Essay 1
“What are the moral responsibilities of managers?”
Among the great debates of the contemporary capitalism is essentially whether or not the concept of morality matters in the business world. Managers or business owners have numerous responsibilities including moral responsibilities as well as legal responsibilities such as paying taxes. Moral responsibilities might be personal, which means that each person in a corporation is responsible for doing what is correct, or the communal responsibilities that involve all the individuals. It is worth mentioning that company culture frequently dictates the significance of the moral duties in the organization (Stikeman, 2000). For this reason, this essay discusses the moral responsibilities of the managers in organizations.
Whether in private or public sphere, the moral duties of managers include observing the applicable codes of ethics, upholding the law, abiding by the commonly held moral values such as not doing harm knowingly and honesty, and fulfilling the legitimate responsibilities of their positions (Bowie & Werhane, 2005). Nonetheless, holding managers responsible for the moral lapses is, in fact, easier said than done. The modern bureaucratic organizations’ complexity has a tendency to get in the way. An individual is normally held accountable for a morally wrong act if he/she knew it and had the capability to stop it from occurrence. The problem is that many organizations that are complex can make it easy for executives to be neglectful of their moral duties through diffusing control and knowledge.
Bowie & Werhane (2005), argue that it is the moral duty of managers to observe the code of ethics that are applicable to the organization. Code of ethics helps the members in an organization in comprehending the difference between wrong and right and in using that understanding in making decisions. Thus, managers should observe the three levels of codes of ethics including codes of professional practice, codes of conduct for the workers, and codes of business ethics. The importance of managers observing the mentioned codes of ethics is that it guides all their managerial decisions and creates a universal framework upon which they base all their decisions.
In addition, it is the moral duties of managers to uphold the law. Practically nothing is more imperative for the managers to comprehend as well as uphold than rule of law. Therefore, managers’ moral duty is to understand and to uphold the rule of law, which becomes the biggest contributor to peace, liberty, national prosperity, and freedom from corruption. Adherence to the rule of law by the managers is essential for the prosperity of their organizations (Thyssen, 2009). Therefore, it is managers' responsibility to uphold the rule of law for the success of their organizations.
The other moral responsibility of managers is abiding by the commonly held moral values such as not harming others knowingly and integrity. Managers that abide by the commonly held moral values become victorious in their relationships with employees. They recognize how to treat them with respect as well as show to earn respect from them. In addition, these managers contribute to the society positively through assisting where they can. What’s more, by abiding the commonly held moral values, managers grow both emotionally and socially, which is crucial for the success of their organizations (Lawrence & Weber, 2013). Last but not least, it is the moral responsibility of managers to fulfill the legitimate tasks of their positions. Managers should treat their employees and clients fairly. Additionally, they should offer safe workplaces and pay employees promptly among the other responsibilities.
Essay 2
What is the difference between management and leadership?
Management and leadership should go hand in hand. The two concepts are not a similar thing but are essentially complementary and linked. In leadership development industry, confusion exists about the link between management and leadership. Many individuals use the two terms interchangeably. There has been a continuing debate of the correlation between management and leadership in the academic circles. "Do leaders need to possess good management skills?" "Do executives have to be great leaders?" "What is the difference between leadership and management?" Therefore, the focus of this essay is to answer these questions through an in-depth discussion.
In terms of their meanings, management entails controlling and directing a group for the intention of harmonizing and coordinating that group towards achieving a goal. In contrast, leadership refers to the capability of a person to enable, motivate, and influence the others to contribute towards both success and effectiveness of organizations that they are part (Collinson, Grint, & Jackson, 2011). Thus, managers have individuals to work for them whereas leaders have individuals to follow them. Management is mainly an executive role, coordinating the individual’s efforts and allocating the required resources to maximize the effectiveness in realizing the identified goals. In contrast, leadership offers encouragement, inspiration, and direction to motivate a group of workers to accomplish the organizational success.
Regarding the personality traits, managers have a tendency of being under control and rational problem solvers. Management frequently focuses on structures, goals, resource availability, and personnel (Montana & Charnov, 2000). The personalities of managers lean toward intelligence, strong will, analysis, and persistence. On the other hand, leaders are frequently called mercurial and brilliant, with great charisma. Moreover, they are frequently seen as private individuals and loners. What’s more, leaders are comfy taking the risks, at times seemingly crazy and wild risks. It is important to state many leaders possess high imagination levels.
Concerning the approaches to tasks, managers generate policies, strategies, and methods to produce teams as well as the ideas, which combine to function smoothly. Managers empower individuals through soliciting their values, principles, and views. What’s more, they believe that this mixture decreases the inherent risks besides generating success (Markić, 2000). Conversely, leaders just look at the hitches and formulate new and creative solutions. By leaders using their commitment and charisma, they motivate, focus, and excite others to solve the difficulties and excel.
Moreover, management involves counting value and not adding it. According to Schermerhorn (2002), managers' count value and a number of them even decrease it through disabling those that add value. For instance, if the boss asks a diamond cutter to report to him every fifteen minutes the number of stones he/she has cut, he (boss) is subtracting value. On the other hand, leaders focus on generating value. A leader creates value and is thus a value- creator. It is worth mentioning that leading through example and leading through enabling individuals are the hallmarks of leadership that is action- based (O'Leary & DuBrin, 2000).
Business owners that are successful need to be strong managers and leaders to get their groups on board and follow them towards their success vision. Leadership is all about getting individuals to comprehend as well as believing in one’s vision and work jointly to realize the shared goal whereas managing is essentially more about administering as well as ensuring that daily activities are taking place as they should.
Essay 3
Are women treated fairly in the workplace?
A number of most explicitly unfair employment practices in the United States workplace were essentially eradicated by the Civil Rights Act of 1964 alongside the other anti- discrimination laws. Nevertheless, a strong resistance to the enforcement of subsisting laws has been experienced. Additionally, politicized opposition to the remedial affirmative action has been in existence. It is disheartening to state that the inequitable employment practices have become delicate as well as hard to identify as well as correct, whereas the workplace in America continues to reflect the unlawful and unfair discrimination against sex, religion, race, or national origin (Cobble, 2004). Women have experienced discrimination in the workplace for a long period. The focus of this essay is discrimination against women in the workplace. For this reason, the essay argues that women are not treated fairly in the workplace by discussing a number of discriminatory practices against women in the workplace.
Unfairness in the place of work still exists in several ways. Pregnancy discrimination is one of the ways that prove that women are not treated fairly in the place of work. Whereas the Americans with Disability Act amendments demand that managers accommodate the employees having medical complications from the pregnancy, many do not consider pregnancy as a disability (Freedman, 2010). Thus, the managers do not have to lawfully accommodate the pregnant employees, even for the minor requests. This demonstrates that women are normally treated unfairly in the workplace. The other unfair treatments that women receive in the workplace are the pay inequality. The statistics demonstrate that women make only 91 cents to the dollar of each man. Various occupations are normally “gendered,” which means that the occupations are linked with feminine or masculine connotations (United States, 2003). For instance, many consider the female nurses as ‘normal’ whereas male nurses are normally not. In numerous instances, men are allied with high paying jobs such as doctor. Therefore, this demonstrates that women are still treated unfairly in the workplace.
Additionally, many employers do not consider equality a priority. For instance, back in 2012, a female manager at Computer Sciences Corporation was fired after filing a sexual harassment case against her co-worker (Duty of Care & Seven Dimensions, 2007). There have been various instances where women have been ignored after reporting the unfair treatment that they receive in the workplace. This demonstrates that the employers ignore negative behavior toward women in the place of work because such behavior is not a priority. This is wrong since the law requires fair treatment in the workplace. Moreover, the Maternity- leave policies have been flawed for a long period. Employees are eligible for 12 weeks of maternity leave, which is unless they have been working for less than 12 months or work at a small corporation (Neville, 2000). However, eight weeks is the highest length of time. It is discouraging to state that the law only protects half of the employees from the illegal termination.
The above discussion proves that women are treated unfairly in the workplace despite the various efforts to curb this problem. According to the statistics, over 25% of the female employees have experienced unfair treatment or discrimination in the place of work. This is a clear indication that women are still treated unfairly in the workplace, which according to the law is wrong. The authorities must the authorities to take the necessary measures that will ensure that women are not discriminated in the workplace.
References
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Cobble, D. S. (2004). The other women's movement: Workplace justice and social rights in modern America. Princeton, N.J: Princeton University Press.
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Schermerhorn, J. R. (2002). Management. New York: Wiley.
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United States. (2003). Violence against women in the workplace: The extent of the problem and what government and business are doing about it : hearing before the Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions, United States Senate, One Hundred Seventh Congress, second session, on examining violence against women in the workplace, focusing on coordinated community response partnerships with employers, to educate them about dangers of domestic violence, sexual assault, and stalking, and assist them in establishing effective policies and programs, July 25, 2002. Washington: U.S. G.P.O.
