Ethics has diverse definitions depending on the field in which it is applied. From a general perspective, ethics encompasses well-established standards of wrong and right acts that humankind should avoid and do. The standards include instances of honesty, societal benefits, fairness, and particular virtues. Moreover, ethics revolves around the development of the above standards in ensuring that institutions study their own ethical standards (Mello, 2006).
Ethical practices are not necessarily found within the laws and social norms. For that reason, a lawful act may not be ethical. This means that the established standards must be well founded and reasonable in their own context. In the business field, organizations have to set up policies and practices that increase trust among their stakeholders.
Therefore, ethics makes businesses to avoid instances of discrimination and bribery that may minimize a firm’s economic values to its stakeholders. In an ethical dilemma where personal ethics conflicts with a company’s ethics, a person ought to comprehend the ethical values of the firm that he/she works for in order to initiate the process of mediation.
In addition to understanding the ethical values, the employee should know why the values exist. The process will assist the individual to change his/her value system to fit in the company standards given that it is rare for corporate bodies to alter their ethical values to fit that of an individual (Mello, 2006).
In this scenario, the person will make decisions depending on what is essential at any given instance after evaluating the consequences that may arise with the available choices. The process of exploring and understanding a firm’s ethics, values and morality requires different methods, which have numerous dimensions.
In the business environment, there are ethical subdivisions such as comparative, normative, and descriptive ethics that stakeholders study and comprehend as part of their organizational cultures. Moreover, there are the ethical principles that are incorporated in the corporate ethnic programs to help employees in furthering their corporate culture.
The law of Equal Employment Opportunity (EEO) tries to minimize instances of discrimination at the workplaces. Some of the instances can rise from race, color, sexual orientation, religious affiliation, nationality, and pregnancy. These laws make it possible for HR to hire employees from diverse cultures.
For instance, the Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 ensures that hiring, promotion and recruitment of employees does not favor one color (Mello, 2006). In addition, the law creates a favorable working environment for all races at a workplace. In this situation, an employee is promoted only if she/he is competent but not due to her/his race.
On religious discrimination, HR will be able to accommodate employees from all religious backgrounds. When recruitments are done irrespective of one’s religious affiliation, a corporate body can easily expand its presence in all regions in the world hence realizing high sales on its products and services since it will get positive reception.
From the two cases, a company will open up to absorb qualified employees who will work towards meeting the company’s strategic objectives. Even though the EEO law tries to avoid discrimination to other groups, it can lead to hiring of unskilled workers as a way of fulfilling the requirement of anti-discrimination (Mello, 2006).
For example, if a company conducts interviews for two posts and finds that the first two best candidates are of one race, the company may consider the third best applicant given that he/she is of a different race. This shows that merit is at risk at the expense of balancing the workforce in a firm. Therefore, the HR has to prioritize quality service to legal requirement in order to balance the entire process. Clearly, a mixed workforce of different cultures opens up the perceptions of employees at the workplaces.
Reference
Mello, J. A. (2006). Strategic human resource management (2nd ed.). Mason, Ohio: South-Western/Cengage Learning.