Legal Study Presentation

Assignment 1: Project Presentation

 

Create a six-slide PowerPoint presentation summarizing key points of the legal study. Use the following format:

 

Slide 1: Impact of the key question in HR on the stakeholders

Slide 2: Legal regulation(s) related to HR Slide 3: Impact of the key question in marketing on the stakeholders Slide 4: Legal regulation(s) related to marketing Slide 5: Impact of the key question in accounting on the stakeholders Slide 6: Legal regulation(s) related to accounting

 

Due by 10 PM, PST, Tuesday, April 23, 2013.  Must be original work based off of the attached essay.    All written assignments and responses should follow APA rules for attributing sources.

 

Running head: CORPORATE REGULATIONS-A LEGAL STUDY

Running Head: CORPORATE REGULATIONS-A LEGAL STUDY
4

This refers to the corporate laws which are enforced to ensure smooth and running of business operations. The corporate laws form the platform in which shareholders, directors, employees, consumers, community and the environment relate with each other. According to corporate law, all corporations of whichever size have separate legal obligations either with limited liability or unlimited liability to its shareholders. It is mainly concerned with companies registered with company’s act of a country.

With all the laws to regulate their operations, these corporatists have rights and obligations. They can exercise their rights to individuals and even the state, and they can still be answerable against the state or individuals for violations of rights. The corporate bodies can still be convicted for committing a criminal offence like fraud. Corporate bodies must find ways of addressing the social, economic and environmental issues when doing business and be keen on balancing other demands of attention, resources and time. There should be a corporate social responsibility policy which articulates priorities, integrate the social responsibility to the business and be able to build social and business value.

The current awareness to stakeholders has led firms to realize that there are people and other factors outside the company which are important and their interests must be put into considerations. One of the stakeholders who play an important role in the business are the employees commonly referred to as internal stakeholders. They include the mangers and all the workers who are situated within the company and are involved in running of day to day activities. Environmental issues can have serious effects on companies’ performance. Poor health and safety standards give an organization a bad image. It can also lead to a bad morale to staff and heavy financial burdens resulting from costs which arise from injury to employees and other health related incidences. A socially responsible company is aware that a safe and conducive environment motivates the staff which in turn increases their commitment and loyalty to the company.

External stakeholders constitute the customers and the communities. They are not part of the business but always are interested on what the company does and are in a position to influence either positively or negatively. Companies should be committed to satisfy their needs. Business cannot exist without customers. Therefore there should be full commitment in maintaining customers by ensuring products are of value in quality and are safe and meet the environmental standards. Safety of products and their environmental impact should remain key in operation. Customers pay a lot of attention on pollution and environmental damage.

Government has introduced regulations to ensure proper safety standards are maintained at work place and products are safe to humans and the environment. One example is the workplace safety & health act applied in Singapore. It requires stakeholders to observe practicable measures for safety and health of workers and any other people affected by their products. Regulations are also applied to control deceptive advertising. Deceptive advertising involves giving misleading information in advertisements. Advertisements are able to persuade people to buy some products they would otherwise not have bought. This type of advertisement harms the business since consumers do not like being associated with companies conning people. These customers normally retaliate by spreading negative words in social media and even it may end up in courts. Employees of such companies many times end up bearing the consequences. Customers may direct their anger to employees who cannot live up to the conflicts created by the deceptive advertisements. Such employees may leave or lack commitment which is not healthy for the company. To control such practices, some legislation has been passed. This includes the uniform Deceptive Trade Practices Act 1964(revised 1966). It lists some items which are prohibited in advertising trade.

Accounting in business is a very important department. This makes it crucial and companies should ensure all financial transactions and practices are open and transparent. In this field it is where many unethical practices will affect employees and external stakeholders adversely. But this will always vary with the situation. The employees are affected since they must be involved in one way or the other. These practices will affect the external stakeholders mainly through delusion of credibility and increased economic leverage and still give the competitor an upper hand in image improvement. It is mandatory for any company to succeed to formulate its provisions and accounting policies to ensure that they are in conformity with the legal practices and standards and still confidentiality of their information.

Regulations have been passed to control unethical business practices. The latest being the introduction of the Sarbanes Oxley Act (SOX) of 2002. It has imposed very strict accounting requirements on all the public companies. The executives have been made to be personally responsible for the accounting records kept by the companies. After scrutinizing most of the unethical business practices, it may seem to be profitable but in the long-run it becomes very costly to the profit of the companies, investors, customers and the credibility of that company.

References

David Kershaw, Company Law in context. (OUP,oxford 2009)

Dubinsky, A.J. Nataraajan, R, & Wen-Yeh, H.(2004). The influence of moral philosophy on retail salespeople Ethical Perceptions. Journal of Consumer Affairs, p 297-319

Jacobs-Measway, Roberta. 1995. “False Advertising” American law institute- American Bar Association. C22 (April 3)