...reputation, do not suffer unnecessary attrition and damages through the implementation of effective, affordable product liability programs. It is important to have people in management that possess the skills such needed to solve liability issues in the legal arena, most importantly before they occur.The challenge of the manager is fulfilling his/hers responsibilities by generating profit in business while protecting the interests of otherstakeholders, such as, employees and customers. Though the savvy manager cannot stop people from having the intention and grievances to sue the organization, they can reduce the motive of prospective plaintiffs and in event of a lawsuit happens; effective product liability management mitigates the negative effects on the organization. Management has the duty of making sure the product liability policies and programs of the organization is clear, concise and precise so that the interpretation thereof cannot be turned to work against the organization. Most lawsuits that are directed at organizations arise in the area of torts. The case of Liebeck vs. McDonalds: Relentlessly controversial in nature, this case continued to be the answer to the journalists’ prayer until it was settled. Liebeck vs. McDonalds aroused the interest of both the media and legal community and held public attention for its lifetime. Initially, the case took off like most frivolous lawsuits in which the...
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...Lawsuit and settlement, loss in organization revenues, cost, can be prevented through education and initiation of promoting diversity in workplace, especially to its upper management officers. My intention here is to find out the proper way of investigation to minimize the possibility of lawsuit. There are possible solutions at the corporate level with effective programs and policies to help preventing similar incident happening again like Maria’s. There are proactive strategies an individual can use to minimize organizational discrimination as well. Now let’s examine the proper way of investigation that can help to minimize a chance of lawsuit. As per the Right Way to Investigate, a supervisor along. with help of Human Resources (HR) to do the investigation immediately after the complaint was filed in writing as facts can be retrieved fresh from other employee’s mind. Timing is very important and prompt investigation would show the filing employee the organization is taking the complaint seriously. It’s crucial to not draw any form of conclusion prior interviewing all persons who have knowledge of the compliant. Interview all persons involved two to three times to get consistent information. Lastly but not least, to advice HR and company lawyer before writing the investigation report and the conclusion on the record as it may be audited in great detail for court use. (The right way to investigate complaints now so they don't wind up in court later, 2012). It important for...
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...| Texaco Lawsuit | | | | Give a brief summary of the Texaco lawsuit case discussed in Chapter 5 of Opportunities and Challenges of Workplace Diversity. After a company experiences a racial discrimination lawsuit like the one at Texaco, how can an organization implement a comprehensive diversity management policy and become a model of effective diversity management? Canas and Sondak (2011) provide details of the Texaco lawsuit in the text. In summary, Texaco historically has not promoted minorities specifically blacks into certain groups or positions and has fostered a very unhealthy work climate as a result. Six employees filed a class-action discrimination suit in 1994 on behalf of 1500 other employees. In what was supposed to be private discussions, senior leaders of the organization were recorded making racial slurs targeted at African American employees and other comments around destroying documentation and other evidence related to the case. These comments were leaked causing a stir in the national media and increased racial tension in the workplace. Unfortunately, in some cases it may take a lawsuit for organizations to implement effect diversity management policies. For example, DiverstyInc (2013) describes how Sodexo implemented stronger and more open lines of communication with employees using a Chief Diversity Officer. In doing so, Sodexo gained a stronger level of trust with its employees. Sodexo also established metrics...
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...measures that can be implemented to help mitigate organizational and institutional liability. Mitigating these liabilities will enable a larger return on investment for the business using these private security forces. Potential for Civil Liability Civil liability is considered the potential responsibility for payment to be assessed to an individual or organization that has incurred damages based on a lawsuit. There are several different factors that can determine the potential for liability based on certain tort laws that may be applied. A tort is considered to be a wrongful act that was committed that may result in compensation based on varying levels of proof and damages that are present. Rules, evidence, precedent, and judicial discretion all help to determine which category or tort law will be applicable. The elements and burden of evidence and proof can also vary from state to state, and can focus on different aspects of the damages or injuries caused. Types of Liabilities and Lawsuits There are three different types of tort laws that private officers and employers must understand effectively to mitigate as much potential liability as possible. Negligence is the most common type of tort, and consists of accidental or negligent act that created a risk to another person. Intent does not play...
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...Ethical Issues in Management Juanita Bell University of Phoenix Ethical Issues in Management What is business ethics? According to wiseGEEK (2003-2010), business ethics “Is the behavior that a business adheres to in its daily dealings with the world.” (What is Business Ethics? para.1). The ethics of a organization may be discrete, however ethics do not just apply to how the business communicates with the world, but also includes the business’ one-on-one relations with individual clients and employee’s. There are many ethical issues involved in management. Diversity has become a major issue in the management world. Workplace diversity refers to the extent of cultural diversity within a company. “Diversity is generally defined as acknowledging, understanding, accepting, valuing, and celebrating differences among people with respect to age, class, ethnicity, gender, physical and mental ability, race, sexual orientation, spiritual practice, and public assistance status (K.A. Green, M. López, A. Wysocki, & K. Kepner, 2008)”. Diversity in business allows a business to better understand the demographics of its marketplace. Many advertise themselves as “Equal Opportunity Employers”, meaning they maintain a diverse workplace and will not discriminate. Though many ethical issues can be found with in the workplace, the most common is discrimination. Discrimination is one of the main issues currently stopping diversity. “Discrimination occurs whenever something other than qualifications...
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...Transportation are currently besieged in. USA Truck Inc. of Van Buren, Arkansas filed a breach of contract lawsuit against Knight Transportation Inc. of Phoenix, Arizona, because Knight Transportation is attempting to buy out USA Truck. The lawsuit, filed in Crawford County Circuit Court, alleged Knight unacceptably utilized USA Truck's proprietary company information to facilitate a hostile procurement of USA Truck for an unreasonable amount, which does not reflect the Company's real value. The lawsuit requests Knight to divest the USA Truck shares they currently have, which USA Truck accuses Knight obtained by violating the confidentiality agreement the two companies agreed to. Knight increased its ownership in USA Truck from 8% to 12% after the company publically announced it was trying to take it over. USA Truck's Board of Directors is very disenchanted with the way Knight Transportation acted when they promised they would not do what they are being accused of doing, which was utilize confidential information expressed to them via friendly private discussions regarding an agreed upon transaction between the companies. When USA Truck’s Board of Directors refused to agree to the terms Knight Transportation decided to take the offer straight to the shareholders. USA Truck retained the legal services of Kutak Rock LLP of Omaha, Nebraska and filed the lawsuit (Turner, 2013). The lawsuit was filed at the Crawford County Circuit Court, a general-jurisdiction trial court, no hearing date...
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...Case Analysis Name: Po-Lin Chiang Date: January 31, 2014 MBA 545 City University of Seattle Background In 1999, Coca-Cola was facing a serious lawsuit which was strongly testify Coca-Cola, because of Coca-Cola systematically discriminating against African-Americans in promotions, evaluations and pay lower salaries than whites. This was a famous racial discrimination lawsuit in the history (Winter, 2000). Plaintiffs At beginning, some workers of Coca-Cola Company were accused and terrorized those African-Americans who work in the same working environment. However, Coca-Cola didn’t make any solution to solve this problem; as a result, more than 2000 employees decided to sued Coca-Cola Company. Accused The salaries which Coca-Cola Company paid for their black workers were lower than white workers. They were doing the some work but the salaries ware totally different; consequently, white workers were earned more than $26,000 average a year. This racial discrimination lawsuit was a very serious problem in Coca-Cola Company’s history. Analysis Racial discrimination is a very serious problem for Coca-Cola Company; it can cause a severe damage on Coca-Cola Company’s brand image. It will affect their future sales performance. In the beginning, Coca-Cola Company can avoid this lawsuit, if they were cared about those black workers’ right. Coca-Cola made a wrong decision about this case which they choose to ignore their workers’ right; as a result, they going to the court...
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...competitors by extending credit to customers who would not be able to obtain credit elsewhere. * Marketing strategy was through its massive database system. Fingerhut would gather detailed information about their customers such as age, marital status, number of children, birthdays, hobbies, etc. It then sent each household the appropriate mix of targeted specialty catalogs. * Distinguished itself by fostering a socially responsible corporate image, leading the industry in recycling and other environmentally conscious practices and developing personalized relationships with its customers via its database * Lawsuit: made its profits by exploiting the poor; painted Fingerhut as a predatory company that suckered low income consumers by using unfair and deceptive marketing techniques; 2 arguments: * Allegation that Fingerhut was charging an effective interest rate that exceeded the legal limit for transactions of the type in which Fingerhut was...
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...sodium content, sugars, saturated fats, and calories, for a long period of time would lead to childhood obesity. Moreover, obese children have a much higher risk of many health problems such as coronary heart disease, high blood pressure, diabetes, and certain cancers--all of which are fatal if left untreated. In 2010, a mother from California sued McDonald’s over the company’s marketing practice of Happy Meal. The mother claimed that McDonald’s used alluring toys to lure kids into Happy Meal. This lawsuit, which might be viewed by many as senseless and absurd, was one of McDonald’s biggest cases. In order to come out of the lawsuit ahead, this largest fast food chain had to undergo some major organizational changes. In this paper, we would like to use the knowledge learned in the class to analyze the event (the lawsuit) and its effects on McDonald’s. The paper will have four main parts. In the first part, we provide a brief introduction of the company, McDonald’s, and the lawsuit. In the second part, we will use the concepts learned in class to analyze Happy Meal’s influencing strategies and the organizational changes during and after the suit. We believe that Happy Meal’s influencing strategies deserve our attention as they were the main causes of the crisis. Since its Happy Meal’s influencing...
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...Ethical Issues in Management Natalie Weaver MGT/216 March 15, 2010 Richard Smith Introduction In management there are always different ethical situations involved. Today one of those major problems in management has been diversity. Diversity in the workplace refers to the amount that cultural diversity is inside a company. “Diversity is generally defined as acknowledging, understanding, accepting, valuing, and celebrating differences among people with respect to age, class, ethnicity, gender, physical and mental ability, race, sexual orientation, spiritual practice, and public assistance status (K.A. Green, M. López, A. Wysocki, & K. Kepner, 2008).” Moral and Ethical Issues Acquiring diversity in the business opens them to grasp the realization of the demographics of its marketplace, just as long as the company uses the opportunity that they receive from the knowledge of a diverse working environment. Businesses toady like to display their “Equal Opportunity Employer” status. What this status says is they like having a diverse work setting with no discrimination. Diversity is not going through that well mainly because of discrimination. “Discrimination occurs whenever something other than qualifications affects how an employee will be treated (L. Trevino & K. Nelson, K., 2007, p. 69).” Discrimination can affect race, age, religious beliefs, ethnicity, gender, sexual preference and any type of quality that does not fit with the society accepted normal. The issue...
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...another company to manufacture the Luna pen after a potential lawsuit that would likely only force Global Service to cease production. DGG's interest was simply to receive money for the use of the trademark because they had no intentions of resuming the Luna pen part of their business but still wanted the payment for its use or a potential partnership that would benefit both parties. However, Global Service's interest was simply to keep manufacturing and distributing the Luna pen as it represented 25% of the company's revenue. If Global Service could not negotiate with DGG and possibly be forced to stop producing the pen in a lawsuit, Global Service would have only one BATNA, which is to find another pen to manufacture instead of the Luna pen. While I liked many of Erika's approaches in negotiating, I still would still have changed many things. I strongly agreed with her first two approaches in dealing with Mr. Feng as she displayed a very polite and accommodating attitude in her first message to the CEO and then properly asserted herself when the CEO was clearly brushing her off. In the first message she sent, I thought it was a great idea to be very courteous and polite because she does not know this person and she does not want to start the negotiation poorly. Furthermore, when the CEO clearly did not have any interest in speaking with her, she grabbed his attention by sending the threat that she intends to file a lawsuit. She did not lose control and start an argument, but she...
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...Negotiation Strategy Article Analysis James Click University of Phoenix Organizational Negotiations MGT 445 Dr. Christina Aleksic April 29, 2013 Negotiation Strategy Article Analysis Negotiations can be an in-depth process that may have a huge effect on an individual’s future. Selecting an effective negotiating strategy is vital when negotiating with other parties. There are numerous styles of negotiation strategies that an individual can use to have a fruitful negotiation. Several negotiation strategies are including collaboration, accommodation, competition, and avoidance (Lewicki, Saunders, & Barry, 2006). Dependent on the situation, one strategy may be more effective than another strategy. Two such examples in which different negotiation strategies were functional are Negotiating New Vehicle Purchases (Craver, 2005) and Town Settles Mall Suit (Chiaramida, 2010). A review of each article, including the application of negotiation strategies and a compare and contrast analysis will highlight the differences from each scenario. Article One (Distributive) In Negotiating New Vehicle Purchases (Craver, 2005), the competitive strategy is used. The article walks through six negotiation stages encountered when purchasing a car. The goal of the article is to prepare the buyer for the dealership’s tactics and maximize the buyer’s negotiation power. The first negotiation phase begins before entering the dealership by determining the true dealer cost for a vehicle. The...
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...At: http://hwsoloutions.com/?product=law-531-week-1 Visit Our website: http://hwsoloutions.com/ Product Description PRODUCT DESCRIPTION LAW 531 Week 1 Introduction The cost of taking a lawsuit to court can be very expensive for a business or company. Knowing that are more option available to you to weigh your option before take a lawsuit or a case to trial could save you time and money. Not every case even makes it to the courtroom because they are solved outside the through alternative dispute resolution, ADR. Understanding how a ADR works and the process of going through the courts are valuable to know and something that anyone in a corporate business setting should have some insight on in case of an incident may arise within your business. Legal Phases Initiating a lawsuit, the plaintiff must prepare a petitionand take this form for to the Clerk of Courts for filing. Once this is done you have to give legal notice to the person or company you are suingthat you have filed a lawsuit against them. This person is better known as the defendant. He defendant may or may not file a response to the lawsuit, which is called an answer or counter claim with the court clerk. The plaintiff has moved on to the discovery process where to get information from the other side of the lawsuit by interrogatories or a disclosure. Another way for the plaintiff and defendant get information is by an oral or written disposition where they have witness question under oath and the answers are...
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...to remove some older piping and accidentally severed the main water pipe. Subsequently, Mr. Reese’s strip mall suffered massive flooding which resulted in $300,000 in property damage and several of the tenants vacating the property. The owner, Mr. Reese, blames the flooding and ensuing property on the negligence of Mr. Copeland, the licensed contractor. Mr. Copeland denies liability for the damages as he affirmatively declares that the flooding was an accident. In this situation, it may be cost-effective for both parties to resolve this dispute via the process of negotiation. Since the owner of the strip mall, Mr. Reese resides in New York and his property is located in Ohio, he may incur huge expenses as the lawsuit could be filed in the state of Ohio and Mr. Reese would need to retain legal counsel in Ohio for the sake of properly addressing any laws specific to this state. Another scenario is that Mr. Reese’s former tenants in the strip mall may file individual lawsuits due to property loss and damages incurred within the flood; therefore, the owner may want to save court costs by negotiating with Mr. Copeland to...
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...Lawsuit in the Hospital It is an indisputable fact that health care business inherently carries a unique set of risks as a business organization; lawsuits by patients are common. What is not common is the fact that a trained professional who has sworn by the Hippocratic Oath to “do no harm,” would seek to file a lawsuit against a hospital because his service is no longer needed because of the new direction that the hospital is going (Grand Canyon University, 2011). To be fair, this physician is claiming an “injury.” It is also fair and true to say that this claim was made after this physician was notified that the relationship will be severed after four months. Due to the sequence of events and the circumstances of this case, any logical, objective, and fair-minded observer would question the underlying motive of this claim and, subsequently, its validity. However, since cases like this are not usually adjudicated in the moral court or court of public opinions, this facility is prepared to explore its options and seek resolution either through a formal arrangement, a formal institution, or a legal entity such as the following: Court of law, arbitration, mediation, and / or settlement. In order to make an informed and appropriate decision, it is not only necessary to analyze and fully understand each choice conceptually and practically, but it is also important to assess the pros and cons as well. Court...
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