Unit 37 – Business Ethics
Task 3a – Business report of McDonalds
The businesses I have chosen to showcase is McDonalds.
McDonalds is a fast food burger chain founded in 1940 by Richard and Maurice McDonald. They are
currently based in Oak Brook, Illinois. They are the world’s largest restaurant chain, serving around
68 million customers daily in 117 countries in over 30,000 stores.
McDonalds are considered an ethical business as they have a policy in place for each aspect of
ethics. These policies are easily accessible on their website, and explain how the company is ethical,
while their 2020 goals explain how they are trying to achieve the next step of ethics and
sustainability. McDonalds also has a Code of Conduct which all employees and suppliers must sign.
This states their values, ethics and laws they abide to, such as the United Natons Declaraton on
Human Rights.
Social implicatons in Finance:
The Code of Conduct that is signed atempts to make sure ethical practces are observed, however,
this is not always the case. In 2009, a McDonalds executve in Hong Kong was convicted of acceptng
bribes giving a Thai based corn supplier an unfair advantage. In Brazil, government ofcials were
bribed in exchange for favourable treatment from tax regulators. Both cases were bribery, which is a
form of corrupton. McDonalds should not be blamed for these events due to the Hong Kong
executve acceptng a bribe, not McDonalds, and in Brazil, the restaurant was a franchise run by
Arcos, not a direct McDonalds business.
This would impact society because they wouldn’t trust that McDonalds employees follow regulaton,
and that the food they buy may not be what they have been told it is, one example being Tesco and
the horse meat scandal.
Another social implicaton for McDonalds would be executve pay, which in 2015 showed
McDonald’s CEO have a 69% pay increase from the year previous, increasing to $1.1 million. This is a
social implicaton as the pay of the CEO increased despite the company losing market share due to
the struggling introducton of new menu optons.
This would also be a social implicaton because customers may feel that the money given to
executves could be beter distributed throughout stores and existng staf, or could have been
donated to their house charity.
Social implicatons in Human Resource Management:
Human resources are the workforce in a business. For McDonalds, this could be the suppliers,
transporters, in store, or in head ofce. With regards to human resource, McDonald’s Code of
Conduct explains exactly the values and ethics they believe in, while explaining what laws they are in
line with. One law that McDonalds work to is the UN Declaraton of Human Rights. This is the global
bill which ensures that no slave labour, underage labour, or heavy hours of labour are given.
McDonalds also strongly believe in no discriminaton, where people are selected for their skills
rather than race, natonality, gender, or other grounds.
Task 3a – Business report of McDonalds
The businesses I have chosen to showcase is McDonalds.
McDonalds is a fast food burger chain founded in 1940 by Richard and Maurice McDonald. They are
currently based in Oak Brook, Illinois. They are the world’s largest restaurant chain, serving around
68 million customers daily in 117 countries in over 30,000 stores.
McDonalds are considered an ethical business as they have a policy in place for each aspect of
ethics. These policies are easily accessible on their website, and explain how the company is ethical,
while their 2020 goals explain how they are trying to achieve the next step of ethics and
sustainability. McDonalds also has a Code of Conduct which all employees and suppliers must sign.
This states their values, ethics and laws they abide to, such as the United Natons Declaraton on
Human Rights.
Social implicatons in Finance:
The Code of Conduct that is signed atempts to make sure ethical practces are observed, however,
this is not always the case. In 2009, a McDonalds executve in Hong Kong was convicted of acceptng
bribes giving a Thai based corn supplier an unfair advantage. In Brazil, government ofcials were
bribed in exchange for favourable treatment from tax regulators. Both cases were bribery, which is a
form of corrupton. McDonalds should not be blamed for these events due to the Hong Kong
executve acceptng a bribe, not McDonalds, and in Brazil, the restaurant was a franchise run by
Arcos, not a direct McDonalds business.
This would impact society because they wouldn’t trust that McDonalds employees follow regulaton,
and that the food they buy may not be what they have been told it is, one example being Tesco and
the horse meat scandal.
Another social implicaton for McDonalds would be executve pay, which in 2015 showed
McDonald’s CEO have a 69% pay increase from the year previous, increasing to $1.1 million. This is a
social implicaton as the pay of the CEO increased despite the company losing market share due to
the struggling introducton of new menu optons.
This would also be a social implicaton because customers may feel that the money given to
executves could be beter distributed throughout stores and existng staf, or could have been
donated to their house charity.
Social implicatons in Human Resource Management:
Human resources are the workforce in a business. For McDonalds, this could be the suppliers,
transporters, in store, or in head ofce. With regards to human resource, McDonald’s Code of
Conduct explains exactly the values and ethics they believe in, while explaining what laws they are in
line with. One law that McDonalds work to is the UN Declaraton of Human Rights. This is the global
bill which ensures that no slave labour, underage labour, or heavy hours of labour are given.
McDonalds also strongly believe in no discriminaton, where people are selected for their skills
rather than race, natonality, gender, or other grounds.
