Case Study: Walmart Manages Ethics and Compliance Challenges

Introduction

Walmart's policy to give regular low costs has in the past come to the detriment of being seen by numerous individuals as being dishonest to both supply and the workforce. The Global Responsible Sourcing Initiative which was presented by Walmart has made new provider understandings be set up in which strain to keep up gauges set by Walmart just as expense would turned out to be even more a weight to the providers. Many have discovered the power that Walmart has in view of its size and the volume it requires, to bothersome. The strategies that Walmart utilizes has made a lot of suppliers need to move their production plants abroad to the detriment of employments inside the United States. A disagreement about time has been the treatment of said "partners" and it being fixated on low wages and advantages. As such, the company neglected to give medical coverage to more than 60 percent of their workforce. That was done and is still facilitated by procuring part-time employees who work under 30 hours per week. Walmart now asserts that more than three-fourths of their representatives have medical cover. However, this is not entirely true as Walmart would have people in general to accept in light of the fact that the majority of the workers' pay is so low that they fit for Medicaid, which has all the earmarks of being another endeavor of Walmart to pass their duty on to another person (the central government).

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Still another issue regarding the workers was that their workforce was diminishing while the organization itself was growing which caused worker disappointment prompting Walmart being positioned as the company with the lowest customer satisfaction among the retailers. One of Walmart's exploitative circumstances would be the one that made the greatest blow the company's name was its involvement in bribery ring in Mexico. The Walmart administrators felt that the zoning licenses process would take excessively long so they offered the authorities a payoff to speed things up which put Walmart at preference over the contenders who were not offering rewards (Ferrell, Fraedrich, & Ferrell, 2015). Walmart did not commit an error or oversight in judgment since it was obvious to them that what they were doing was deceptive, and it was clear in the way that they choose to cover their tracks with fake reports.

Major Effects That Walmart’s Business Philosophy Has Had on Its Human Resource Practices and Policies.

Walmart's logic of client fixation can be seen in its initiative style as well as in the way that they are eager to give low costs even to the detriment of its staff. The beam of light is anyway in the style of administration controlled by the supervisors that spur, and urge representatives to advance a greater amount of an exertion in their undertaking and their capacity to connect with the clients in a positive way. The way that the supervisors are happy to show others how its done just as move up their sleeves and work next to the representatives to achieve their sleeves and work alongside the representatives to achieve their obligations would make any activity progressively passable and significant. Correspondence is a standout amongst the most important ability that any administrator can have. Great relational abilities can make it less demanding for workers to approach you with clashes, concerns, and different issues that they may have. Having an open door arrangement is nothing more than a bad memory if workers don't feel great tending to you. The general population deal with the human asset that can oversee and spur such a significant number of utilizing the practices and approaches put forward by the association. It is difficult to introduce moral obligation in a laborer when the managers of the company are performing deceptively. You can't simply say that you and your company are a morally socially dependable organization, you need to demonstrate it in your activities.

Legal Mandates That Workers and U.S. Government Has Accused Walmart of Violating

As research was done to discover allegations made against Walmart for infringement or legitimate orders there was an area entitled, "Walmart! Corporate Rap Sheet", which fortifies the announcement in the address from week 3 that expresses that the bigger an association the almost certain there is to be deceptive conduct. The principal infringement picked was where Walmart compromised and rebuffed specialists in 14 states who wanted to protest amid one of the busiest occasions of the year "The shopping extravaganza following Thanksgiving." The National Labor Relations Board found that Walmart had unlawfully undermined workers for partaking in planned walkouts. The case was reinforced when David Tovar gave a meeting to CBS nightly news where the dangers where affirmed by his announcements. The second would be a class activity suit brought against the organization by vision focus administrator's advantage insurance facilitators. Walmart was infringing upon the U.S. Branch of Labor's Wage and Hour Division of neglecting to pay for extra time worked by said representatives the U.S. Division of Labor recuperated $4.83 million in back wages to more than 4,500 of those offices. Just expressed when a worker stays at work longer than required they should get extra minutes compensation. Also, Walmart was found guilty of dismissing employees who worked in a unionized store in Quebec on the pretext of poor economic performance. The evidence obtained showed that the store was set to reopen hence the ruling that the closing was not genuine nor definitive under the law. The board also affirmed that the closing of the store was not permanent which made the dismissal of the workers illegal under the provisions of the Quebec law. The court ordered Walmart to pay the more than 100 employees their dues (Jamieson, 2013).

Efficiency of the Structure of the Ethical Decision Making Framework That Walmart Has Used in Making Its Decisions

The structure of the moral basic leadership system that has been utilized by Walmart is not effective. This is clear in their unscrupulous activities, it creates the impression that they have submitted every deceptive demonstration conceivable by disregarding numerous lawful orders set by both government and state laws. When settling on choices, Walmart contemplated the necessities of the organization while neglecting partners, representatives, sellers, general society, and the environment. The hierarchy and structure of the organizational factors such as its corporate culture or its composed moral culture have not been contemplated or referred to on many occasions which explains the reason why the company has been involved in a significant number of deceptive exercises. Also, the founding principles engraved by Mr.Wharton have increasingly been ignored. It is my belief that the founder (Mr. Wharton) wanted to create a place whereby the low-income families could shop and enjoy high customer service. However, this faded away as the organization grew in revenue and size. The new management has driven the company in a different direction that is far away from the family friendly store and adopted a monopolization approach that has driven many businesses out of the market due to inability to compete with their prices. The decisions made this far appear to be more business-oriented as evidenced by the many problems the organizations faced when it went global (Djurkovic & Maric, 2010). Although the retail giant has in the recent past attempted to rebuild its reputation by following the founder's path, many are skeptic that the company will go back to what it used to be. Nonetheless, with a company as big as Walmart, it is almost impossible to completely eliminate the risk factors that come along with it.

Actions That Walmart’s Human Resources Department Should Take in Order To Improve the Employees’ Perspectives of Walmart’s Human Resources Policies

The top executive team based at Arkansas is tasked with making the decisions for all other branches of Walmart. Therefore, the first step would be allow this management team continue with its mandate but create a little room to accommodate input and give autonomy to the management teams in other locations so that they can address internal issues based on their environment. That would be critical because of the diversity within the organization and its customer base hence every person and issue is unique and must be approached distinctly. The second initiative would be to stop hiding bad actions or covering unethical conduct of some of the company's officials. The company needs to start addressing such issues with openness and letting the customers know that the conduct of one official does not represent the stand of the company. Importantly, the company should start treating its employees with respect and dignity as if they are the most valuable asset. To achieve that, the human resource department should ensure that the company's code of conduct and compliance is updated and verified. It should then be monitored by the board audit committee which recommend actions if found not in compliance. In addition, the company should hire more managers who would then be enrolled in rigorous training (Courtemanche & Carden, 2011). Further, more external auditors should be hired to monitor the behavior of the top management and ensure that they abide and comply with the established policies.

Conclusion

In conclusion, Walmart has faced many allegations and litigations for reasons such as unsafe work environments, unfair work practices, bribery, and unethical practices. As a way of rebuilding its image, the company has tried to remedy majority of the scandals that have emerged in the recent past. Given that Walmart is a huge company that has attained a bad reputation among the public, the management should be careful who they hire as a representative of the company. Although the company has taken steps to become a family friendly store, many are skeptical they can regain the lost glory or get back the trust they destroyed in their workforce, their business partners, and their customers.

References

Courtemanche, C., & Carden, A. (2011). Supersizing supercenters? The impact of Walmart Supercenters on body mass index and obesity. Journal of Urban Economics, 69(2), 165-181.

Djurkovic, J., & Maric, R. (2010). The influence of human resource management on improvement of business ethics. Perspectives of Innovations, Economics and Business, 4(1), 77-79.

Ferrell, O. C., Fraedrich, J., & Ferrell, L. (2015). Business ethics: Ethical decision making and cases (10th ed.). Stamford, CT: Cengage Learning.

Jamieson. (2013, November 19). Walmart Broke Labor Law, Feds Charge. Retrieved from https://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/11/18/walmart-nlrb_n_4298387.html