Ethical issues in Marketing .

Ethical Issues in Marketing

Ethical problems in marketing stem from conflicts and disagreements. Each party in a marketing transaction brings a set of expectations regarding how the business relationship will exist and how transactions should be conducted. Each facet of marketing has ethical danger points as discussed below.

Market Research

Some ethical problems in market research are the invasion of privacy and stereotyping. The latter occurs because any analysis of real populations needs to make approximations and place individuals into groups. However, if conducted irresponsibly, stereotyping can lead to a variety of ethically undesirable results.

Market Audience

Selective marketing is used to discourage demand from so-called undesirable market sectors or disenfranchise them altogether. Examples of unethical market exclusion are past industry attitudes to the gay, ethnic minority, and plus-size markets.

Ethics in Advertising and Promotion

In the 1940s and 1950s, tobacco used to be advertised as promoting health. Today an advertiser who fails to tell the truth offends against morality in addition to the law. However the law permits puffery (a legal term). The difference between mere puffery and fraud is a slippery slope.

Marketing ethics, regardless of the product offered or the market targeted, sets the guidelines for which good marketing is practiced. To market ethically and effectively one should be reminded that all marketing decisions and efforts are necessary to meet and suit the needs of customers, suppliers, and business partners. The mindset of many companies is that they are concerned for the population and the environment in which they due business. They feel that they have a social responsibility to people, places and things in their sphere of influence.

Ethical and unethical issues in finance.

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                              

Ethics (maintaining true and fair statements) is a key part of financial reporting. For shareholders to trust a company with money, they must feel confident in the company’s financial reporting. Financial reporting presents all data relating to the entity’s current, historical and projected health meaning investors and shareholders rely upon the available financial data for making informed and educated decisions. To help entities comply with business regulations and maintain financial reporting, shareholders can trust the existing organizations designed to watchdog different aspects of the accounting world. Primary among the organizations are the Securities and Exchange Committee (SEC), Financial Accounting Standards Board (FASB) and Public Company Accounting Oversight Board (PCAOB). These three bodies together ensure financial reporting is fair, reliable, and available to all investors.

Financial Manager

The specific importance of ethics in business and in financial reporting is to inspire and ensure public and investor confidence in companies. Without a strong code of ethics, and adherence to that code, individuals may not be certain their investments are secure. Accounting professionals must have a strong ethical and moral reasoning as their decisions regarding financial reporting can have major consequences for individuals as well as corporations and entire nations. Ethics in the business environment are more than just issues that relate to accounting; because ethical practices can and will cross boundaries from business practice in to what a company may ask its accounting professionals to do in financial record-keeping and recording. The many recent scandals involving accounting fraud generally began at the CEO and made their way down into the financial records.

Financial Managers

Before the Sarbanes-Oxley Act, various financial abuses such as World Com, Enron, and Adelphia Communications plagued the American public and affected economic health of the entire nation adversely. Most of these frauds stemmed from unethical accounting practices instituted at the highest levels of the corporations, but carried out in the financial reporting practices of public accounting firms. In December 2001, Enron, which used to be one of the world’s leading energy companies once, filed the largest bankruptcy in the history of the U.S., using the retirement accounts of thousands of American workers, to enrich those at the highest levels of the corporation. Using thousands of off-the-records partnerships to hide nearly $1 billion in debt and to inflate profits, company had defrauded shareholders of billions. Due to these scandals, President Bush and Congress were forced to take tough stance in the form of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act in July of 2002.

When ethics seem to be on the downfall in a society, the common man naturally turns to the government for guidance. Various crises in the history of the United States have led to creation of several regulatory bodies and laws. The three entities in the US, mentioned above, work closely together to ensure financial accounting is honest. While these three bodies work together, they rely on cooperation from member companies and from participation from “whistle-blowers” in companies and public citizens. As the Enron collapse illustrated, there were systemic failures in the private-sector watchdog-groups. The SEC and the PCAOB must work closely together and include way to fast-track criminal cases.

Ethical and unethical issues in Human Resource management.

Current Ethical and Unethical issues in discipline of Human Resource Management (HRM)

Ethics

• Ethics are moral principles that govern a person's behaviour or the conducting of an activity.

• The word Ethics stem from the greek word ethike which attribute to a social environment referred to a social environment referred to as ethos or social millieu, or we can say the general word Ethics means what is right to do and what is wrong to do.

• Ethics or moral philosophy is a branch of philosophy that involves systematizing, defending, and recommending concepts of right and wrong conduct.

• Ethics is concerned with what is good for individuals and society and is also described as moral philosophy.

Business Ethics

• Business ethics (also known as corporate ethics) is a form of applied ethics or professional ethics, that examines ethical principles and moral or ethical problems that can arise in a business environment. It applies to all aspects of business conduct and is relevant to the conduct of individuals and entire organizations. These ethics originate from individuals, organizational statements or from the legal system. These norms, values, ethical, and unethical practices are the principles that guide a business. They help those businesses maintain a better connection with their stakeholders.

• Business ethics is the behavior that how an organisation deal with the world. The Ethics of the business can be diverse .They are applied not only on how the business interact with the world but also to interact with an individual.

• If an organisation want to run their  in the competitive market then it is necessary to follow the ethics in business for moral values, norms, and as well as for the society.It would be beneficial for an organisation to follow the business ethics.It is the responsibility of the organisation to maintain the ethical status.

Human Resource

• Human resource management is the strategic approach to the effective management of people in an organization, so that they help the business gain a competitive advantage. It is designed to maximize employee performance in service of an employer's strategic objectives.

• Also called personnel or talent management human resource management involves overseeing all things related to managing an organization’s human capital.

• Human resource is defined as managing laborers or employee in an organisation in an efficient and effective manner for the betterment of the organisation.

• Human resource management is a contemporary, umbrella term used to describe the management and development of employees in an organization.

Ethical Issues Related to Human Resource

• Of all the organisational issues or problems, ethical issues are the most difficult ones to handle or deal with. Issues arise in employment, remuneration and benefits, industrial relations and health and safety.

Cash and Compensation Plans

• There are ethical issues pertaining to the salaries, executive perquisites and the annual incentive plans etc. The HR manager is often under pressure to raise the band of base salaries. There is increased pressure upon the HR function to pay out more incentives to the top management and the justification for the same is put as the need to retain the latter. Further ethical issues crop in HR when long term compensation and incentive plans are designed in consultation with the CEO or an external consultant. While deciding upon the payout there is pressure on favouring the interests of the top management in comparison to that of other employees and stakeholders.

Race, Gender and Disability

• In many organisations till recently the employees were differentiated on the basis of their race, gender, origin and their disability. Not anymore ever since the evolution of laws and a regulatory framework that has standardised employee behaviours towards each other. In good organisations the only differentiating factor is performance! In addition the power of filing litigation has made put organisations on the back foot. Managers are trained for aligning behaviour and avoiding discriminatory practices.

Employment Issues

• Human resource practitioners face bigger dilemmas in employee hiring. One dilemma stems from the pressure of hiring someone who has been recommended by a friend, someone from your family or a top executive. Yet another dilemma arises when you have already hired someone and he/she is later found to have presented fake documents. Two cases may arise and both are critical. In the first case the person has been trained and the position is critical. In the second case the person has been highly appreciated for his work during his short stint or he/she has a unique blend of skills with the right kind of attitude. Both the situations are sufficiently dilemmatic to leave even a seasoned HR campaigner in a fix.

Privacy Issues

• Any person working with any organisation is an individual and has a personal side to his existence which he demands should be respected and not intruded. The employee wants the organisation to protect his/her personal life. This personal life may encompass things like his religious, political and social beliefs etc. However certain situations may arise that mandate snooping behaviours on the part of the employer. For example, mail scanning is one of the activities used to track the activities of an employee who is believed to be engaged in activities that are not in the larger benefit of the organisation.

Unethical issues of Human Resources

Examples for unethical issues are as follows:-

Reasons why above practices are wrong are as follows,

•  Unethical behavior is an action that falls outside of what is considered morally right or proper for a person, a profession or an industry. Individuals can behave unethically, as can businesses , professionals and politicians.The employees, function, involvement, loyalty,dedication, discipline,and decision making play a big role in the success of the organisation . However great facilities, machinery,and building a corporate provides,it is ultimately the people who have to make them workable and to achieve the organisations success.More or less organisation sources is obvious signs of unethical behavior you may have faced with public problems of ultimately loss business .some of the problems promoting ethical business on the right path are lying about performance , breach of contact ,crossing harassment,failure to maintain safety in workplace.