Ethics and Human Resource Management

 

Ethics and Human Resource Management

Ethics and human resource management are two interrelated factors that have an impact on how well an organization performs.  Every organization should give human resource management more attention because it is the most important component. Numerous HR functions fall under the purview of human resources management, and to carry them out properly, the company should uphold HR principles..

 What is a HRM?

 The administration of an organization's most valuable asset—the employees who, individually and collectively, help it achieve its goals—through human resource management is strategic and cohesive.

Recruitment, employee selection, proper orientation and induction, training and skill development, employee assessment (performance of appraisal), proper compensation and benefits, motivating, maintaining proper relations with labor and with trade unions, and maintaining employee safety, welfare, and health by abiding by relevant state or national labor laws are all parts of the human resource management process.

Managing an organization's human resources to accomplish its goals and objectives can be summed up as human resource management..

A strategic, integrated and coherent approach to the employment development and well being of the people working in the organization.( Armstrong, 2014).

What is the Meaning of Ethics?

Ethics are "a set of prescriptive rules, principles, values, and virtues of character that inform and guide intrapersonal and interpersonal conduct," according to the definition given for the term. A major area of philosophy is ethics, which examines what is morally right or wrong in people's actions. In debates about good and evil, ethics and morality are concepts that are frequently used interchangeably.

Law requires businesses to treat their employees fairly and refrain from targeting particular groups with discrimination. Legislation acts to moderate standards within a community for the greatest good of the greatest number and is a codified of accepted moral concepts.

According to the concise Oxford definition, ethics is described as being concerned with morality and treating moral issues.

According to Petrick and Quinn, (1997) wrote that ethics is the study of individual and collective moral awareness, judgement, character and conduct.

Ethics and HRM

It is important to understand that Human Resource Management by the nature of its role inside organizations is at the front line of ethics problems on what concerns employees and employers. This is why many companies give HR professionals the role of leadership in establishing and maintaining ethical programs. (Wiley, 2000).

Although some activities are outsourced, most HR Managers follow the main stages of an employee’s path in the companies/Organizations: Recruitment and Selection, Reward Management, Performance Appraisal, Career Management and Firing/Separation. (Mercier, 2003).

Areas of ethics in HRM include safety in the workplace, respect, fairness, privacy, basic human rights, justifiable treatment of employees, and honestly based processes in the workplace . As an example, employee monitoring is deemed necessary in many companies that work remotely.

Professional Human Resource Managers have a responsibility to promote good ethical standards within the organization. It will help to the company in different ways because success of the organization directly depends on its workforce talent. If the organization has ethical issues it will directly affect to employees. In 1992 "Ethical issues in human resource management ''survey five issues were highlighted as follows.

·                  Staffing based on favouritism.

·                  Sexual Harassment.

·                  Using discipline for managerial and non-managerial discipline. 

·                  Non-performance factor used in the appraisal.

·                  Allowing difference in pay.

Apart from that, there are another so many ethical problems can be identified within the organization.HR manager should try to understand all the ethical issues and sort it out as much as possible. Most of the time HR ethics can be identified when we are doing below-mentioned HR functions and related activities in the organization.

·                  Recruitment and selection: This is one of the most crucial HR functions, and we should conduct recruitment in an ethically correct manner. According to the HR policy guideline, every firm should have a recruitment policy and follow it.

·                  Justifiable Treatment: There shouldn't be any discrimination at work. All employees must get equitable treatment..

·                  Privacy: Maintaining employee privacy is the most crucial duty for every organization. should not share the identities of its personnel with third parties. Given that all of the information is an employee's property, the HR department bears a significant amount of responsibility in this. For instance, pay details or personnel matters.

·                  Respect and fairness: Everyone wants to be respected by others and should be treated fairly. Therefore, the HR department should foster an environment in the company that values respect and justice.

·                  Performance Management: The organization typically uses performance management to assess employee performance in order to determine whether to offer annual raises, promote employees, identify training and development needs, etc. Sadly, the majority of the organization does not carry out this function in an ethically correct manner. There are numerous indications that the majority of employees experienced prejudice throughout the performance review process.

·                  Reward Management: The most crucial task is reward management, which deals with how to fairly and without bias reward personnel. Every person in the company works primarily to benefit financially from their position. If this wasn't handled fairly, it would be a major problem for the business. In order to develop an ethical reward system, the organization should have plans and rules in place.

• Discipline: The necessity is discipline.It is simply defined as adhering to corporate policies and procedures and using sanctions to deter wrongdoing. Every firm should have a clear disciplinary policy and equal treatment for all employees.

 Conclusion

Every organization recognizes the value of ethics since it is so intimately related to human resource management. In most organizations today, the duty of upholding HR ethics has been delegated to HR specialists.The success of the company will be aided by HR managers handling any ethical concerns within the company. Earlier, HRM performed only administrative and HR tasks, and due to the growing popularity of HR ethics, HR Managers acted as the organization's ethical agent. Finally, dealing with ethical issues will be advantageous for the organization. Ethics and human resources management are closely related.

References 

1.Available at https://www.slideshare.net/saumyasingh7921/ethics-in-human-resource-management[Accessed 29-04-2023]

2.Available at https://fbr.springeropen.com/track/pdf/10.1007/s11782-010-0111-[Accessed 29-04-2023]

3.Available at https://core.ac.uk/download/pdf/39152505.pdf[Accessed 29-04-2023]

4.Available.at:https://repositorio.iscte-iul.pt/bitstream/10071/11294/1/Ethics%20in%20HRM_%20MargaridaPimenta_2015.pdf[Accessed 29-04-2023]

 5.Available at https://gfgc.kar.nic.in/punjalakatte/GenericDocHandler/199-710383b9-21db-413b-8c31-8cf77bf839d2[Accessed 29-04-2023]