Chapter 17
Employee Stakeholders and Workplace Issues
LEARNING OUTCOMES
After studying this chapter, you should be able to:
1. Outline the characteristics of the new social contract between employers and employees.
3. Explain the employee rights movement and its underlying principles.
5. Discuss the right to due process and fair treatment.
6. Elaborate on the freedom-of-speech issue and whistle-blowing.
TEACHING SUGGESTIONS
INTRODUCTION – The employer/employee relationship is central to business’s role in society.
The authors devote two chapters to the subject, with this being the first. They discuss some of
the changes occurring in the workplace and to the social contract, as well as the employee rights
movement. Particular areas of interest include the right to not be fired without just cause, the
right to due process and fair treatment, and the right to freedom of speech in the workplace.
These employee stakeholder issues entail economic, legal, and ethical responsibilities.
KEY TALKING POINTS – The issues discussed in this chapter should be highly relevant to the
students, because they hope to be employees of companies in the near future, if they are not
already. The doctrine of employment-at-will has the potential to affect each of them, both
directly and significantly, especially as companies expand internationally and navigate their way
Much has been written about employee rights and due process in the workplace. As pointed out
in the textbook, employees have routinely been expected to forego their civil liberties when they
enter the workplace. Organizational theorists might question an organization’s ability to operate
efficiently without a command-and-control bureaucratic structure, but employees are
increasingly demanding the right to be treated fairly and as something more than a machine part.
Ch 17, Instructor’s Manual, Business & Society, Carroll 10e
Students usually are willing to open up and discuss their ideas regarding due process in the
workplace and will describe their current employer’s due process procedures when questioned.
The most dramatic topic in this chapter is the question of freedom of speech, particularly that of
whistle-blowing. As the textbook mentions in Figure 17-5, several movies have been made
about true-life whistle-blowers. Although several of them are now dated, students can view
graphic representations of some of the very real hazards whistle-blowers encounter. In addition
to informing a discussion of employees’ right to free speech, these movies are also excellent
PEDAGOGICAL DEVICES – In this chapter, instructors may utilize a combination of:
Cases:
5-Engineered Billing
6-The Waiter Rule: What Makes for a Good CEO?
15-Nike, Inc. and Sweatshops
17-Chiquita – An Excruciating Dilemma
18-Dole’s DBCP Legacy
29-Felony Franks (2)- Home of the Misdemeanor Wiener
31-Moral Dilemma – Head vs. Heart
32-Walmart Labor Practices
33-Case of the Fired Waitress
Ethics in Practice Cases:
Should I Say Something?
The Pocketed Purse
Spotlight on Sustainability:
Employees are Key to Sustainability
LECTURE OUTLINE
I. THE NEW SOCIAL CONTRACT
II. EMPLOYEE ENGAGEMENT
III. THE EMPLOYEE RIGHTS MOVEMENT
A. The Meaning of Employee Rights
V. THE RIGHT TO DUE PROCESS AND FAIR TREATMENT
A. Due Process
B. Alternative Dispute Resolution
1. Common Approaches
2. The Ombudsman
3. The Peer Review Panel
4. The Future of ADR
VII. SUMMARY
SUGGESTED ANSWERS TO DISCUSSION QUESTIONS
Students should recognize that their answers to these discussion questions should be well
reasoned and supported with evidence. Although some answers will be more correct than others,
students should be aware that simplistic answers to complex questions, problems, or issues such
as these will never be “good” answers.
1. Question: Rank the various changes that are occurring in the workplace in terms of their
importance to the growth of the employee rights movement. Briefly explain your ranking.
Answer: Technology and automation and globalization are two of the major forces
impacting the employee rights movement. I rank technology first because it affects every
business, and machines don’t demand rights. The worker rights movement is just one
more reason that an employer faced with the opportunity to replace workers with machines
2. Question: Explain the employment-at-will doctrine, and describe how it is being eroded.
Do you think its existence is leading to a healthy or an unhealthy employment environment
in the United States? Justify your reasoning.
Answer: The employment-at-will doctrine means that either the employer or the employee
can terminate the employment contract at any time, for any reason other than
discrimination. It is being eroded because the courts are restricting the employer’s ability
to fire employees through public policy exceptions, contractual exceptions, and breach of
3. Question: In your own words, explain the right to due process. What are some of the
major ways management is attempting to ensure due process in the workplace?
Answer: Due process is the right to receive an impartial review of one’s complaints and to
4. Question: If you could choose only one, which form of alternative dispute resolution
would be your choice as the most effective approach to employee due process? Explain.
Answer: I would institute a peer review panel, making sure that employees from every
level of the company were represented on the panel. There are distinct class and power
differences between managers and workers, and different levels of managers. This
5. Question: How do you feel about whistle-blowing now that you have read about it? Are
you now more sympathetic or less sympathetic to whistle-blowers? Explain.
Answer: I have always been sympathetic to whistle-blowers and still am. Organizations
hold a great deal of power over their employees, and often expect the workers to do things
that many consider unethical. People who are willing (and have sufficient moral courage)
6. Question: What is your assessment of the value of the False Claims Act? What is your
assessment of the value of the whistle-blower protections under the Sarbanes-Oxley Act?
Answer: The False Claims Act revived the Civil war practice of sharing the monies recovered
from reported fraud with the one reporting it, so provides some recompense. Sarbanes-Oxley
protections are limited to employees of public companies. Anything that can be done to provide
7. Question: What other steps can management take to be responsive to potential whistle-
blowing situations?
Answer: As the text states, listening and responding are the best deterrents to whistle-
blowing. There are many initiatives outlined to help prevent whistle-blowing situations,
including open communication, which is the most important. If a company has checks and
GROUP ACTIVITY
Divide students into groups of four to five students. Ask students in the class to bring in the
employment manuals from their current jobs. Distribute the manuals among the groups. Each
group should identify what rights workers have under the manual with regards to the following
(1) termination, (2) due process and (3) freedom of speech in the workplace. Specifically,
students should determine whether employees have contractual rights to employment under the
the students to review these memos before, during and after class to obtain a sense of different
strategies and approaches used by a variety of companies regarding these issues.
INDIVIDUAL ASSIGNMENT
(Note: This Assignment also may be used in conjunction with Chapter 10)
Distribute the following instructions to each student:
Research and describe how U.S. companies have employed the doctrine of employment-at-will
during the global economic recession. Evaluate how this response compared to non-U.S.
companies’ treatment of labor during the recession and how different responses to labor have