MMM343 Business Ethics – Articles Folio Online Tutoring

Article 1:

Title:72% of women in construction have experienced gender discrimination in the workplace.

Duke, R. (2020). 72% of women in construction have experienced gender discrimination in the workplace, Bdaily News, Blog Post, Reviewed on 29 April 2020 <https://bdaily.co.uk/articles/2020/03/09/72-of-women-in-construction-have-experienced-gender-discrimination-in-the-workplace>

Bdaily News

Raoul Duke

9 March 2020

Gender Discrimination is quite common is majority of the workplaces and sectors. It is more apparent where the sector or corporation is a sought to be patriarchal like the construction sector or in a factory where the top management only include males. The packaging department that is considered to be a meager department involves majority of women. Gender Inequality in the workplace is a real challenge that should be eliminated at all times but its more crucial to curb it. The issue of Gender Inequality is introduced in any workplace when an employee is employed on the bases of gender rather than their talents and abilities. There are many laws regulated for Gender Discrimination in workplaces around the world. The issue of Gender discrimination is discussed the mentioned articles in the construction sector of United Kingdom. The title itself claims that more than half of the women working in the construction sector experiences gender discrimination from their male counterparts. The article includes statistics and figures about the women leaving their workplace and other issues related to their employment.

The article includes an interview from Owen Goodhead who is responsible for recruiting employees for Randstad Construction Property & Engineering. He explained with figures about the Gender discrimination problem in the construction sector. The ethical issues highlighted in the articles about women employees and their issues are discrimination on the bases of gender, no childcare and no flexible hours due to several feminine issues. However, the major reason why women employee left their jobs is because of patriarchal culture in the workplace. About 65% of the women left their jobs due to this culture and about 30% left the job due to gender discrimination.  There are multiple studies that have investigated the issue of working hours of mothers as compared to their male colleagues. However, there has been very little investigation about the alteration in female timings in different workplaces because of multiple challenges (Correll et al. 2007; Budig and Hodges 2010). The women employees face many challenges when their male colleagues are not supportive and often, they get into fights over petty issues that can impact the career development of these females (Plickert and Hans 2012; Ridgeway 2011). The article includes an interview of a women working in the Strategy department of the construction company. She claimed that when she was hired in the company that was 18 years ago, gender discrimination still persisted. Whenever a female stepped out on the field she was judged by her looks, clothing, the way she speaks, her talents and capabilities. However, that is not the case in this century, discrimination has decreased but it is still persistent. The percentage of the female workers have gradually increased around the world, more and more females are getting hired in the corporate world. Nevertheless, these females also face gender inequality in their workplace either in private sector or the government sector. They also have problems developing their careers as male colleagues are prioritize instead of them (Albiston 2007; Epstein et al. 1995).

Prior to 1963 it was seen normal that females were paid less than as their male colleagues. However, after the act was passed in the same year, The Equal Pay Act that invoked the equal pay right to females as well. It was not acceptable for a company or corporation to pay less to a woman. In the succeeding year, gender discrimination was made illegal in the workplace all around the world. Although female workers are facing gender discrimination in almost every department of a company. As mentioned above, women are prioritized in tasks like packaging and sewing but men are prioritized in the top management or tasks that are more masculine. This norm should be broken as it has negatively impacted the females’ career development and equal pay. The participation of female labor force should be encouraged to participate in top management as they also possess capabilities that can lead the company to success (International Labour Organization, 1995).

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Women all around the world have faced gender discrimination throughout their lives, mainly in their workplaces because of jealousy towards them from their male colleagues. This article highlights how women in a male dominated sector are facing gender discrimination that is the reason for them to leave the organizations. The primary stakeholders that are impacted in this article are women employees and male employees. The secondary stakeholders are media and other trading groups. The women colleagues are impacted by losing their employment as many women employees are single parents that are the sole earner of their homes. If they are forced to leave their jobs their houses won’t have the basic necessities like food and health. When they face gender discrimination in their workplaces their self esteem is reduced and their self confidence is broken. It is unable for them to move forward in the workplace and grow career wise, gender inequalities hinder their growth in a workplace. Gender discrimination also blocks female employees to shine when it is their time to do so. Females also have personal issues but they are not understood because of the gender inequalities in the workplace. These issues aren’t addressed as the issues of males are. The stakeholders in this article are also male colleagues as they are the one affecting the females in the first place, there are some male colleagues who take pleasure in discriminating the women. Some do it out of jealousy because they want to be on top and wants to be seen as the “good” employees in front of their managers. So, they discriminate the women employees in order to force them to resign and cherish the moments. This will allow them to grow career wise and reach to that position they always wanted to be. As mentioned in the articles, when women employees step out on the field, they are judged in every way possible that make the females uncomfortable. Due to these they are reluctant to go in the field and conduct their tasks. The media and trading groups are the secondary stakeholders who doesn’t have anything to do with the survival of the company. They don’t interact with the company directly but perform such tasks that can indirectly affect the company like any new policy or statement introduced by the government would be displayed on the media. Through which the company can implement if deem necessary.

There are theories regarding ethical issues in workplace around the world, there also ethical theories regarding Gender discrimination in workplace. One such theory is Ambivalent Sexism Theory that includes aggressive behavior against women in the workplace. This theory includes not only just negative behavior against women but also positive behavior. This theory on one hand highlights the hostile and benevolent behavior that encompasses the traditional thinking towards women. The hostile behavior includes that women are not able to take part in the decision-making in economic, radical or interpersonal entities. On the other hand, the benevolent behavior towards women states that men are superior than the opposite gender. The positive side of this theory gives superiority to the women for conducting their feminine tasks (King, Botsford, Hebl, Dawson & Perkins, 2010). Similarly, the article talks about how the women have to leave their jobs due to gender discrimination, no flexible hours and stress, these women are working in a male dominated sector. These women are discriminated on the bases of gender and are not seen fit in this sector. The benevolent and hostile sexism can be seen in this article, where it is a stereotype that women cannot work in the field of the construction sector. They are seen as weak because of their feminine side, the sector has still a traditional side to it that is visible in the article.

In the article, the author interviewed employees of the Randstad Construction Property and Engineering company who stated that to stop the outflow of women from the sector. The company should include flexible hours for the women, childcare and change in the workplace culture. The recommendations are appropriate but the company should focus more on changing the environment. The managers should not encourage the unethical environment of gender discrimination as the employees observe the manager taking part in degrading the women employees the other male employees also get the opportunity to degrade women colleagues. The Gender discrimination policies should be implemented in the workplace, the recruitment team should not hire the employees on the basis of gender and most importantly all the employees should be clearly instructed that any type of discrimination isn’t allowed. If any one is caught degrading any one on the bases of gender or race strict actions would be taken against them. Lastly, the hiring of more women in the top management positions will empower other women to take risks and chances to move forward in the workplace.

Conclusion:

Gender discrimination is still common in this era of technology where the world is so developed, there are numerous technological advancements and the traditional mindset has been almost eliminated. However, Gender discrimination in workplace is still persistent. Women are expected to work according to their feminine role given to them by God but women can do much more than that. They possess capabilities that can lead a company to victory, however, they are underestimated at every step of the way especially in a male dominated sector like construction. The article discussed in this essay talked about how the women employees are forced to leave due to rude comments spoken towards them. No flexible hours and not giving them an equal chance. The company should apply policies regarding gender discrimination and encourage the women to take risks in the company.

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Article 2:

Title: Dealing with Bullying in the workplace

Gloria, 2020, ‘Dealing with Bulllying in the workplace, Blog, CRS, reviewed on 29 April 2020 https://www.crs.co.za/tag/workplace-bullying/

Gloria,

CRS

6 March 2020

Multiple workplaces around the world have an intimidating environment where the employees are abused verbally by their managers and employers. Organizations that have a toxic environment towards their workers and employees it is really difficult for them to work in this environment. When employees are abused with a foul language or strict measures are taken against them unnecessarily then employees are forced to leave the organization. The article talks about workplace abuse, Myburgh (2020) define workplace abuse as bullying that includes mistreating of the employees. The abuser threatens, humiliates or intimidates the victims; the verbal abuse can include interference in the tasks like disruption that can delay the completion of the tasks. The article specifies that how can an employee identify when h/she is verbally abused. A person is verbally abused when h/she has an impact on h/her behavior through joking, gossips or any other type verbal abuse. A person can identify verbal abuse when h/her work is being impacted through it. The article points out the types of bullying that is direct which involves bullying in front of everyone like to shout, humiliate, accuse the victim whereas indirect bullying involves gossip, ignoring the victims and manipulation of the information received regarding the victims. Through abuse a person feels that he has control over others and is powerful. The article focuses on the workplace bullying in South African corporations. Moreover, the article also indicates what to do incase someone faces workplace bullying. The article doesn’t indicate any policies or laws that can be used if someone is facing verbal bullying in their workplace.

A company or a superior that want to get work done from the workers by threatening them, creating fear in their minds and through intimidating them can come under abuse. An organization is called abusive when it only thinks about to complete a given task in time. They do not address the issues of the employees and their needs. Due to which these employees are either fired or they quit their jobs due to increasing stress. Moreover, many of the employees keep up with this behavior because they are scared of being unemployed if they lose this job but they are negatively affected in terms of stress (Ebeid, Kaul, Neumann & Shane, 2003). Previously, job stress and abuse at work were seen as one however, stress in an employee can been seen when a superior want to have control over the works which ultimately transforms into work abuse. Abuse at a workplace can not only be aimed at subordinates but also at individuals with higher positions like superiors or someone in a top management level. Managers aren’t stressed only because of hard work (Ebeid, et al., 2003).

The entities that are present to provide justice to these employees are not efficient to listen to these employees. The person that is being abused is not supported during their employment and fail to continue their employment. Many researches have investigated that workplace abuse can seriously impact an employee’s in long term. Moreover, it has also being reported that harassment can put an employee into long term depression that impacts h/her personal relationships, work and professional relationships. The negative impacts of harassment can also directly affect the working pace of the employee, high absence, leaving the organization and can also affect the overall reputation of the organization in the market (Mordukhovich, Gale, Newlam & McNeely, 2019).

The South African government introduced Employment Equity Act in 1998 to tackle discrimination in the country. However, bullying goes unidentified in the workplace and under this act. Nevertheless, bullying comes under harassment but the victims doesn’t report to the top management as workplace bullying is not identified under harassment (Horwitz & Jain, 2002). There are many types of abusive behaviour but the broadest among all is an anti-social behavior, this type of behavior observes abuse in an organization from the abuser’s viewpoint. This behavior is described as any type of behavior intentionally or unintentionally can negatively impact to the organization. Some instances of antisocial behavior are harassment, fraud, social violence, greed, blackmail, extortions, misusing a company’s resources, lies, whistle-blowing and revealing the company’s secrets (Hackney & Perrewe, 2018). It was reported that about 77.8 percent of South Africans have been bullied in their workplaces. Moreover, the legislation of the country is pressurizing the organizations to get hold of these preparators and report bullying so that it is easy to form a policy regarding this issue (Mostery & Cunniff, 2012). However, there are no current regulations to percent verbal abuse from organizations. Nevertheless, if a verbal abuse upon an employee is not reported than the organization can suffer and have major consequences. In the country, the Employment Equity act is pressuring the corporation to investigate their workers to work together with uniformity in order to achieve the aimed goals of the corporation. This allows the corporations to allow diversity in them and help the workers to grow in these organizations (Cunniff, 2011).

The primary stakeholders of this issue are the victims and the bullies. The victims are directly impacted that can cause them to leave their organization if they cannot put up with the bullying. If they decide to tolerate this abuse than it causes stress that can ultimately impact the working outcomes of the organizations. Organizations need teamwork to function and to lead themselves to success in the industry. However, if the workers are abused by the managers and superiors or even their colleagues it can make the victims lose their self-esteem. Moreover, it will cause stress through which they can’t focus on their work. The other primary stakeholders are the preparators who enjoy to verbal abuse the employees, it can be in form of joking, taunting, threatening or creating fear in their minds. They either abuse for enjoyment or they abuse out of jealousy and want to break the employee. The latter do this either they want that employee to leave their job or become a good employee in front of the superiors.

The article talks about bullying focusing on the major type of abuse that is verbal abuse. It comes under egoism theory, egoism theory states that every person works for h/her own well-being. That individual will always do such acts that will benefit h/her only and doesn’t think about others in any way. There are many types of egoistic theories, this article involves ethical egoism theory in which the individual only maximizes h/her own self-interest. The abusers degrade the employee in order to complete the tasks by creating fear in their minds. This comes under the act of thinking about oneself and for their own interest. The literature talks about that the superiors abuse these employees out of jealousy or they want to be seen as a good employee in front of the superiors. That can only be done through making their competition lose their self-confidence and by increasing stress through verbal abuse. This will ultimately impact the working pace of the workers and they won’t be able to complete their tasks in time. This is thinking about themselves by degrading and making fun of others and in the end getting what they always wanted that is to get rid of them (Shaver, 2002).

The article gave their own recommendations that is what to do when an employee observes verbal abuse in the workplace environment. Myburgh states there should be an organization policy or procedure that should deal with verbal abuse if necessary. According to him, the abuse should be reported to the Human Resources department as soon as possible. Moreover, the HR Executives should not be biased and help the victim in h/her time of need even if the abuser is among the top management the victim shouldn’t be neglected. Myburgh advised that an external entity should deal with the abuse so that there isn’t ant biased response. He exclaimed the sole means to stop the abuse is to train the employee regarding the issue and this can only reduce the abuse in the South African corporations.

Conclusion:

Verbal abuse is among the major unethical issues in the workplace that creates a toxic work environment in an organization. There is proper law to prevent the employees against it but it’s the duty of the leader to prevent the verbal abuse in the organization. This article provides an insight about the verbal abuse that is the definition of it, how to identify and to overcome it. The report provides literature on this topic that what is the stance of the previous academic scholars. The theory that is linked with this behavior is an egoistic ethical theory in which an individual only thinks about self-interest and self-welfare. The abuser also thinks about oneself and only works to move forward in the organization. He abuses the employees to be in control and to have power amongst others. The article provides recommendations as to how can the victim stop the abuser from abusing.

References:

Albiston, C. (2007). ‘Institutional Perspectives on Law, Work, and Family’. Annual Review of Law and Social Science, 397–426

Budig, Michelle J., & Melissa J. Hodges. (2010). ‘Differences in Disadvantage: Variation in the Motherhood Penalty across White Women’s Earnings Distribution’. American Sociological Review, 705–28.

Correll, Shelley, Stephen B., & In P. (2007). ‘Getting a Job: Is There a Motherhood Penalty?’ American Journal of Sociology, 1297–339.

Cunniff, L. (2011). Workplace bullying of South African employees: Prevalence and the relationship with sense of coherence and diversity experiences (Doctoral dissertation, North-West University), Reviewed on 29 April 2020 <https://www.crs.co.za/tag/workplace-bullying/>

Ebeid, F., Kaul, T., Neumann, K., & Shane, H. (2003). Workplace abuse: Problems and consequences. International Business & Economics Research Journal (IBER), 2(6).

Epstein, Cynthia F., Robert S., Bonnie O. and Martha Gever. (1995). ‘Report: Glass Ceilings and Open Doors: Women’s Advancement in the Legal Profession.’ Fordham Law Review.

Hackney, K. J., & Perrewé, P. L. (2018). A review of abusive behaviors at work: The development of a process model for studying abuse. Organizational Psychology Review, 8(1), 70-92.

Horwitz, F. M., & Jain, H. C. (2002). Employment equity in South Africa: overcoming the apartheid legacy. Workplace Equality, 225-242.

International Labour Organization (1995), “Women Work more, but are Paid Less”, viewed on  29 April 2020, < https://www.ilo.org/global/about-the-ilo/newsroom/news/WCMS_008091/lang–en/index.htm>

King, E. B., Botsford, W., Hebl, M. R., Kazama, S., Dawson, J. F., & Perkins, A. (2012). Benevolent sexism at work: Gender differences in the distribution of challenging developmental experiences. Journal of Management, 38(6), 1835-1866.

Mordukhovich, I., Gale, S., Newlan, S., & McNeely, E. (2019). The impact of workplace harassment on health in a working cohort. Frontiers in psychology, 10, 1181.

Mostert, K., & Cunniff, L. (2012). Prevalence of workplace bullying of South African employees. SA Journal of Human Resource Management, 10(1), 1-15.

Myburgh, N. (2020). Dealing with Bulllying in the workplace, Blog, CRS, reviewed on 29 April 2020 https://www.crs.co.za/tag/workplace-bullying/

Plickert, G., & Hans M. (2012). ‘Hours of Work and Careers: The Effects of Gender on Professional Careers of Young Lawyers’. Zeitschrift für Rechtssoziologie, 77–106.

Ridgeway, Cecilia L. (2011). ‘Framed by Gender: How Gender Inequality Persists in the Modern World. New York: Oxford University Press’.

White, S. (2020). You’re Paid to Work, Not to Endure Verbal Abuse. Don’t Be Intimidated, Lifehack, Blog, Reviewed on 30 April 2020 < https://www.lifehack.org/590585/youre-paid-to-work-not-to-endure-verbal-abuse-dont-be-intimidated>

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