Nuts and Bolts - A mandatory assignment, received 25/25 PDF

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A mandatory assignment, received 25/25...

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Siliang Chris Timineri 11/30/19 BLW 302 – Nuts and Bolts Assignment A. Answer the following questions relating to ethical issues (each answer should be between 1/4 and 1/2 page long): 1. Is it ethical for the company’s management to lay off ten percent of the employees while the company is still profitable, regardless of which method is used to identify those who will lose their jobs? Laying off ten percent of the employees is an ethical choice to make. While it is not ideal for those ten percent involved, it can be a preventative measure to make sure that the remaining ninety percent keeps their jobs in the future. If the company continues to do poorly and sales go into the red, the company will have to lay off additional employees to make up for the additional loss. If the company chooses to not lay anyone off at this time, it may end up going out of business which will require all 500 employees to find a new job. Laying off ten percent of the employees is the ethical choice to make. 2. Assuming that it has been established that layoffs are needed and that the good to be accomplished justifies removing some satisfactory employees from their jobs, is the manner of proceeding outlined in Option 1 ethical? Why or why not? Option 1 is not an ethical choice. Leaving someone’s employment to a division manager allows too much room for subjectivity and may make some room for subtle discrimination. That alone is enough to make option 1 an unethical choice, but as well as having subjectivity involved, not having enough time for either party to plan accordingly makes it a rushed process. Not necessarily lay off employees by attrition, but at least notify both division heads and employees more than a week in advance. The division heads will need additional time to make proper cuts to their staff; as laying off has never been done before in this company, the division heads need the extra time to be certain about their choices. On the same note, having division heads pick and choose who they would like to keep can prove beneficial to the company as the division head would know who is the best and worst performers in their sector, this additional information and trimming the “fat” in the company could be the most beneficial to the company in the long run. Option 1 is a clear case of having a substantial grey

area, but I believe having the power based in a person’s hand gives room for biases and discrimination, leaving it more unethical then option 2.

3. Assuming that it has been established that layoffs are needed, that the good to be accomplished justifies removing some satisfactory employees, is the manner of proceeding in Option 2 ethical? Why or why not? Option 2 is more ethical in practice then option 1, but option 2 has grey area with execution. While option 2’s aim is to essentially eliminate all randomness and discrimination by having a certain condition be met for termination. While the condition present is the letter of last name that may not be the best for the company. It does eliminate biases from the equation, but what if all of the top performers for the company have their last names begin with the letter A. This would lay off 10% of the employees, but it also could remove the top performers within the company. It is not a very practical choice, but it is an ethical one. As well as having the potential to be eliminating the good employees of the company it may also adversely impact several minority groups that generally have a certain last name. Yang, lopez, wang, smith are several very common last names among several groups of people and if a whole segment of them were to be terminated at once, this could be grounds of a bias at play. Option 2 is more practical, as it does not discriminate against who is being terminated. It has clear measures as to why a person is being terminated. B. Answer the following questions relating to legal issues (each answer should be between 1/4 and 1/2 page long): 1. Does Nuts & Bolts, Inc. have a potential legal duty to inform the workers that there will be layoffs? No, the company does not have a legal obligation to tell their employees. The WARN act states that if 1/3 of the employee’s are being laid off, or if closing a plant of 50 or more employees. The company is cutting 10% of the employees, this does not fall in either condition to have a mandatory notification. However, I believe the company should still inform the employees ahead of time so that they are able to start looking ahead for a new job. While the company does not have any legal obligation to inform their employees, I believe the ethical choice is inform them. The company plans on telling the employees the day of that they are being laid off, and

that can cause a lot of heartbreak and unnecessary damages to both the employee and their families. 2. The Nuts & Bolts layoff Option 1 calls for each division head to determine which specific employees will be laid off. Some of these employees will almost certainly fall into various classifications, such as race, color, religion, national origin, sex, disability and age, which are protected under federal law, most notably Title VII of the Civil Rights of 1964 which protects the first five. It is quite likely that some of these workers will feel they are being laid off not because of their lack of skills and abilities, which is presumably what the division heads will say (and quite likely are applying) is their criteria, but are in fact being laid off because of their race etc. How would these workers make their case that they being intentionally fired for such an illegal act? The workers would have to make their case of being terminated as to being discriminated against in comparison to their co-workers. This would be best described in a hypothetical scenario, if Jane and John had the same position and same hours and wages, similar performance, but Jane was let go due to “skills and abilities” the only difference between Jane is being of a different sex then John. The two are the same in every which way on the job. The workers could have a case at hand, in the scope and responsibility of the job performing similarly, the only difference would be a characteristic that falls under title VII. If that condition is met then the workers would have a valid case against the company. As well as looking at who is retained at the job after the ten percent purge happens. If it is coincidently all the same ethnic group that remains and having all different ones expelled could be another way this case could be made. 3. The Nuts & Bolts layoff Option 2 calls for employees to be terminated by alphabetical order beginning with the letter “A” until the desired number is reached. This approach would be applying facially neutral criteria since all people have names and thus, on the surface this does not appear to be illegally discriminatory. However, under Title VII even using facially neutral criteria is illegal if it has a disparate impact on protected groups. Give an example of disparate impact analysis, and then discuss whether this is likely to occur in this scenario. Among ethnic groups there are common last names that are associated with it. Lopez for Hispanics; Smith and Rogers for White; Wang, Yang, Xi for Asians. While these last names are commonly associated with a certain ethnic group, Option 2 could inadvertently cause a disparate impact using the way of last name. While the use of last names will eliminate all randomness, it can side effects like eliminating or focusing on a group that may have a certain last name. The company states they want to start with A then B and work their way down the alphabet, the avoidance of the common last name letters could be a way the company could avoid disparate impact. The likelihood of causing a disparate impact is slim,

the last names mentioned above are far into the alphabet. If the selected last names were to be laid off then Title VII would be at play and those impacted by it would have a viable case in court....