Ethical Analysis of Johnson & Johnson: Business Ethics and Management

This report examines the ethical issues faced by Johnson & Johnson, focusing on their business practices and the impact on stakeholders. The analysis delves into specific ethical dilemmas, including the opioid crisis, product safety concerns (such as talcum powder and faulty implants), and the company's corporate social responsibility. The report identifies key stakeholders affected by these issues, such as patients, doctors, employees, communities, and suppliers, and assesses the consequences of J&J's actions on each group. Furthermore, the study applies ethical theories such as utilitarianism and individualism to evaluate the company's decisions, weighing the pros and cons of each theory in the context of the case. The report also provides recommendations for how Johnson & Johnson could have handled these issues more ethically and responsibly, including suggestions for improved product safety, transparency, and stakeholder engagement. The report concludes with a reflection on ethical leadership and maintaining integrity within a business environment.

Business ethics and
Responsible
management

Table of Contents
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................3
PART 1............................................................................................................................................4
1. Ethical issues that company faced, impact on society, the stakeholeders, there are some
goods as well as bad ethics that company faced and recommendations.....................................4
2. Explain the theories that can apply on the case study and examine certain pros as well as
cons with recommendations........................................................................................................6
PART 2............................................................................................................................................8
1. Ethical leadership management in both ethical as well as unethical organization culture.....8
2.How to maintain integrity and compliance in an unethical and ethical business environment.
.....................................................................................................................................................9
3. Reflective essay on own experience.......................................................................................9
CONCLUSION..............................................................................................................................10
REFERENCES..............................................................................................................................11
Books and Journals...................................................................................................................11

INTRODUCTION
Business ethics and responsible management means the policies that business follows to
achieve the approval from audiences. It ensures that all consumers and marketers trust each
other. It involves development, management to provide training to all the people who performs
in business. In the business environment there can be many moral problems that can occur at any
period of time through audiences, legal systems and so on. In an organization it is possible that
with the involvement of right things, some sort of wrong things can also be done so organization
has to ensure that only right things are done. The below analysis is based on Johnson and
Johnsons. It is the largest american multinational company which deals in healthcare services. It
is the highest drug company and is still at the top among all other corporations. It deals in many
products like Band-aids, baby powders. (Sroka and Szántó, 2018)
PART 1
1. Ethical issues that company faced, impact on society, the stakeholeders, there are some goods
as well as bad ethics that company faced and recommendations.
Johnson and Johnsons faced many issues which affected their company in a major way.
The lot of pain and they didn't told them the risk of using that product. Another ethical issue that
company faced was the opioid epidemic as it was the health crisis. The company were supplying
the product in excess and due to that people were dying. The company also produced some
Tylenol capsules due to which many customers were died as they were not told earlier that they
have to take the medicine in limit and not exceeding that. Corporate social responsibility is very
much important for the company as they become responsible for all the products they are
providing to public. So, in case of Johnson and Johnsons, It was analysed that they were not
responsible as public got affected by their products in the bad way. (Ferrell and et.al, 2019).
The capsules which company produced was containing huge amount of potassium cynide which
led to many people's death and it was seen that organization was not worrying about the incident
they did to society. As the company were not successful in maintaining their corporate social

responsibilty that faced a loss in their sales as they were facing lot of controversies and that too
for a long period of time. There were many stakeholders that got affected by the controversies
faced by the company. The stakeholders were doctors, communities, patients, employees and
suppliers. In case of doctors, they represented that it was all the fault of government. All doctors
were in the conflicts because they were not been informed that there is a risk in the medicines
company is producing. They also faced the issue of lack of regulation and they were not been
able to give their opinions and were not able to file complaint. In the case of patients, they were
severly affected by faulty hip implants due to which they were facing the problem of not being
able to walk, destruction in bones. According to the report, it was analysed that upto 32%
patients were having surgeries. In case of employees, as the products of Johnson and Johnsons
were having huge risk but employees who were working with the company were facing a bad
impact on their jobs as all the public were rising issues on the company and they were also the
part of organization. In case of communities, due to bad products they were also facing health
issue especially kids because talcum powder were getting applied on them and when they faced
various skin problems consumers stopped buying the product which led to decline in their sales
and created a bad image in front of everyone.In case of suppliers, as they were supplying the
products which were harmful Johnson and Johnsons also faced various bad ethics in their
company. (Crane and et.al, 2019). The company gave more priority to money instead of safety
to consumers. When customers started purchasing the products from the company they were
facing many health issues and many people were caused by cancer. Due to the bad ethics they
followed it also affected their brand image because they were aware of all the risks regarding
their products as well as their medicines but they were busy in promoting their brand. Johnson
and Johnsons is one of the most famous baby product brand so later the company tried that they
build their image again, started focusing on their reputation beacause there were many
competitors but as most of the consumers were having trust on their company only so they
started working on that and stopped the production of such harmful medicines. main ethical issue
which led to their decreased reputation was in the product of their talcum poweder. As customers
started using their product they faced huge health issues which led to ovarian cancer. It was not
at all safe for the customers as it was analysed that their product that is talcum powder were
containing asbestos. Due to this issue many men and women died as they were affected by lung
cancer, ovbarian cancer. Another ethical issue that company faced that they didn't warned the

patients before using their products not only the baby powder but also other johnson products.
There was a vaginal mash implant through which women suffered from severe pain. Another bad
ethic that company had was the honesty issue. They were not at all honest regarding their
products risk. When consumers purchased products they were not told at that particular time and
when consumers faced health issues then they were informed that it had risk. Every company has
some responsibilities that they should follow so it was same in the case of Johnson and Johnsons
but they were not able to fulfill that particular responsibility because consumers want that
marketers should always be honest with them. Due to these ethical issues not only company were
surviving but also other stakeholders were facing the problems. For example, in case of Amazon,
they had both good as well as bad ethics. Amazon has always considered customers the most
important thing to focus on. (James, 2019) As the company was providing all its products at
affordable prices and fast delivery service and through this they attract all consumers but at the
same time there was some bad athical issues too like in the company discrimination wasdone,
abuse was done which led to bad image of the company. In case of Loreal, it is the largest beauty
product company which has good reputation across whole world but the company had some bad
ethics too like it used certain chemicals in their products which led to health issues of consumers
and it affected their rating too. According to the above analysis it is recommended that company
must change the things that are used in the production of products as it is shown that there were
many products which caused severe health issues so the chemicals or some sort of things that are
involved should not be done. It is also recommended that as they faced lot of issues due to
consumers health and safety so they must found guilty and try their best to rebuild their image.
For every company it is necessary that if anything bad happens to the company, then must ensure
that it does not affect their company. (Arnold, Beauchamp and Bowie, 2019)
2. Explain the theories that can apply on the case study and examine certain pros as well as cons
with recommendations.
The below analysis is based on the theory of utilitarianism and individualism. According
to the theory of utilitarianism, it is based on the principal of “the greatest good”. There are some
key aspects that this theory persues like Universalism which means the moral standards should
be applied to all individuals on an equal basis. If a situation would be right for me then the same
right situation should be applied on the other individual. Another key feature is considered as
Consequentialism which means that telling lies and not being honest in some situations whether

it is done right only but the company may face certain consequences also. According to the
theory of Individualism, there are three certain aspects like autonomy which means the capacity
of an individual in thinking and survival. It means that priority is for own decisions and choices.
The another aspect is self-responsibility which means an individual agrees to the responsibilty it
has and build more confidence. The third aspect is about being unique which means person
thinks that they are are completely different from other individual. (Etter, Fieseler and Whelan,
2019)
 Utilitarianism: This theory means choosing those actions that provides happiness
rather than creates harm. According to the case of Johnson and Johnsons,
whatever the company did was wrong and is not at all considered as a greater
good. As the product caused severe health issues to all consumers and many
people lost their lives. Earlier the company has build lot of trust but after having
lot of ethical issues, they broke their trust in front of all consumers which took
over 100 years to rebuilt. Even doctors were not believing the company drug
product that it will improve people's life. The company was not able to do
anything greater than good infact everything was done in an unethical way.
(Endenich and Trapp, 2020)
 Individualism: This theory means considering worth of each individual.
Whatever products company are producing, the organization should focus on
individuals well-being also. As only focusing on their products but are not
considering the health and safety issue will lead to unethical practice because they
are not considering what is good for them. As in the case of Johnson and
Johnsons, company focused only on increasing profits and their performance to be
better than competitors and forgot about consumers health issues. It resulted into
negative way and affected the whole society. As there were many patients who
were suffering from pain so company faced a major disrespect from all
individuals as well as from other stakeholders too. (Manasakis, 2018)
Advantages and disadvantages of Utilitarian theory and Individualism theory.
1. Utilitarianism:-
 Advantages :- There are many pros of utilitarian theory like it focuses on the
happiness of whole society. They improve incomes of consumers as well as there

are huge unemployment rates also so they try to reduce the unemployment. It also
tells that providing harm to other people is wrong, they just focus on making other
people happy. They make sure that being selfish and just thinking about self
benefit should not be done. This theory tries to create the greatest good.
Sometimes it is not possible to make happy each and every individual so they try
to make maximum people lives better. This theory is easy to implement as the
focus is only on creating happiness for as many people as possible. (Popescu,
2019)
 Disadvantages:- There are many cons of theory like focus is put only on one
element that is happiness but there are certain other elements too on which focus
should be there. This theory is unpredictable because no one can predict all the
future information correctly. The focus should be made on present situations.
2. Individualism:-
 Advantages:- This theory believes in freedom. The person can do whatever they
want to do. This theory indicates more time for yourself which means people gets
time to get aware about their capabilities. It helps to develop oneself and does not
focus on other people opinions. It also creates a sense of uniqueness as through
individualism people becomes unique from other individuals.
 Disadvantages:- As this theory depends on independence so sometimes it
becomes difficult for individuals to handle the hard times. There is no support
from other people so no one cares about what is exactly happening. In this theory
, people becomes selfish and start beleiving in “ me time”. So, instead of focusing
on “ me time” they should help others. Interaction with other individuals is very
much necessary because in today's world some situation occurs where you need
support then you will not be able to ask for help but this theory lacks in
interaction. (Helfaya,Kotb and Hanafi, 2018)
Recommendations:-
According to the above analysis it is recommended that, company must follow the theory
of utilitarianism and inividualism in an effective manner. As all focus of the company should be
the greatest good of people, creating happiness and not being selfish. So, Johnson and Johnsons
must not provide harm to individuals and rather than that provide such products which create

happiness and believe in the greatest good. Company must not become selfish, as only focusing
on increasing profits instead they should focuas on both that is providing good quality products
as well as thinking about profits.
PART 2
1. Ethical leadership management in both ethical as well as unethical organization culture.
Ethical leadership means the organization have full full focus on various ethics and
values. There are many terms like honesty, trust which comes under the category of ethics. In an
ethical organization culture, there are many steps through which ethical leadership management
follows:- Be a role model and be visible:- As a leader they should behave in the form of a role
model because employees work according to them. They should always believe in
creating positivity because if leaders would be positive then employees will behave in a
positive manner. (Yin and Quazi, 2018) Ethical expectations:- Whatever the expectations of leaders are from all individuals so
they must be communicated so that individuals also follow. If top management fails to do
something then it will impact individual performance also. Ethics training:- In an ethical organization culture all leaders should provide proper
training like creating seminars or workshops, and give all the details regarding what is
permitted and what not.
 Give rewards to ethical act and punish to the unethicals:- In the ethical organization
culture all the performances are evaluated and those who are doing in an ethical way they
are rewarded and those who believe in unethical practices are punished. (Weber and
Wasieleski, 2018)
Ethical leadership management in an unethical organization culture means to develop the
organization that supports honesty, trust, being responsible and so on. In organizations when
there is lack of ethical values then ethical leadership management creates strategies that will
develop the values of organization. As there are lot of criticisms while working in the unethical
organization culture so the leaders fully evaluate the culture and considers what is right and what
is wrong.(de Bakker, Rasche and Ponte, 2019)

2.How to maintain integrity and compliance in an unethical and ethical business environment.
In the ethical organization culture integrity and compliance can be manged by doing
everything with honesty. As in the organization, all the ethics and values are maintained in the
proper way so to maintain in the future also, everything should be done by the leader
appropriately. To maintain integrity and complaince is very much important in an organization
so all the rules and regulations which are made in organizations should be properly followed. In
the unethical organization it is necessary that all leaders should be honest and then only
employees would be honest to all consumers. There are many issues that may arise in unethical
organizations so it is necessary that both integrity and compliance should be maintained through
making proper rules, creating positivity in the organization. (Brenkert, 2019)
3. Reflective essay on own experience.
According to the above analysis I have learned that ethical issues are very much
important for the company. Without following ethics and not considering values it becomes very
difficult for every organization as well as for every individual too. As Johnson and Johnsons
didn't followed ethics and values and faced lot of issues which led to a great impact on their
company in the form of bad image and also affected their reputation so I have analysed from this
situation that we should never forget about our values. I have also learned that being selfish and
only thinking about ourselves should never be done. As I have analysed the issues faced by
Johnson and Johnsons, being selfish and only thinking about earning profits and not about other
people's health and safety, so I have learned that we should never play with human health. If we
are aware of some risks that can happen so we should inform about it to other individuals.
Through both the theories I have also analysed that we should try our best to make maximum
people happy and provide them with all the joy. According to me, everyone can face verious
issues whether we are employees working in an organization or as an individual too but it
depends on us how to deal with them. So, by analysing the situation of the company, I have
ensured that as we face any issue and we can't handle it alone and we need support so proper
interaction and communication will be done so that it doesn't create any problem in future.
According to my overall experience from this report on issues faced by Johnson and Johnsons, it
created a bad impact on the company and they also followed the concept of bad ethics. So, I have
learned that we should follow only good ethics so that we never face such issues in future.
(Vazquez, 2018)

CONCLUSION
According to above report it is concluded that, Johnson and Johnsons faced lot of ethical
issues because of their harmful medicines as well as issue in their talcum powder due to which
many people lost their lives as it caused ovarian cancer. The company is still the world largest
company who deals in health care but due to these issues they also faced decline in their sales
which led to impact on their reputation. Though company was founded guilty and they stopped
producing such products which deals in chemicals or are providing harm to most of consumers.
It is analysed that company followed two theories; unitarianism and individualism which
believed in the greatest good of consumers and not being selfish. It is also concluded that
integrity and compliance is very much important in organization cultures because a company can
enhance their profits and built a good image if there is proper integrity among whole company.
Due to ethical issues faced by Johnson and Johnsons, many stakeholders also faced issues like
suppliers, doctors, patients and so on.

REFERENCES
Books and Journals
Sroka, W. and Szántó, R., 2018. Corporate social responsibility and business ethics in
controversial sectors: Analysis of research results. Journal of Entrepreneurship, Management
and Innovation, 14(3), pp.111-126.
Ferrell, O.C., and et.al, 2019. Business ethics, corporate social responsibility, and brand
attitudes: An exploratory study. Journal of Business Research, 95, pp.491-501.
Crane, A., and et.al, 2019. Business ethics: Managing corporate citizenship and sustainability in
the age of globalization. Oxford University Press, USA.
James, W., 2019. Business Ethics.
Arnold, D.G., Beauchamp, T.L. and Bowie, N.E., 2019. Ethical theory and business. Cambridge
University Press.
Endenich, C. and Trapp, R., 2020. Ethical implications of management accounting and control:
A systematic review of the contributions from the Journal of Business Ethics. Journal of
Business Ethics, 163(2), pp.309-328.
Manasakis, C., 2018. Business ethics and corporate social responsibility. Managerial and
Decision Economics, 39(4), pp.486-497.
Popescu, D.I., 2019. Social Responsibility and Business Ethics: IX. Green Management and
Sustainable Development of the Firm. Quality-Access to Success, 20(168).
Helfaya, A., Kotb, A. and Hanafi, R., 2018. Qur’anic ethics for environmental responsibility:
implications for business practice. Journal of Business Ethics, 150(4), pp.1105-1128.
Yin, J. and Quazi, A., 2018. Business ethics in the greater China region: Past, present, and future
research. Journal of Business Ethics, 150(3), pp.815-835.
Weber, J. and Wasieleski, D.M. Eds., 2018. Corporate social responsibility. Emerald Group
Publishing.
Brenkert, G.G., 2019. Mind the gap! The challenges and limits of (Global) business ethics.
Journal of Business Ethics, 155(4), pp.917-930.

Vazquez, P., 2018. Family business ethics: At the crossroads of business ethics and family
business.Journal of Business Ethics,150(3), pp.691-709.
de Bakker, F.G., Rasche, A. and Ponte, S., 2019. Multi-stakeholder initiatives on sustainability:
A cross-disciplinary review and research agenda for business ethics. Business Ethics Quarterly,
29(3), pp.343-383.
Etter, M., Fieseler, C. and Whelan, G., 2019. Sharing economy, sharing responsibility?
Corporate social responsibility in the digital age. Journal of Business Ethics, 159(4), pp.935-942.