Jessica R. Arellano & Yentl Rose Q. Bico BSBA Business Economics

COCA-COLA FEMSA

Vision

To be the best bottling company in the world, known for the excellence of its operations and the quality of its people.

Mission

"To satisfy and please the beverage consumer with excellence ".

This report deals with the concept of business ethics and the code of conduct of an organization as well as the employee of that organization.

Code of Conduct-Coca Cola Company

In the multibillion brand of Coca Cola Company, the code of conduct is summarized in five small lines:

Act with integrity. Be honest. Follow the law. Comply with the Code. Be accountable.

Elaboration is as follows-

Discrimination and harassment

1. Discrimination on the basis of caste, colour, religion, race or creed is a punishable offence and the culprit will be dealt with strictly.

2. Sexual harassment in any form is strictly prohibited. The person responsible for such actions will be held accountable for same.

Finance record keeping

1. All the revenue calculations should be done in the predetermined time and limit, no one is allowed to modify the period of accounting of revenue in order to meet their optimal budgetary goals.

2. All the data in the financial report should be backed up by required legitimate documents.

3. No transactions should be twisted and modified in order to display a different set of scenario altogether.

4. No person or entity should be allowed to defy the laws in order to evade from paying taxes and duties. Everyone should abide by the monetary, judicial and government norms of the country where the business is carried out unless and until the entity involved in the transaction has sold its rights to another party.

5. Personnel concerned should be accurate in laying out the company’s pecuniary details, however, honest mistakes or misprints could happen and will not be concerned as a non-compliance or violation of code.

Company’s property

1. Company has the full right of penalizing the employees who will intentionally damage company assets and properties.

2. No company asset can be used for a different purpose other than what it is meant for. No personal benefits can be extracted by the employees from company’s assets.

3. Theft or intentional replacement of company assets may result in termination or filing of lawsuit against the personnel involved.

4. No one is allowed to get involved in personal activities during the hours meant for utilization towards company’s objectives.

5. No one is allowed to use company’s assets like computers and other electronic devices for carrying out illegal business or getting involved in unethical actions like gambling or pornography.

Company information

1. Non public company information shouldn’t, in any case, be disclosed to a third party.2. Sensitive information provided to the employee concerned by the company is meant to

be kept undisclosed by the same unless there is a corporate reason to share it with another employee.

3. Company employees are prohibited from disclosing any sensitive company data or information even after their working hours, leaving the organization or retirement.

4. No company’s undisclosed information can be used for trading in stocks and markets.

Gifts and favours

1. No employee is allowed to receive any personal favors or gifts from a third party in exchange of doing any particular favor to it.

2. No employee is allowed to ask for gifts from a third party dealing with the company.3. Gifts as a gesture of respect like trophies or t-shirts and of modest value can be accepted

by the company employee from a third party.

Government dealings

1. Gifts of a particular value can be provided to government officials only after the approval of counsel of legal affairs.

2. Hiring of any retired or off duty government official to further company’s goals can only be done after the prior written approval of the counsel of legal affairs.

3. No official is allowed to take improper payment or commodity in the form of bribe from any third party or government official or entity in any case.

Possible violations

Although very ingeniously prepared and written, yet some of the norms of this code of conduct are vulnerable to manipulation and there is a presence of certain loopholes in them.

No employee can be monitored 24/7, hence the major loophole, although it is there in almost every code of conduct, is that a person violating the code of conduct can continue to do so unless and until he is caught which in case of employees with higher designation is highly unlikely.

The biggest victim of unethical violation in business is the accounts department in which the goodwill figure is padded in the balance spreadsheet and/or the expenses could be shifted to a wrong time or usage and in some cases this malpractice is practically undetectable.

The beginning of twenty first century witnessed many malpractices of the employees in which the employees extracted huge monetary lumps from company and utilized it for personal benefits before getting caught, likewise Coca Cola company can also face such ‘financial extraction’, majorly because this is possible at any level of employment and Coca Cola company basically deals with huge networks of clients and employees, so the larger the network the more the possibility of undetectable monetary misuse.

Discrimination pertaining to race, caste, colour, creed or sex is quite ubiquitous in many organizations around the globe and it will be impractical to say that Coca Cola Company is an exception, it happens at various levels, ranging from the time of recruitment to the time of retirement and in most cases the complains of the victims go unheard because mostly the personnel discriminating is present at a superior level and has the ability to lay his hands on various resources in order to prove himself innocent.

Like the case of discrimination, the cases of sexual harassment are also very difficult to penetrate the level after which it comes into limelight because most of the time the person harassed is at a lower designation than the one harassing and is also too ashamed to accept the harassment in publicly. (Coca Cola Company-Code of Conduct,2009)

Code of Conduct and the Fundamental Right

According to John Lock there are three fundamental right which are right to life, right to liberty and right to property. To ensure that the fundamental right of a person is protected as well as the right of an organization, code of conduct has a big role in it. To be really effective the code of conduct shall be prepared and laid down in the most comprehensive way possible. It shouldn’t leave out even a single entity within the organization or without, irrespective of the power or authority of that entity. The code of conduct and business ethics in an organization are guidelines to work in the interest of their own while also caring the integrity and welfare of others the employee or the company might effect.

Coca Cola’s imposition of Code of conduct is considered to be one of the organizations business practice that protects not just the interest of an organization but the right of the employee. Their code of conduct is summarized by the following: Act with integrity, Be honest .Follow the law, Comply with the Code, Be accountable and Acting with Integrity. The right to liberty is not just a political but also a social freedom thus discrimination and harassment of an individual should be avoided and should not be observed inside the organization. It is the right of every individual especially of the employees to be free from discrimination and harassment.

The Companies property and finance record keeping is also being considered in the Code Of conduct. This is the right of the owners and stakeholders of the company to protect their property. Information about the company should be kept confidential.