Abstract
Religion is an aspect that concerns the private lives of individuals. In the working environment, the religious practice and the integration of faith in the working relations raises ethical concerns. Ethical concerns about the assertion of faith in organizations appear also in the hospitality industry. Companies like Chick-fil-A, In N Out or Taco Bell, have been facing claims of religious practices at work that discriminates employees by pressuring them to approach the employer’s religious assertion. While the assertion of faith in the workplace poses not solely ethical, but also legal and performance – related concerns, this paper focuses on the ethics of religion practice in the hospitality environment. Based on various assumptions that validate or invalidate faith manifestation in the workplace, this essay aims to assess whether these assumptions are valid, hence whether it is ethical or unethical to integrate faith and religious principles in the working environment in hospitality industry.
Key words: religion, faith, ethical concerns, discriminates, pressuring.
A rising concern regarding the application of religious believes in the workplace has shaped the existing literature on workplace ethics in the recent decades (Webley, 2011). In the 21st century hospitality environment, there are ethical and legal issues that argue the right of the employer to practice faith and to hire, promote or end employees’ contracts based on religious principles. In this sense, this essay questions the validity of various assumptions that argue for or against the integration of religious practices in the workplace.
While some consider ethical to manifest religious beliefs at work, such as it is the case of Chick-Fil-A restaurant chain that professes that gay relationships are against God’s judgment, other organizations activating in hospitality segment, like Marriott hotel chain, puts aside their religious beliefs (Brady, 2012). This approach is not solely ethically – focused, but also business performance oriented, because Marriott maximizes financial benefits from dedicating hospitality activities to LGTB community, despite the fact that encouraging this community comes against the Mormon religious principles (Brady, 2012). Nevertheless, manifesting religious practices at work remains an issue of the ethical spectrum.
It can be argued that employers have the right to select employees and clients based on their own established criteria, in order to maintain the order and harmony in the workplace and to avoid individuals with different religions than the one of the employer to proselytize their faith (Wolf, Friedman & Sutherland, 1998). However, this assumption is obsolete for the working place and the hospitality environment of the 21st century, because it is considered as a harassment, pressuring the non – believers or the adepts of other religious faiths to adopt the religious practices imposed by the employer or coordinators (Wolf et al., 1998). Therefore, the claim according to which religious practices at work encourage ethical conduct, on the grounds that God’s omniscient and will notice the unethical behavior is unsupported, because different religions have distinct values, which can be contradictory and can generate in discriminations.
This is the case of Chick-Fil-a restaurant chain, In N Out and Taco Bell, all being accused of religious discrimination against their employees and customers, two of their main stakeholders. Through its actions, of citing Biblical passages on its cups and wrappers, In N Out practices proselytism, which can be offending for the adepts of other religions, hence unethical (Nisen, 2013). Taco Bell was sued for religious discrimination when the company threatened a Californian employee to cut his hair, on the ground that it violated the grooming code of the restaurant. Nevertheless, this request was against the employee’s Nazirite believes (U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, 2012). In the case of Taco Bell, the discrimination was not based on the employers’ religion believes, but lack off. It nevertheless implied a pressure on one of its employees to act against his religion.
Personally, I believe that Taco Bell is a sensitive case, because grooming was part of the attributions of the serving personnel, and the Nazirite employee refused to comply with his attributions. This validates the employer’s intention to fire the employee not on the basis of religion beliefs, but on disrespecting the working conditions, which had nothing to do with religious practices at work. I consider that not only the employer, but neither the employees, should be allowed to practice their religious believes at work and that this employee’s attitude is unethical, because he pressured the restaurant owners to accommodate his religious principles, disrespecting their grooming policies, hence contravening the working code. Although this situation was legally resolved in favor of the plaintiff, the employee, there is no indication that the employee was treated unethical.
This paper opposed the application of faith into the workplace, considering it unethical. In relation with religion believes ethical conduct in the hospitality environment implies the lack of pressures to comply with specific religious or non – religious practices, coming from both the employer and the employee. The case of Chick-Fill-A and In N Out are representatives for unethical behavior generated by the employers who aim to impose their religious believes on their stakeholders, whereas in the case of Taco Bell the opposite is available as an employee pressured the company to comply with his religious practice. Marriott, on the other hand, takes careful approach on dissociating from religious practices, enforcing an ethical and performance oriented business conduct.
References
Brady, D. (2012) God and gay marriage: What Chick-fil-A could learne from Marriott. Retrieved from http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2012-07-26/god-and-gay-marriage-what-chick-fil-a-could-learn-from-marriott.
Nisen, M. (2013) 18 extremely religious big American companies. Retrieved from http://www.businessinsider.com/18-extremely-religious-big-american-companies-2013-6?op=1.
U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (2012) Press Release. Taco Bell operator pays $27,000 to resolve EEOC religious discrimination lawsuit. Retrieved from https://www.eeoc.gov/eeoc/newsroom/release/4-27-12.cfm.
Webley, S. (2011) Religious practices in the workplace. London: Institute of Business Ethics.
Wolf, M, Friedman, B, and Sutherland, D. (1998) Religion in the workplace: A comprehensive guide to legal rights and responsibilities. Chicago: Book Publishing, Aba Publishing.
