Question a.
Wipro has added special terms under their employee handbook to help disabled employee feel comfortable and part of the organization. Wipro aims to offer equal opportunity to all their employees and avoid engaging in or supporting any form of discrimination in hiring, training, compensation, termination, promotion, or retirement on the basis of disability (Wipro, 2012).
The provisions of Wipro’s employee conduct have guidelines to protect the rights of disabled employees, such as:
a. Employees need to co-operate with all measures introduced for the development of equal opportunities;
b. Employees must respect other employees and their sensitivities. This means that disabled employees need to be respected in the office environment.
c. Employees need to refrain from any discriminatory decisions or actions that are contrary to the spirit or letter of the policy.
d. Employees who report discriminatory practices need to comply themselves to behaviour standards. They should not instruct, induce, or pressurize other employees and force them to breach of company policy.
These guidelines are helpful in making sure disabled employees have the support of Wipro management.
Question b.
Wipro does not have a clear guideline of difference between treating workplace and other disabling injuries. Both have more or less been clubbed into one category. This is partially due to the nature of business operations at Wipro and the rare chances of injuries occurring. Wipro is taking appropriate measures for preventing workplace injuries and provides employees with healthy and safe working environment by considering the evolving societal standards and industry practices of care. Wipro continuously manages and assesses the impacts of health and safety standards and eliminates the unreasonable risks of any present, upcoming or future project, activity or production and design of products (Wipro, 2012). It is logical and wise to differentiate between workplace injuries and other disabling injuries as it helps to understand the level of danger faced by employees from workplace and non-workplace injuries. Identification of the level of danger helps to create policies and structure to ensure employee health and safety is prioritized. In case of Wipro, the policy might not be effective as there are limited workplace injuries and clubbing both forms is suitable for the business type.
Question c.
The policy is slightly unfair as it leaves out many common guidelines and fines that can be imposed. Wipro has a large employee base of 170,664 and the disabled employees are not given enough monetary protection. Adding monetary penalties would be fair, as any disabled employee can easily be treated unfairly in today’s competitive world. From the perspective of a disabled employee, the employee guideline limits the potential of getting fair treatment from the organization. Especially when the disabled employee is treated unfairly or insulted by another employee; and the only solution as per the guideline is to discuss the issue and make the employee apologize. It is important that employees who insult or treat disabled employees in unfair manner need to be fined and informed that repetition of such behaviour can lead to their firing. Also, the guideline needs to add many other instructions for protection of disabled employees; especially for taking care of the disabled employees. From the employer’s perspective, the policy is fair as Wipro understands the importance taking care of their disabled employees. The policy can be amended with time when the company is faced with the greater challenges in the globalized world.
References
Wipro. (2012). Code of Business Conduct and Ethics. Retrieved 8 April 2016 from, http://www.wipro.com/documents/investors/pdf-files/code_of_business_conduct_and_ethics_march_2011.pdf
Wipro. (2016). Who We Are. Retrieved 8 April 2016 from, http://careers.wipro.com/benefits-of-joining.aspx
