Business Ethics and J&J: Taking the Pain Away Case Study

This report presents a comprehensive case study analysis of Johnson & Johnson (J&J), focusing on the ethical issues arising from the company's involvement in the opioid crisis. The report begins with an introduction that outlines the ethical dimensions of the case and discusses the role of business in society, particularly regarding social responsibility and ethical decision-making. Part 1(a) identifies the key issues, including unethical marketing practices, manipulation of scientific findings, and the impact on stakeholders such as customers, employees, investors, and the community. It also provides examples of good and bad ethical practices, drawing comparisons with other companies like Procter & Gamble and Volkswagen. Recommendations are provided to guide J&J toward ethical conduct. Part 1(b) delves into ethical theories, specifically utilitarianism and the ethics of care, and applies them to the issues faced by J&J, discussing the pros and cons of each theory and suggesting improvements. Part 2 includes a reflective essay. The report concludes with a summary of the findings and recommendations, emphasizing the importance of ethical practices for business sustainability and societal well-being. The references section provides a list of sources used in the report.

Case study: Johnson & Johnson:
Taking the pain away.

TABLE OF CONTENTS
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................1
PART 1(a)........................................................................................................................................1
1. Issues in case study.................................................................................................................1
2. Role of business in society......................................................................................................1
3. Stakeholders............................................................................................................................2
4. Examples of good or bad ethics..............................................................................................3
5. Recommendations...................................................................................................................3
PART 1 (b).......................................................................................................................................4
a) Ethical Theories......................................................................................................................4
b. Applying theories to issues.....................................................................................................4
c. Pros and cons of theories.........................................................................................................5
d. Improvements..........................................................................................................................5
PART 2............................................................................................................................................6
Reflective essay...........................................................................................................................6
CONCLUSION................................................................................................................................7
REFERENCES................................................................................................................................9

INTRODUCTION
Business ethics and social responsibility are considered as one of the important issues for
any company and it is really important for organisations to consider this factor while making any
business decision. Present report is based on the case study of Johnson and Johnson which was
fined in Oklahoma, to $572 million to state in order to mitigate the effects which state was
dealing with an opioids addiction crisis (Guerci and et.al., 2015). So, J&J was involved in
violating some ethical concerns in order to achieve profits. Present report discusses about the
issues in the case study and the role of business towards society and also discusses about various
ethical theories and their pros and cons. Also, this report also includes the reflective essay.
PART 1(a)
1. Issues in case study
This case study is based on the case of Johnson and Johnson, company had to pay a huge
fine ad firm was engaged in unethical business activities. Company was made liable to pay a
fine of $ 572 million to state as it was involved in selling of opioid products to relieve its
customers from pain. Use of opioids in their products has resulted in addiction of customers to it
which is considered as one of the major issue. It has been report by CNN that approximately 1.7
million people in United States have suffered from this substance and this has resulted a disorder
among individuals (Crane and et.al., 2019). Another major issue is that J&J was trying to make
profits by using unethical business activities, it has used different marketing strategies to
convince people about its products in order make them to buy the product. Another issue was
that various companies including J&J has been successful in persuading doctors to prescribe
these patients to use J&J products in order to get relief from pain which was another ethical
misconduct by the company. There were a clear case of questionable marketing practices which
was used by J&J in order to motivate customers to buy products. Also, there were the
manipulation of scientific findings and doctors were put in a clear conflicting interests (Crane
and et.al., 2019).
2. Role of business in society
Major role of business in the society is to produce and distribute products to satisfy their
customer is an effective manner. It is not only for making profit but to make positive
contribution towards the society (Davies, 2016) . J&J is affected the society to great extent, for
example it has affected the people in a negative manner as it has made the people addicted to
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opioids which is not good for society though they are finding relief for this drugs but is also
affecting their health (Swanson and Frederick, 2016). This has developed a negative perception
among the customers which can also result decrease in customer loyalty. Using opioids has
resulted in opioids addiction among the people, this has affected brand image of firm badly.
Also, one major factor is profitability, this issue will decrease the customer base of J&J which
will decrease the profitability of the company to higher extent. Besides using questionable
marketing strategies to attract and motivate customers to buy their products, this has also
affected the society in negative way for example their marketing strategies made society believe
that people gets relief from the product eventually it was non-beneficial for them which only
resulted in addiction (Strobel, Tumasjan and Welpe, 2015). Also, this issue has also affected the
society in a negative manner. for example, J&J involved doctors and have manipulated the
research findings which can result in disbelief among the people in doctor's prescription and
people won't believe in research finding which is not good for society and for the company as
well (Jamali, El Dirani and Harwood, 2015). This issue has created a major problem not only to
people but to its business as well. This issue has made society more addicted to drugs, which
have a negative effect on current and future generations who so ever are prescribed with such
products.
3. Stakeholders
There are various stakeholders which are affected by this issue :
Customers: They are the main stakeholder those who are been affected by this issue as they
have become addicted to these drugs which is affecting health of people and quality of living.
Employees: This issue have also affected employees as they feel that they have been involved in
making the society addicted to drugs and which has also decreased the value of company for
them (Davies, 2016).
Investors: These stakeholders are the backbone of the company it can affect the investors in
various ways for example they may not make investments in the company for the future (Guest,
2017).
Suppliers and Vendors: Suppliers and vendors may face loss as other companies may stop
buying raw materials from them which may result in the loss (Quarshie, Salmi and Leuschner,
2016).
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Community: This is a major stakeholder which has been negatively affected by this issues, this
issues has made the society a opioid addict which may not be good for future generations and
society will be engulfed drugs (Kaptein, 2017).
4. Examples of good or bad ethics
One of the best example of good ethics is given by Procter and Gamble which has issued
a report which outlines the company is focusing on the ethical practices in the organisation.
Company is focusing on mitigating the issues of gender inequality within the organisation which
is a good example for good ethics (Atiyeh, 2019). Another example is that P&G has been able to
achieve the goal of reducing its energy consumption by 20 percent and was achieved
successfully. Another example of good ethics is that main focus of the company is to offer
quality products and keep their promises (Voegtlin and Greenwood, 2016). So, the lesson which
can be learned form this is that ethical practices are really important for a company to adopt
which can help the company to gain competitive advantage.
One of the best example of bad ethics is Volkswagen emission scandal, which began in
September, 2015 as company installed emission software in half a million diesel cars and 10.5
million cars across the world but it was called a defeat device for the company. These diesel cars
violated all the federal emission levels and was fined more than 30 billion Euros. Even it was
admitted by employees of the company that company was manipulating 11 million vehicles in
order to fool the testing process (Burns, 2019). This is considered as one of the worst ethical
misconduct in the history of automobile sector. In this case Oliver Schmidt was fined with $
400,000 fine and seven years of imprisonment (Kaptein, 2017) . So, this means that before
launching a product there should be proper testing of products before launching a product
otherwise it may be harmful for the company's brand image and profitability.
5. Recommendations
 It is recommended that J&J should follow its ethical policies and practices in order to
influence its customers.
 If company adopts unethical practices it can harm its brand image of the company and
can also impact the profitability of the business of the company. So, it is really important
for J&J to take care of its image by re-framing its existing policies and practices.
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 In order to satisfy its customers it is vital for the organisation to use ethical conducts and
produce the products which can benefit the customers for long-term (Quarshie, Salmi
and Leuschner, 2016).
 It is also recommended that investors should keep check on the business activities that a
company is involved in.
 Also, employees of the organisation can get involved in various ethical practices and can
help the company to come out of the issue.
PART 1 (b)
a) Ethical Theories
In order to over come the issue of misconduct, there are various theories which can be
adopted by J&J which can help the company to carry out the ethical practices in their business.
The two important theories which can be adopted by the company are as follows:
Utilitarianism: It is moral theory which is based on the actions that a company should get
involved, it should spread happiness or pleasure. Also, company should reject all the actions
which may cause unhappiness or any sort of harm to customers. This philosophy was developed
to direct the organisation to make effective economic or social decisions in order to make society
better. (Utilitarian Theories, 2019).
Ethics of care: This is also one of the best ethical theory which can be adopted by J&J, as
this theory is based on the cluster of normative ethical theories which were developed by
feminist within second century. This theory uses a contextual and relational bound approach
towards decision making and morality. This theory highlights various theories which depend on
the principles for highlighting the moral actions the theories may be justice, utilitarianism,
Kantian deontology etc. This theory is based on the belief that caring is the foundation of
morality, without care there is no morality. So, this theory can also be adopted by J&J in order to
improve its business practices which can be beneficial for the organisation in various ways
(Utilitarian Theories, 2019).
b. Applying theories to issues
As J&J has been involved in various misconducts by using opioids as pain relief to
customers has also manipulated the scientific findings and used questionable marketing
strategies in order to achieve profits. With the help of utilitarianism philosophy, J&J can
overcome the issue according this philosophy, company get involved in those actions or business
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operation which can help in spreading happiness and reject all the actions which can harm the
society. This means that J&J has stop using opioids as it is just harming the society and people
living there. So, it is really important for the company to produce a substitute products which can
prove beneficial for the company and for the customers as well. Company has to implement the
strategies which can promote good for the people living in the society and should take the
decision related to the issue which can benefit company as well as the society (Quarshie, Salmi
and Leuschner, 2016).
Another theory which can be applied to the issue is ethics of care, according to this
theory company need to take of the society in which it is operating for this it is really important
to high the moral actions. These actions may include the strategies which can help the company
in to mitigate the problems faced the people. Also, company should develop a set of relationship
which can help the company to overcome issue like supporting people to decreasing the
addiction due opioids. So, with the help of these theories company can improve its ethical
business practices (Crane and et.al., 2019).
c. Pros and cons of theories
On of the major advantage of the Utilitarianism is that by providing and promoting
happiness can be beneficial for the organisation as it can increase intrinsic and extrinsic value of
the organisation. It will allow the company to follow the right course of actions which can lead to
benefit to the society and people living in it. This can resulted in good for society as it rejects all
the actions which can provide harm to the society. One of the major disadvantage of this theory
is it does not consider any other element besides happiness like it ignore lots of life experience.
Another disadvantage it can create unrealistic perspective within the society which may not be
possible to achieve in real life (Kaptein, 2017).
One of the major benefit of ethics of care is the it can humanise business ethics by
centring the thought on the real people but one of the major disadvantage is that it threatens in
devolving into the tribalism.
d. Improvements
With the help of utilitarianism company can make various imprisonments within its
products and services which can help J&J in improving its business practices and ethical
conducts. J&J should get involved in the activities which can promote happiness within the
society like production of goods and services which produce a real solution the problems of the
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people living in the society (Quarshie, Salmi and Leuschner, 2016). Also, it needs to reject all
the activities or actions which can harm people physically and mentally. So, based on this theory
it is recommended to quit using opioids in their products which is harming society. As per the
theory of ethics of care, it is recommended to J&J that it should focus on the moral regulations
from individual towards the network of social relationships. It is also suggested developing a
strategy in order to develop a strong connection within the society which can become people
closer with the company (Burns, 2019).
PART 2
Reflective essay
Ethical leadership management can be defined as management of conduct as well as
collaboration within the team it can also demonstrates various conducts of common good which
is acceptable in the society and is appropriate within the area of life. It is really important to have
an ethical leader within the unethical organisational culture as it can help the organisation in
guiding towards the ethical practices (Crane and et.al., 2019). With the help of ethical leadership
management, company can focus on ethical activities of the organisation by following and
adopting this ethical standards in order to solve various issues of the society. Ethical
management is really important for unethical organisation as it is really important to teach
employees how to follow and deal with the ethical dilemma and issues faced by them. It also acts
as a tool of communication between the organisation and society where employees and people
can feel comfortable in speaking in public about the ethical issues. With the help of ethical
management, company can increase the well-being of employees and people in the society which
can be beneficial and profitable for the company (Burns, 2019).
It is really important for the company to maintain the integrity and the compliance within
ethical environment of business as it can help in smooth operations of the business with facing
trouble due ethical misconduct. Company can maintain the integrity and compliance by adopting
and following the ethical practices in order to solve various problems of the society. Also,
company can talk about the importance of business ethics within the business environment which
can employees and customers realise that company is serious about the ethical issues and really
want to support the society in solving social problems (Crane and et.al., 2019). Also, company
can maintain the integrity by keeping the employees adequately informed about the issues which
can impact theme. By informing employees about the issues, employee can show their interest
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towards the ethical practices. Also, in order to maintain the integrity it is very important for the
company to uphold their promises as well as commitments to their customer and stakeholders. If
any company fails to uphold their promises it can affect the company image which can result in
the loss of the organisation (Atiyeh 2019).
I worked in a company where I saw that there are several unethical practices was been
followed. This was because of ineffective practices were followed. Also, I noticed that staff was
also not concerned about those ethical practices. I noticed that they were not providing quality
services to customers. In that they were only solving problems but to some extent. It means
issues were solved in such a way that after some time again that same problem occurred. Thus, I
noticed that this was unethical way of solving issues.
Apart from it, I observed that in manufacturing product, company mixed some chemical
substance to make it of high quality. Through this, product features were improved. Also, many
customers were highly attracted towards buying those products. Thus, in order to retain them
they followed unethical practice. Moreover, I realised that the management was biased in giving
rewards to staff. They only gave high rewards to those who were favourite of managers. So,
there was no focus on equality. Hence, biasness was observed as it led to decrease in employee
satisfaction. It has impacted on their performance as well. I felt that organisation was following
various unethical practices. Along with it, discrimination was done among them as well. In that I
observed that male were given more preference than female. For growth opportunity and
promotion, male staff were selected over female. So, it clearly showed discrimination in that.
This resulted in conflicts among management (Crane and et.al., 20190.
So, it can be concluded that ethical leadership is really important for any company to
maintain the integrity and within the unethical leadership environment. It can also be concluded
that ethical leadership management can help in effective management of business practices.
CONCLUSION
It can be summarised that a company may face different ethical issues while operating
business but it is really important for the company to minimise these issues. Also, business play
an important role in the society as its business decisions can affect the society and various
stakeholders of the company. There are various theories which can be adopted by an organisation
in order to carry out its ethical practices but there are various advantages and disadvantages
associated with these theories. It can also be concluded that ethical management can play an
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important role within the unethical organisational culture as it can act as guide for carying out
ethical practices in the organisation.
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REFERENCES
Books & Journals
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the age of globalization. Oxford University Press.
Davies, P. W., 2016. Current issues in business ethics. Routledge.
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sustainability on organizational ethical climates: An employee perspective. Journal of
Business Ethics. 126(2). pp.325-342.
Guest, D. E., 2017. Human resource management and employee well‐being: Towards a new
analytic framework. Human Resource Management Journal. 27(1). pp.22-38.
Jamali, D. R., El Dirani, A.M. and Harwood, I.A., 2015. Exploring human resource management
roles in corporate social responsibility: the CSR‐HRM co‐creation model. Business
Ethics: A European Review, 24(2), pp.125-143.
Kaptein, M., 2017. The battle for business ethics: A struggle theory. Journal of Business
Ethics. 144(2). pp.343-361.
Quarshie, A. M., Salmi, A. and Leuschner, R., 2016. Sustainability and corporate social
responsibility in supply chains: The state of research in supply chain management and
business ethics journals. Journal of Purchasing and Supply Management. 22(2). pp.82-
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Strobel, M., Tumasjan, A. and Welpe, I., 2015. Do business ethics pay off?. Zeitschrift für
Psychologie/Journal of Psychology.
Swanson, D.L. and Frederick, W.C., 2016. Denial and leadership in business ethics
education. Business ethics: New challenges for business schools and corporate leaders,
pp.222-240.
Voegtlin, C. and Greenwood, M., 2016. Corporate social responsibility and human resource
management: A systematic review and conceptual analysis. Human Resource
Management Review. 26(3). pp.181-197.
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Burns J. B., 2019. P&G advertising, workplace reflect how ‘we can be a positive force for good,’
CEO says. [Online]. Available Through:
<https://www.bizjournals.com/cincinnati/news/2016/12/15/p-g-advertising-workplace-
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