While the organization blatantly made mediocre managerial decisions, such decisions merely reflect the competitive business environment the financial services industry has grown accustomed to. When it comes down to it, the employees of Wells Fargo did what most individuals would do when faced with the terrifying reality of potential unemployment. In the fast paced, money driven, cut throat environment that is known as twenty first century Corporate America, the lines often blur in terms of ethical decision making. Wells Fargo deserves to receive the blame in this situation in order to demonstrate that the big business taking advantage of the individual is intolerable and that the consumer demands a change. Modification of organizational behavior,
A company’s everyday decision making should be ethical, but some decision can lead to ethical
The following essay will approach the workplace philosophies of Howard Gardner and Mike Rose and attempt to apply them to real-world work-related problems and situations. First, before proceeding any further, it is necessary to provide a brief overview of the basic. Gardner, in his book Five Minds for the Future, identifies five mind that people can apply to their jobs and their work environments: the disciplinary mind, the synthesizing mind, the creating mind, the respectful mind, and the ethical mind (Gardner 3). For the creating mind, as Mike Rose redefines the intelligence in his book The Mind at Work, he believes the blue-collar workers are as creative as other white-collars. Besides the creative mind related to the physical workers, Mike
Well just one I know of and that is Wells Fargo. A civil law suit was filed by the attorney for the City of Los Angeles. The suit was filed and accuses Well Fargo of unethically treating its employees and customers. The suit claims the Bank of setting nearly impossible sales goals for its employees. Which enticed them to use fraudulent ways for meeting the big goals. There have been several former and even present Wells Fargo employees that have come forward to tell their experience of the huge pressure from the bank. The employees used unethical fraudulent means to achieve these nearly impossible sales goals. They did this by opening unauthorized customer accounts, giving out illegal credit cards with lines of credit. They even went as far
Unethical behaviors in business affect everyone since you either work in the field or are a consumer of its services. Unfortunately, almost every company usually has individuals who act unethically whether it is for their personal benefit or for the sake of the company they work for. Unethical behaviors in business might be as simple as using company property or funds for personal gain to inside trading and financial fraud. According to The Chartered Institute of Management Accountants, nearly one third of business professionals feel pressured to compromise their ethical standards and are increasingly pushed towards unethical behavior. Moreover, “misconduct is common and accepted by business services professionals, the integrity of entire economic systems is at risk”, states Jordan A. Thomas, partner and chair of the Whistleblower Representation Practice at Labaton Sucharow law firm. In fact, making money at any cost is all what matters, while doing what is right and abiding by the law is not. That said, as a corporate finance student and a business administration major, it is as interesting as important for me to learn about what is considered as unethical in business, in addition to who is enforcing the federal securities laws, proposing securities rules, and regulating the securities industry.
Philippa Foster Back says that apparently most of large companies have seperate function that looks after ethics, but she see no tension between ethics and commerciality, because ‘doing business ethically makes for better
This situation creates an identity of the company as being fake and acting against the community. The company is going against the theory of Utilitarianism which is concerned with making decisions that promote human welfare. The Company’s bad consequences were more than good consequences making it an unethical decision which resulted in a fine of $7 million.
When it comes to the Ethical Decision Model, it does not just pertain to the employees who opened these accounts but also leadership who either failed to realize what was going on or decided to sweep it under the rug by just covertly firing some employees. Wells Fargo did take the first step in recognizing the problem but failed to define it, which explains why these unethical behaviors continued for so many years. When the corporation was initially aware of what was going on, they should have acted immediately and strategized a solution that would dilute the possibility of it occurring again. Instead of defining the problem, which would have foster, a proper solution but company decided to just terminate
The misconduct of code of ethics by the management level by Enron corporation has led to the another question – The ultimate responsibility of a corporation towards society ? The ultimate responsibility of a corporation is to gain profit or become a stable economic unit ? (Johnson , 2014 ) In this case , it shows that under normal circumstances the management level of a company or corporation will choose to hide the truth over honesty and integrity .In other way , profitability has override the important of ethics in the corporation .
The then CEO John Stumpf was forced to resign following insurmountable political and public pressure. Federal prosecutors also issued subpoenas and congressional hearings were held, for which then CEO John Stumpf attended. Additionally, on February 21, 2017, Wells Fargo terminated four high level executives involved in the scandalous news. The SEC’s investigation consists of warrants against bank executives for possible violations of GAAP principles and the Sarbanes-Oxley Act for inaccurate accounting practices. The SEC will probe possible violations of employee whistleblowing protection under the Sarbanes-Oxley and Frank-Dodson Act. Lastly, the SEC will scrutinize any securities fraud that may have been committed as a result of withholding private information (insider trading) to investors due to possible accounting malpractice. Currently, the SEC and Department of Justice results are still pending the ongoing investigation. Tomi Kilgore of MarketWatch reported “Wells Fargo investigation into sales practices should be completed before the April 2017 shareholder meeting.” Likewise, Wells Fargo responded following the mandates of the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency by opening
The company can hire an ethical officer to ensure the company pay sufficient attention to the ethical ramifications. The responsibility of this position is monitor the legality and ethical impact of the company. Ethics officers can offer guidance, answer employee questions, and updating information.
Business is an economic activity whereas its concern is continuously and constantly producing and distributing goods and services to market in order to provide and satisfy human needs, wants and demand.
This task analysis the issue of ethics in accounting and finance as discussed in the International Journal of accounting and finance. Currently, ethics of any firm is an important topic due to the numerous scandals that have taken place in different countries which have resulted in damage to the economy and society. These scandals have made the morality of accountants and businesspeople. The main contributors of business ethical standards are the accountants. The accounting profession has a duty to play so as to reduce the corporate scandals. They should make sure that there is proper financial management, quality audit, ethical standards improvement and that the governance regimes are strengthened
Basically, ethics are at their essence which is it is the moral judgments about what is right and what is wrong. Business ethics is focusing on examine the policies and conduct within the context of commercial enterprise in an organizational as well as in an individual level. In business, the ethics in business is an applied ethics where professionals and researchers use principles and theories to solve any ethical problems that exist in business. At the quarter of the 20th century, as technologies like internet have made world business or international business all more viable, the business ethics domestically have grown in importance along with the power and significance of major businesses. So that, international business ethics take center stage as a major concern of the modern era. The earlier opinion stated that a business cannot be ethical, but this opinion is not used anymore in the modern business. Today business has belief that they must be responsible for social since they live and operate within a social structure. The key factors that make business ethics is important at the quarter of the 20th century are corporate social responsibility, corporate governance, and globalized economy.
Unethical behavior can tarnish a company’s image and reputation. If a company is unethical, they may have to spend additional money to improve their public image, as well as gain back as many customers as possible.