For example, FTG violated the contractual requirements and this is a breach of organization ethics, in the real essence, the contracts were made to solve the pluralistic conflicts. This is further complicated by the emergence globalization and capitalism. Thus, the social-political diversity plays a critical role in modern human resource management (Zoffer & Fram, 2005). This is a great lesson that modern managers need to understand while solving the dilemma surrounding violations of CCE in organizations or companies. The modern worker is more informed about the rights and duties that they are entitled to as provided for in CCE, so any violation of their rights may not go unnoticed. It can be concluded that people are the key source of capital for a company, and they maintain competitive advantage of the organization. Thus, the companies need to manage the human resource ethically and with dignity they deserve for the company to be competitive and to maintain high performance through the time. As indicated by the researchers (Schultze & Stanbel, 2004) there is a direct correlation between HR management and performance that is a major area of study by modern investigators. Conclusions Some ethics principles in HR Management can be advantageous to the workers but exploitative to the company. For instance, the requirement for payment for hours not worked such as sick offs though ethically right cab be detrimental to the company especially if such cases become numerous. Most of the approaches employed by human resource persons in making these decisions are more aligned to organizational strategy rather than on economic standpoint (Wiley, 2000). In as much as these practices need to be protected, there is the need for the HR managers to consider their contribution to organizational performance. Finally, in as much as these practices concern performance, they are subject to scrutiny, and the correct measure of ethics should be determined through research. It is through this that researchers can rationally draw conclusions from their findings on this topic as the suggestions in there viewed articles may not sufficient to substantiate the ethical violations by companies such as FTG as offered by the different researchers. References Amanda, R. (2006). Ethics and human resource management. London: Oxford University. Bloomberg, (2012, October 8). Foxconn workers go on second strike in two weeks over strict Apple quality demands.Retrived from: Financial Post.: Duhigg, C & Barboza, D. (2012, January 25). In China, human costs are built into an iPad. The New York Times. Retrieved from: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/26/business/ieconomy-apples-ipad-and-the-human-costs-for-workers-in-china.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0 Kaiser, T. (2012, January 27). Report: Apple’s suppliers continuously violate code of conduct, Apple does nothing to change it. Daily Tech. Retrieved from: http://www.dailytech.com/Report+Apples+Suppliers+Continuously+Violate+Code+of+Conduct+Apple+Does+Nothing+to+Change+It/article23867.htm Pinnington, A., Macklin, R. & Campbell, T (2007). Human resource management: ethics and employment. London: Oxford University Press. Schultz, T., & Brender, I. (2004). Beyond justice,: Introducing personal moral philosophies to ethical evaluations of human resource practices. BusinessEthics: a European review, 13 (4): 302 -316. Schultze, U. & Stabell, C. (2004). Knowing what you don't know? Discourses and contradictions in knowledge management research. Journal of Management Studies, 41(4), 546 -570. Schumman, P. (2001). A moral principles framework for human resource management ethics. Human Resource Managemen tReview, 11, 93-111. Velaquez, M. (2006). Business Ethics: Concepts and cases. New Jersey: Pearson Education. Weaver, G.R & Trevino, L.K. (2001). The role of human resources in ethics/compliance management. A fairness perspective. Human Resources Management Review, 11, 113-134. Wiley, C. (2000). Ethical standards for human resource management professionals: a comparative study of five major codes. Journal of Business Ethics, 25(2), 93-114 Zoffer, H., & Fram, E. (2005). Are American corporate directors still ignoring the signals? International Journal of Business in the Society, 5(1): 31-38. Read More