Contemporary Issues - Assignment

CONTEMPORARY
THEMES

TABLE OF CONTENTS
1. Assess an ethical dilemma that has occurred with the fields of business, law or accounting. 3
2. Using appropriate methods, plan how to conduct market research for a new restaurant........4
3. Examine equality cases and develop a policy for the new restaurant......................................5
4. Advising the client for arresting in a fraud case......................................................................6
5. Accounting models and their application on a struggling business.........................................6
REFERENCES................................................................................................................................8
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1. Assess an ethical dilemma that has occurred with the fields of business, law or accounting
An ethical dilemma also termed as ethical paradox is a problem related to decision-
making to choose among 2 likely moral imperatives. This is basically due to the fact where
neither of the 2 choices are explicitly satisfactory or preferable. The intricacy arises due to a
situational battle in which following 1 could result in disobeying other (Santos, Pache and
Birkholz, 2015). Ethics in businesses involves several numbers of areas where all business
owners are required to understand the way in which the ethics related issues pertains to run a
business. This is basically to ethically deal the workers as well as the community people. As per
their work aspects, a best approach is to anticipate the issues related to business ethics. Before
any ethics related violation, it is important for the business owners to effectively address the
issues with quick decisions followed by prompt judgements.
This section is to demonstrate about the ethical dilemmas faced by the businesses in
several areas that also involve accounting and law, etc. All of these issues are as specified below- Discrimination at the workplace- It is a foremost ethical dilemma of every business in
Britain where each of their businesses must be aware of anti-discriminatory laws as well
as legal regulations. This is for instance to discourse upon the norms of Disabilities act, in
whose accordance, businesses can be claimed to pay fine for not having suitable doors
having appropriate widths, fails to provide handicap parking and absence of handicap
accessibility, etc. Also, the people who are complaining against it need not to be a
handicap for receiving settlement of $4000 for each charge against violation. Unsafe conditions of work- This defines yet another right of the employees to work in
safe and secured setting where the businesses are hereby required to follow the norms of
Occupational safety and health administration (OSHA). This regulatory standard is
known to govern the violations due to full exposures, respiratory protection as well as
chemical exposure (Olson and Wu, 2017). It also involves proceedings with respect to the
security of innate substances like the sign boards that spins at the corners of the street
with a purpose of advertising. Accounting practices- It is in accordance to the legal requirements of businesses in
Britain, one must maintain a correct practice of bookkeeping. One such example of
breach is of a well-known oil giant named Enron who was exposed for misconstruing
their earned profits. Such a dishonest act severely impacted upon the prices of
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stockholders where a large number of public shareholders also suffered losses due to such
ethical violation. Lastly, the company also became insolvent where a legal act was
framed in the year 2002 named Sarbanes- Oxley for protecting the public shareholders
with stricter rules of financial reporting. Followed by this law, even the SME’s that were
privately hold were obligated to maintain accurate fiscal records by paying suitable taxes.
2. Using appropriate methods, plan how to conduct market research for a new restaurant
Usually, a market research is composed of 2 main measures of data collection namely
primary and secondary. In which, the primary data involves a feasible collection of data by
directly gathering the responses from specifically chosen participants for the study. This can be
done with assistance of interviews, questionnaires, surveys and focus group, etc., where the
regular consumers who often visit restaurants can be interviewed as well (Thompson, 2017).
Secondary data on another hand involves referring to some previously conducted studies on
restaurants to acknowledge people’s choice or company reports, newspaper articles and past
records of eateries in the selected location where a newly proposed restaurant will be launched,
etc. Collecting secondary data is also evident to assist in acknowledging the contenders in the
market.
Below are some steps that are opined to conduct a market research for launching a new
restaurant- Obtaining the market statistics- It is a foremost requirement of carrying out a market
research by firstly determining the factual market statistics in terms of acknowledging
the type of customers and their other demographic information such as age and income,
etc. This will in turn assist the newly launched restaurant to adopt an effective pricing
strategy along with the segmentation tactic for targeting potential set of customers
(Yanfei, Mengsha and Yu, 2017). Assessing potential locations- This is stated to be yet another prime requirement where
deciding a preferable location will be the key to success for the newly proposed
restaurant business to attract large number of customers. Reviewing the state of competition- This is basically to identify the existing state of
competition in the market that will in turn assist the newly launched business to frame
effective work related strategies in comparison to the existing rivals in the market (Zaidi,
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2015). It will also help them to easily combat the competition and gain ample shares and
revenues. Determining a suitable cost structure- It is yet another significant aspect for a newly
structuring business to properly fund the business and invest into some viable areas to
avoid any future concerns.
3. Examine equality cases and develop a policy for the new restaurant
Equality is aimed to assure that everybody has the access to similar opportunities with
fair treatment. It thereby becomes a prime responsibility of the businesses with a special
consideration of the employers to ensure the usage of unbiased measures at work. In whose
accordance, no one at work should deal with any partial measures with a right of working in a
non-discriminatory environment with no harassing practices (Thompson, 2016). For this, every
businesses established in Britain are bound to follow the compliances related to Equality Act,
2010 that was proposed in UK with intent of eradicating any illegal discernment at work. It
together aims to provide equal set of opportunities to the workers as a way of promoting good
relationship among them. This together consists of some of its protected characteristics namely,
aged, gender, disability, race and religion, etc. On whose basis, the newly launched restaurant
can together consider framing their work related polices.
Maintaining an appropriate level of diversity in the development of a new restaurant is
very important because it can help in maintaining a positive image of the restaurant, thus it will
increase the possibility of people from different castes and religions to visit there and then can
enjoy the services. Diversity means focusing on the factors like race, ethnicity, gender etc. It can
actually throw a very positive impact on the operations of the restaurant. Whether it on the basis
of the menu or according to the other essential factors, maintaining diversity can actually help in
making a balance in different operations of the restaurant (Lewandowski, 2016). Also, the fact
that the restaurant should ensure that is the fact that they should not include any such factor such
as paintings etc. that can hurt the sentiments of any of their customers. Maintaining an efficient
rate of ethnicity can help in increasing the popularity rate of the restaurant, thus it will help in
making the environment of the restaurant happier and healthier. It can further help the restaurant
in increasing the rate of productivity. So, these factors can be considered important enough to
maintain an efficient rate of diversity while developing the restaurant.
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4. Advising the client for arresting in a fraud case
If a client has been arrested in a credit card fraud case, then they can be referred to take
the help of the law and policies because it can seem important enough. Without any proof or
evidence, one does not have any right to take a person inside the bars. Having any sort of
evidence can act beneficial for the one who have files the case but without any evidence, it is
quite difficult to carry out any complaint further (Greene and Kirton, 2015). So, if in case the
client has been drawn in some credit card case, then with the help of law, the person can take an
efficient rate of help because evidence is very important. Also, in such cases, there is a
possibility that the fraud person make involvement of some factors that might act as the
temporary evidences but the law and the policies can be used in order to analyze whether the
evidence has actually proven or not. There are appropriate laws made by the government in order
to punish the one who has deliberately drawn some innocent person in a fraud case. If the client
has been arrested for credit card fraud case, in that case, the person can request for the proper
evidence because without the evidence, the police does not have authority to arrest the person.
So, the client can go in the court for this issue. It is because without any sort of evidence, one
cannot arrest someone. So, the only advice that can be given to the client is that they can go in
court and there, they can issue their request that they have not done anything and they have been
arrested without any sort of evidence etc. Thus in such case, the person who has arrested the
person without any evidence etc., can be punished because no authority can arrest the person
without evidences.
5. Accounting models and their application on a struggling business
Accounting models are considered as the keys or frameworks that can be involved in
order to provide a variety of ways that can help in maintaining a sort of balance between the
processing of the operations and services. If a business is struggling in order to make an increase
in their productivity rate, then the proper involvement of the accounting models can actually
help in making the overall processing better and at an efficient rate. There can be various factors
because of which the business may have to struggle and some of the well known and common
examples of this include cost, unavailability of the resources etc. So, these factors can throw a
very negative impact on the operations and processing of the operations. Therefore, at such
times, making involvement of the accounting models can actually prove beneficial in making
improvements and modifications required. There is a wide variety of accounting models and
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some of the well known examples of it include merger model, three statement model, budget
model etc. Every single model has an influence on the processing of the business. So, if in case
there are some challenging factors in a business, the involvement of these models can actually
provide a sort of help in gaining an efficient arte of profitability and interest (Drake, Guest and
Twedt, 2014). The three statement model is considered as one of the most used and common
method as it involves the use of three statements that are linked together and thus help in
effective operations. These three statements involve balance sheet, income sheet and the overall
flow of cash. So, the basic aim is that all the accounts have been connected properly so that the
number of complications can get reduces, thus focusing on a better rate of operations and
functioning. Another very popular model is considered as the merger model which can be termed
as quite more advanced than the other models. It keeps its focus on two basic factors such as the
accretion and dilution of the acquisition. Although for different operations, the overall rate of
complexity can differ but usually, his e of framework is being used in most complicated
situation. Therefore, it can be termed beer o make involvement of these accounting models in
order to resolve the issues of the struggling business and also help in making improvements as
soon as possible.
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REFERENCES
Books and journals
Drake, M. S., Guest, N. M. and Twedt, B. J., 2014. The media and mispricing: The role of the
business press in the pricing of accounting information. The Accounting Review. 89(5),
pp.1673-1701.
Greene, A.M. and Kirton, G., 2015. The dynamics of managing diversity: A critical approach.
Routledge.
Lewandowski, M., 2016. Designing the business models for circular economy—Towards the
conceptual framework. Sustainability. 8(1). pp.43.
Olson, D.L. and Wu, D.D., 2017. Data Mining Models and Enterprise Risk Management.
In Enterprise Risk Management Models (pp. 119-132). Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg.
Santos, F., Pache, A.C. and Birkholz, C., 2015. Making hybrids work: Aligning business models
and organizational design for social enterprises. California Management Review. 57(3),
pp.36-58.
Thompson, N., 2016. Anti-discriminatory practice: Equality, diversity and social justice.
Palgrave Macmillan.
Thompson, N., 2017. Promoting equality: Working with diversity and difference. Macmillan
International Higher Education.
Yanfei, W., Mengsha, F. and Yu, Z., 2017. A Literature Review of Diversity and Equality
Management System. Foreign Economics & Management. pp.40-52.
Zaidi, N., 2015. Equality and Diversity: Embedding Equality and Diversity into the Curriculum-
a literature review (Vol. 1). Education and Training Consultants Ltd.
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