Ethic week 3 Project - Essay Example

Ethics Week 3 Project Ethics Answers Question one The element of business ethics has with time evolved significantly from organizations running in a way that does not break the law and moral guidelines to inclusion of proactive efforts towards good citizenship and honest business practices. I am quite familiar with Wal-Mart Stores where ethical policies have gradually changed in response to external pressures. One such ethical policy is one concerned with female employees’ is sex discrimination.

For female employees, both single and married, the policy was termed as unfair with disparate impacts since it favored males’ chances of getting promoted over female counterparts. According to Siekman (2011), women are denied advancement to higher positions as evident in Duke’s case yet women employees account for about 72% of the company’s hourly employees and with only 33% of Wal-Mart store managers. The Supreme Court ruled in favor or Wal-Mart and against women’s class action this has helped Wal-Mart in maintaining its policy of no unionized workers since this would give them a bargaining power.

Question Two Legal issues refer to matters that are protected by law or regulation and involve all persons within their jurisdiction (Lehman & DuFrene, 2010). Ethical issues are matters concerned with doing what is morally right. However, an overlapping relationship exists between them in that what is unethical is considered to be illegal in some instances while in others, unethical issues are considered to be legal. In others, what is illegal is considered to be ethical. In this regard, businesses have to consider law and ethics as two different things.

An example of unethical but legal issue is Wal-Mart’s labor practices and policy which has forced most vendors to set their commodities at extremely low prices for them to be sold in Wal-Mart Stores. For vendors, the best way was consider aligning their production costs to those of Wal-Mart since it is within its standards of ethical conduct. An illegal but ethical issue includes the recent Vermont that makes it illegal for pharmaceutical company to give $25 or more gifts to personnel or doctors and imposes $10,000 for each violation.

For the pharmaceutical companies, the best way is to act within the law as they lobby legal changes.Question three Often, credit history check on new employees is used to gauge their responsibility level in that employees should be reliable and their past credit conduct like paying bills would be best to proof reliability. Credit checks also include information about an applicant’s former employers who can then verify application information accuracy. Employers using credit checks to hire reliable applicants is not an invasion of privacy a since they can also be conducted on existing employees considering to be promoted.

In the United States, Fair Credit Reporting Act permits employers to request credit reports for existing employees or job applicants by first obtaining written permission from the subjects and notify them before taking adverse action.Question fourThe chosen company is Apple Inc. the company has strong innovation culture that have seen it ranked as the world’s most admired company severally for its promotion of consistency in day to day behavior (Fund, 2011). Apple Inc. ethics are defined in the demonstration of integrity during creation of high quality, innovative services and products through honesty, compliance, respect and confidentiality.

However, the ethical issues arise from the fact that most of the company’s products are produced outside US with less direct oversight and varying labor standards. As a result, ethical issues are present on product quality, privacy especially on products that display phone’s locations.ReferencesFund, D. (2011, December 4). Ethics innitiative. Retrieved from Danielsethics.mgt.unm.edu: http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=4&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=0CDsQFjAD&url=http%3A%2F%2Fdanielsethics.mgt.unm.

edu%2Fpdf%2FApple%2520Case.pdf&ei=5-6dU8z4AeSV7AatmIHQCA&usg=AFQjCNHNLJiOTwZBPL0val9vwZpLr-hspQ&sig2=4LYgIZmPJeuP2gUZb9WHnQ&Lehman, C., & DuFrene, D. (2010). Business Communication. United Nations: Cengage Learning.Siekman, L. (2011, June 21). Wal-Mart and the Glass Ceiling. Retrieved from Daily Kos : http://www.dailykos.com/story/2011/06/21/987399/-Wal-Mart-and-the-Glass-Ceiling#