Retail Food Group: Code of Conduct Analysis for MBA402 Course

This report provides an analysis of the Code of Conduct for Retail Food Group (RFG), a major food franchisor in Australia. It addresses critical aspects of corporate governance, ethics, and sustainability, drawing on recent news articles and academic research. The report specifically examines key ...Read More

Governance, Sustainability and Ethics
With Special Reference to Code of Conduct of Retail Food Group
Student Details
8/24/2019

Executive Summary
Retail Food Group is the meal franchisor organization headquartered in Queensland, Australia. It
is generally referred to as RFG. This corporate food company has many businesses that operate
under it, interacting with retail meals. Some elements of the code of behavior are addressed in
this study regarding the Retail Food Group's present ethical as well as governance position. It is
achieved by explaining as well as knowing the significance of these elements with the assistance
of suitable examples in the field. These elements must be successful for both RFG and other
organizations. It is the necessity of each business in today's rapidly-changing competitive globe
to have its own code of behavior linked to ethics as well as governance. It is suggested that both
businesses and the Retail Food Group should establish a powerful code of behavior that provide
an ethical foundation for their corporate governance.

Contents
Introduction......................................................................................................................................4
Code of Conduct..............................................................................................................................4
Discrimination..............................................................................................................................5
Exploitation..................................................................................................................................5
Corruption....................................................................................................................................6
Dishonest and Fraudulent Behaviour...........................................................................................7
Whistleblower Protections...........................................................................................................7
Enforcement.................................................................................................................................8
Conclusion.......................................................................................................................................8
Bibliography..................................................................................................................................10

Introduction
Retail Food Group is the group of food franchisor, which is based in Queensland, Australia. It is
popularly known as RFG. This retail food group has many companies operating under it, which
are dealing in retail food. The companies included in Retail Food Group are Gloria Jean’s
Coffees, Donut King, Brumby’s Bakeries, Michel’s Patisserie, The Coffee Guy, Crust and many
more. This Retail Food Group was established in 1989 and was incorporated in 2003 in order to
hold a large amount of food franchise companies under it (RFG, 2019). It deals in many types of
fast food items as well as beverages such as soft drink, coffee etc. The RFG is following code of
conduct related to its governance, ethics in productive manner so that the sustainability can be
achieved, however there are some studies that have shown that it is not easy for such a big
organization to have a structure which is following every principle of code of conduct (Herman
Aguinis, et al., 2012).
Code of Conduct
Code of conduct can say to be the combination of rules and regulations for an employee,
individual, organization or group of individuals. It is considered with terms of an organization or
a business, in which the set rules or regulations must be followed by each employee of that
organization as well as every function and product of that organization must be according to the
set code of conduct of that organization. Code of conduct is the set of rules, which directs the
behavior of a person situations. These codes can be related to the ethical values or the corporate
governance of the organization (Yong-Soon Kim & Se-Won Kang, 2012).
Recently within two years, the RFG Company has faced some governance as well as ethical
issues relating to their operations as well as product. By many reports, it has been claimed by
many experts’ report that the RFG is getting deep into many types of scandals. These scandals
were related to poor quality products, bad influences, done by the franchises of this RFG group
in order to increase sales (OsnatBouskila-Yam & Avraham N.Kluger, 2011).
In this report, some aspects of code of conduct are discussed with reference to current ethical and
governance situation of Retail Food Group. It is done by explaining the importance of these

aspects as well as understanding them with the help of appropriate in field examples. These
aspects must be by RFG as well as other organization effectively.
Discrimination
It is a term that is related to the prejudicial treatment or unjust towards different types of people
based on many factors such as age, gender, race, color, etc. It is known with many names in the
field such as narrow mindedness, inequality, unfairness, etc. It is also known to be a process that
recognizes or understands the differences between two or more things. Discrimination is a main
element when one talks about the code of conduct (Chambers, et al., 2013). It is one of the core
elements of code of conduct, which deals with unethical as well corporate governance issues of
the organization (Carl-Ulrik Schierup, et al., 2015). Discrimination can be related to races of
individual that is related to the community to which they belong. It can also be related to gender
of the individuals and it is the most common base of discrimination in today’s world
(OsnatBouskila-Yam & Avraham N.Kluger, 2011).
In Real Food Group there are many companies under it working in variety of food items. These
companies are vast and are rapidly growing. Still there are some case which shows that the
discrimination can hamper their reputation in long run. For eg: Gloria Jean’s Coffees have
reported to get anti-racism messages after an incident took place with a customer. This anti-
racism message went viral on all over the internet (Bridget Kelly, et al., 2015). Similarly, there is
another example of McDonald’s, which got sued by a customer in Virginia due to racial
discrimination. There are many examples of discrimination taking place in many organizations,
hence it is the responsibility of every organization to make some provisions for avoiding
discrimination from their workplace. It can be related to sever punishments, demotion,
suspension, etc.
Exploitation
It mainly means treating someone unfairly or misbehaving with them for own benefit. It can be
related to once job or once personal life, however here the code of conduct element exploitation
is discussed with reference to occupation of an employee as well as of Retail Food Group of
Australia. Exploitation is wrong as it involves negative behavior for the betterment of once. It is

not ethical to make your own profit on terms of others (Sunghoon Kim, et al., 2018). In today’s
world there are many companies in which exploitation is taking place. It can be related to
employees, customers, product or services, as well as core resources of the company. It is mainly
related to exploitation of employees or customers (Jamie A.Gruman & Alan M.Saks, 2011).
Retail Food Group is the franchisor group that involves many companies in it. It is not easy to
monitor the performance as well as other factors of each of its companies in a productive
manner, hence such cases of exploitation can occur. For e.g. the founder of Brumby’s Bakery a
company of RFG, calls for franchise council meeting as it is facing exploitation from the side of
its parent company. There is another example of RFG group in which the franchisee is
strategically getting exploited by not being the part of strategic decisions about the franchise it is
running. In order to get through this exploiting thing, it is the responsibility of the organization to
frame such rules and policies which strictly prohibit unfair treatment of other for own benefit.
Corruption
In general terms corruption is fraudulent or dishonest behavior of a person which can be in
power and the process involves bribery. This is done in order to get the work done by any means,
even by illegally making others to take money and do the work. It is strictly treated as a criminal
activity or conduct. There are strict rules and regulation made for corruption in the organization
as well as in the nation in which the organization is working. It mainly deals with the people who
are on high posts or have abundance of money. They make officials of companies to take the
bribe money and accomplish their task as fast as possible (Ashutosh Muduli, 2015).
In Retail Food Group, the companies are doing heir business for the betterment or success in
future. They are conducting many activities which somehow affects the world. Not every
company, however some company’s management are involved in the corruption. For e.g. There
is a case of Michel Patisserie and Gloria Jean, in recent months that talks about the scandals done
by these companies related to corruption and many other aspects. It is advised to RFG and its
franchise companies to improve their code of conduct, which can help them in improving their
governance activities by following ethical measures.

Dishonest and Fraudulent Behaviour
This is related to the behavior of a person, which for their personal interest based on false
promises and statements. Dishonesty is related to specking lies instead of truths. It is against the
code of conduct of any company or any community. On the other hand, fraudulent behavior is
related to making someone fool related to the situation, product or service. In this way the
persons with fraudulent behavior as well as dishonest behavior have the tendency of cheating
with other people and harming them financially or physically. In terms of business it is a very big
element, as the main objective of business is to deal in things in order to make profits, however
frauds can make this process unworthily by fooling the others (Frank Chung, 2019).
In RFG the companies are there to sale food of different kind to their customers, however there
can be any chance that what ever they are claiming to have in their food may not be there, or can
be harmful for the health of the customers. There is an example of Nestle’s Maggie product in
which for many years the organization selling its Maggie product by knowing that it contains
zing, which is harmful for customers. Still after getting caught they told customers that some
changes have been made, but still they are dealing with the same ingredients. In order to reduce
this fraudulent and dishonest behavior of organizations and its employees, it is important for
retail foo group as well as for other companies to have transparency in their operations as well as
bring strong code of conduct.
Whistleblower Protections
A whistleblower is an individual who, within an organization which is either domestic or foreign,
exposes data or activity that is considered illegal, unethical or incorrect. Alleged impropriety
data can be categorized in many respects: infringement of business policy/rules, law, legislation,
or threat to public/national safety, as well as fraud, as well as corruption (John Keown, 2018).
Those who want to be whistleblowers may choose formally or informally to take data or
accusations to the ground. Inside the convicted organization, including a direct supervisor, a
leaker can take his / her allegations to the publicity of others. Outdoors, a whistleblower can
carry accusations to light by trying to contact the third party out of an alleged organization
including the press, state, law enforcement, or those involved. Though, whistleblowers take the

danger that those that are convicted or suspected of misconduct will face severe reprisal as well
as retaliation (Mary Elector Odukah, 2016).
In retail food group of Australia, its franchise companies for recent years are getting into deep
mess of unethical measures that the companies or their employees are conducting. It is the
responsibility of the parent organization of these companies to bring some rules and regulations
that strictly can help the companies in making a decorum in business world by avoiding all unfair
and unethical activities. Among other cased of RFG there are cases related to whistleblower. Its
protection is severely important. It can help the in betterment of the organization and become
profitable in the long run.
Enforcement
It is the process which make sure that the company or individual is compliance with the code of
conduct. It is a very important element of code of conduct for effective governance of an
organization. Enforcement can be done by facilitating some standards in the organization, that
needed to be followed by every employee ether of top level, middle level or lower level as well
as by the whole organization. These codes of conduct are then managed with the help of
disciplinary actions that are fixed for each code of conduct (Leslie I. Boden, 2012).
In retail Food Group every company needed to follow the set rules and regulations fixed by the
RFG in advance. These rules and regulations are the code of conduct that is designed by the
specialists of RFG. These are framed in order to make the functioning of various companies of
RFG better and effective. For e.g.: Ethical Code of Conduct can be the enforcement that is
designed by companies in order to provide ethical base to each of its activities. It is ultimately
the responsibility of the various companies of RFG to bring ethical grounds in their working to
avoid legal as well as ethical issues.
Conclusion
The retail food group is a very vast as well as profitable franchisor organization. It has various
departments, which are dealing in variety of operations that are conducted in the organization in
order to conduct business successfully. Just as every other company, Retail Food Group also has
its code of conduct, which defines the behavior of organization as well as its employees in every

aspects of their work life. Some elements of code of behavior are discussed in this study
regarding the Retail Food Group's present ethical and governance position. It is achieved by
explaining and understanding the significance of these elements with the assistance of suitable
examples in the field. These elements must be effective for both RFG and other organizations. In
today’s fast changing competitive world, it is the requirement of every company to have their
own code of conduct related to ethics and governance. It is recommended that the companies as
well as Retail Food Group must make a strong code of conduct and provide ethical basis to its
corporate governance.

Bibliography
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