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The importance of human resources
The role of business ethics in the corporate world
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Global Business and Ethics 1. Any company doing business in the United States and abroad has a responsibility to be socially responsible. This responsibility is guided by business ethics basic values that guide a firm's behavior. These ethics come into all decisions made by businesses. Including what goes into the products, how they are advertised and sold, and how they are disposed of. Wal-Mart, the world's largest retailer, is the largest corporation and private employer in the United States. Wal-Mart is consistently listed among America's most admired companies by Fortune magazine. At the same time, it is frequently the target of criticism for its employment practices and its effect on the larger economy and community. How should consumers evaluate these issues? Is it ethical to shop at Wal-Mart? (http://www.scu.edu/ethics/publications/ethicalperspectives/wal-mart.html) Wal-Mart can both be seen as socially responsible and also unethical. Wal-Mart makes headlines almost everyday with stories of hiring illegal immigrants, gender discrimination, low wages, and pushing smaller stores out of business. This is only one side of the story, however. Passing along the gains of its brilliant distribution system to consumers, its farsighted managers have done nothing less than democratize the American dream. Its low prices are spurring productivity and helping win the fight against inflation. It is America's most admired company. (http://www.scu.edu/ethics/publications/ethicalperspectives/wal-mart.html) According to Forbes magazine Wal-Mart, last year alone, gave $140 million to non-profit organizations. Also, Wal-Mart received the Ron Brown Award for Corporate Leadership that recognizes with outstanding achievement in empl... ... middle of paper ... ...rd for trying to remove unsafe and unfair working conditions in factories in foreign countries. 5. I plan on getting into the Human Resource Management field. My field could be largely impacted by companies going more global. I am very interested in working with a company where I not only handle hiring procedures and benefits but also safety procedures. If the company I work for is in the global market I would have to know different safety procedures for domestic and international procedures. The procedures could very greatly because of different international laws. Also, depending on my responsibilities I could be responsible for hiring in these foreign markets. I would have a possible language barrier to deal with as well as matching the best candidate for the job. I would be very excited if I had to undertake all these aspects of a foreign market in my job.
But Wal-Mart’s care for us goes beyond that simple relationship. As many of us have seen if we have been to a Wal-Mart, they hire people who normally would not be able to get a job. The company knows that by broadcasting itself as positive and helpful in nature it can increase its revenue and in turn increase the amount of assistance it provides to us the consumer. “In 2004 Wal-Mart donated over $170 million. More than 90 percent of these donations went to charities in the communities served by Wal-Mart stores.’ Even more heartfelt than this, Wal-Mart was the leader in goods based relief efforts for victims of hurricane Katrina. “Walmart’s response to the hurricane was lauded even by its critics: it donated more than $20 million worth of merchandise, including food for 100,000 meals, and it promised jobs for all of its displaced workers.” And the first supply truck to arrive at the superdome was a Wal-Mart truck.
Wal-mart is currently the world’s largest company. It has seen continuous growth and financial success since it was founded in 1962. Today it is living off of a previous reputation of solid ethical business practices that are no longer being exercised. Sam Walton, the founder of Wal-mart, was considered to be “freakishly cheap… Cost-cutting was an obsession in the Wal-mart culture… on business trips, everyone, including the boss, flew coach, and hotel rooms were always shared.” (reclaimdemocracy.org. 2006). This was only part of the reason for Sam Walton’s success.
Corporation has is to increase profits for its stockholders. Through a utilitarian perspective, we can see that Wal-Mart is acts in a way to product the greatest possible balance of good over dissatisfaction for their stockholders. Wal-Mart upholds the fiduciary duties to their stockholders by not increasing wages of their employees, instead they take the sum of money and return it back to their stockholders and shareholders such as customers and suppliers. Wal-Mart creates the happiness for the amount of people who invest in the company. Ethics is about the consequences of an action and the consequence of Wal-Mart’s actions creates the greatest amount of good for the people who are the primary stockholders of the corporation.
“Doing the right thing and doing things right” (Devin) spoken by their CEO at a conference on their profits and annual reports, however this does not pertain to their employees or their suppliers even though he states “the Wal-Mart way is to stay the course, because Wal-Mart is too important to individual families that are stretching a budget, to important to the suppliers who employee millions of people, to important our associates who we value and love so much." (Devin). Wal-Mart values its employees and suppliers so much; “since 2011, Wal-Mart has spent over $35 million and hired more than 300 outside lawyers, accountants, and investigators to deal with bribery issues” (Sethi) and Wal-Mart’s “penalties under the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act and Securities Exchange Commission regulatory filings are likely to be in the $100 millions, which is such a small fraction of Wal-Mart’s earnings” (Sethi). If only this mega retailer could reinvest this negative...
Besides all the points that I have stated, Wal-Mart has had to pay fines due to breaking Child Labor laws and Illegal Immigrant laws; fines up to $11.5 million for just those two types of laws. Wal-Mart is not good for this economy, for the people, and the company, in a whole, is criminal. If the people let Wal-Mart stay on the track it is on, the United States will not have anything but Wal-Marts. Wal-Mart will become a monopoly and put everyone, who started with something more than greed, out-of-business.
For many enviros, the name "Wal-Mart" has always triggered a shudder. The world's biggest retailer has been charged with exacerbating suburban sprawl, burning massive quantities of oil via its 10,000-mile supply chain, producing mountains of packaging waste, polluting waterways with runoff from its construction sites, and encouraging gratuitous consumption. (And those are just the environmental complaints.)
Many have complained about Walmart shrewd business practices to maintain its competitive edge and the loss it has brought to communities because of jobs lost to overseas suppliers. In the documentary, the question of Is Walmart good for America can be summed up in the statement that “Walmart is giving the American people what they want, low prices, to save money and to live better.” Walmart defends against those who would argue that Walmart has been bad for working class Americans because it has lower their standard of living. Walmart however states that that they have rather raised the standard of living for the American people by providing affordable products to its consumers. Brink Lindsey, economist in the documentary sums it up as “Walmart is good for America. Walmart is doing what America is all about, what the American market economy is all about, which is producing things consumers want to buy. Walmart is offering consumers a wide range of goods at rock bottom prices and therefore meeting the market test.” (PBS Frontline,
Wal-Mart is now operating globally, and its main vision is for additional global expansion of operation and "promotion of ownership of ethical culture" to all of its stakeholders worldwide (www.walmartstores.com). The idea of Wal-Mart’s vision on ethical culture is key in globalization. Wal-Mart has had good reputation and competitive advantage worldwide because it has been able to embrace culture and diversity in its operations across nations. In promoting ethical culture, Wal-Mart helps its customers and stakeholders to take the right decisions and to do the right thing.
There is only a small portion of the CSR that mentions bribery and/or corruption, we feel this is a weakness because Walmart has had some very public scandals involving bribery, most recently in getting their Mexico stores built. The weakness of not addressing the disadvantage their suppliers have because of Walmart policies. K. Evans states, “Wal-Mart subjects its suppliers to strict regulations on product quality and employee working conditions, for example, which add production time and increase overhead for the suppliers. Their competitors, meanwhile, can operate at lower costs and turn out products more quickly” (Evans). We found the lack of emphasis on employees to be a weakness in the CSR because there is no mention of employees being able to earn shares in the company, or any opportunity for advancement. Lastly, when we were reading through the Global Report we realized that it mostly focused on North American operations and fails to address the operations they have in other parts of the world. Why is there no discussion about the other places that fall under their umbrella but are outside of North
Walmart is a company that can be seen from many different perspectives. Due to its vast size; it can be easy to identify its faults and environmental issues surrounding the company. However, they are well aware of these problems and criticisms and have made many efforts towards issues around the world. The motivation and desire Walmart have to improve the world we live in today can be seen through their treatment of employees, suppliers as well as their efforts towards the environment and other humanitarian issues. Given this, there is still endless resources on the web proving the company to be one of a negative burden on society.
They expose the terrible conditions employees have to work under and the minimal pay they receive, I was most shocked to learn that while Wal-Mart prides itself on having great insurance policies available for their employees, they force many employees to work part-time hours so they are not eligible for insurance and save the company money. Part of building a strong reputation starts with how employees are treated. Wal-Mart is not being socially responsible. They are not being ethical because they are not doing the right thing by forcing employees to work part time to not be eligible for insurance. This is also ethically wrong in how the company makes money, because they are saving money by not having to pay for as many employees’
Walmart has been plagued with issues that have only been detrimental to its image, and it is because its ethical culture of
While keeping in mind they are a business which rely on profits. Walmart is a popular company that is known for their low prices. This corporation is also known for giving back to communities by making charitable contributions of 100,000 grants annually, as well providing disaster relief to various countries burdened by disasters and donated $100 million dollars to neighborhoods and law enforcement agencies. They also provide employees with college grants to obtain a two or four year college degree, Walmart is investing in their employees by giving them an advantage in their future. Walmart has also found ways to reduce waste by creating materials that are nontoxic and are recyclable friendly. With the use of sustainability, strategic philanthropy, causing marketing, shared values and stakeholder that is why this company was ranked number one by Forbes list in
The success of Walmart is openly related to its leadership and culture. The company’s indispensable viewpoints on economics and worth of money. It was recognized to be a culture that flourished on its thoughtfulness to aspect and repeat cost saving that are passed straight to the shoppers (Ckewa, Martin & Wells, 2015).
Walmart has had a long-standing presence in America society since the middle of the 20th century, seen as a place to get everything done, Walmart has become a fixation in our society. From grocery shopping, to changing your oil and even filing your annual tax returns, Walmart is always there, everyday. Started by Sam Walton in 1962, it began as a small operation catering to a small Arkansas community. It was started on principles very similar to small local businesses in small towns. Today Walmart has gotten a different, darker reputation. On the surface, Walmart may seem like the solution to everyday issues. Low-income families are attracted to the low prices, and people who work odd hours benefit greatly from the 24 hours a day that many Walmarts are open. Lately, Walmart has also managed to be publicly recognized as a store that sells many of today’s green products, including organic food, environmental conscious cleaning products, as well as, paper products made from recycled paper. However, underneath all this, Walmart has a different side. Exploitation of its workers is widespread amongst Walmarts who do not belong to a union, especially in the United States. Wal...