employment at will doctrine Essays

employment at will doctrine Essays employment at will doctrine Essay employment at will doctrine Essay ASSIGNMENT # 1: EMPLOYMENT AT WILL DOCTRINE by Mohammed A Khan November 1, 2013 LEG 500: Law, Ethics and Corporate Governance Prof. Charles E. Wilson Employment at will doctrine is a doctrine of American Law that defines an employment relationship in which either party (employer and employee) can immediately terminate the relationship at any time with or without any advance notice and with no subsequent liability, provided there was no express contract for a definite term governing the employment relationship and that the employer does not elong to a collective bargaining group. In USA, any hiring is presumed to at will that is the employer is free to discharge individuals for good cause or bad cause or no cause at all and the employee too is equally fit to quit, strike or otherwise cease work. In this assignment, we have some cases/incidents that faced by the highest authority of a company after his appointment and need to take actions/decisions on those incidents. Case 1: John posted a rant on his Facebook page in which he criticized companys most important customer. In this case Jonhs action of posting a egative statement on Facebook is truly unprofessional and unethical. According to the National Labor Relations Board, criticism by the employee over social network site is a protected activity that employers should not violate by punishing workers for such statements. Hence it prohibits employers to retaliate against employees for will surely have impact on the operation of the company. To limit the liability and impact on the company as a COO, I would simply arrange a workshop on the code of ethics and conduct for the individuals working in the company. Case 2: Jim sent an mail to other salespeople to protesting a change in commission schedules and bonuses suggesting everyone boycott the next sales meeting. Being an internal issue within the company, as a COO I will talk to Jim in person and issue a letter to him to show cause why he did such actions towards destruction of organizations discipline. I will also issue a notice to everybody to keep under organization discipline otherwise taking disciplinary actions to those employees who will break the order. Case 3: Ellen started a blog to protest the CEOs bonus, noting that no one below director has otten raise in two (2) years and portraying her bosses as know nothings and out of- touch. These all issues like CEO bonus, appointment of higher authority are parts of management decision. These are not a part of Ellens concern. I will warn Ellen verbally not to do anything which is not within the scope or authority of her Job. If she keeps going with the same gesture or attitude, I will fire her to restore the chain of command within the company. Case 4: Bill has been using his company-issued Black Berry to run his own business on the side- It is a matter of ethics. As a COO, I will initially warn Bill to do such activities which is not ethical on moral perspective. If he fails to follow the rule I will cut off the facility. Case 5: The secretaries in the accounting department decided to dress in black and white stripe to protest a memo announcing that the company has installed keylogger software on all company computers. It is companys sole authority to introduce or install new software or program for achieving their business goal. Being an employee, you can or cannot like it. You have the right to protest it within the rules of company guidebook. If it permits to demonstrate by dressing black and white stripe to protest, you can do that. Being a COO, I must address a notice mentioning the companys position regarding the issue and will warn those employees not to do such things which may lead to termination due to violation of company memorandum. Case- 6: After being disciplined for criticizing a customer in an email (sent from his personal email account on a company computer), Joe threatens to sue the company for invasion of privacy. First of ll, being a representative of a company, it is not a private issue to criticize any customer of that company even though Joe sent the email through his personal email account. I think its not a violation of privacy rather he should be terminated due to criticizing the customer. Case- 7: One of the departments supervisors requests your approval to fire his secretary for insubordination. Since the secretary has always received glowing reviews, you call her into your office and determine that she has refused to prepare false expense reports for her boss. Since the company does not have any histleblower policy, I will send a show cause notice to that secretary to clarify his/ her position for insubordination of his/her superior in written. Getting the written notice, I will mark that piece of paper to our audit department to scrutinize the matter. If the allegation of the secretary is true I will fire the superior and if the secretary was wrong, I will transfer her to a more unimportant department. Case- 8: for being absent without permission. Being a citizen of United States, it is an obligatory duty to attend in the Jury board and nothing can supersede such duty. So Annas boss has no right to fire her. I must call anns boss and let him know the importance to Join Jury board being citizen of this country. I think every company should have a whistleblower policy in their organization. It draws a line to keep attention to each employee that what would be the consequence of a whistleblower on a particular issue as well as the reward. It is necessary to admit that the protection of whistleblowers is only can be ensured through establishing a whistle blowing policy in the organization. In addition to the whistle blowing legislation, it is ery important that policy implementers use a pro-active management approach to whistle blowing that emphasizes the establishment of functional organizational structures and procedures that ensure actual protection of whistleblowers. Among the most important points with regard to a whistle blowing policy are the following: Managers should address disclosures of wrongdoing to avoid damage to individual or organizational reputations and other negative consequences; A pro-active management approach to whistle blowing feature three simple guidelines: 1) do ome groundwork; 2) be professional; and 3) protect whistleblowers Ongoing training of staff handling disclosures will make an internal reporting system more effective; Ongoing review of the effectiveness of internal whistle blowing systems is needed to ensure effectiveness of whistle blowing policy. In closing, I certainly do not believe that whistle blowing policies are a panacea for all ethical problems. Employees should understand that they must be responsible in making accusations for wrongdoing, and malicious or reckless charges not sanctioned. Employees should nderstand how the organization will respond to their concerns in terms of an investigative process. References 1) Information retrieve of definition and understanding of employment at will doctrine from the website www. bls. gov/opub/mlr/2001/01/art1full. pdf. 2) Information regarding employment at will retrieve from the website vwwv. ncsl. org/ research/labor-and-employment/at-will-employment/ at-will-employment- overview. aspx. 3) Information retrieves from http://ethics. csc. ncsu. edu/old/12_00/ basics/whistle/ rst/wstlblo_policy. html regarding whistleblower policy.

How to Calculate Backgammon Probabilities

How to Calculate Backgammon Probabilities Backgammon is a game that employs the use of two standard dice.   The dice used in this game are six-sided cubes, and the faces of a die have one, two, three, four, five or six pips. During a turn in backgammon a player may move his or her checkers or draughts according to the numbers shown on the dice. The numbers rolled can be split between two checkers, or they can be totaled and used for a single checker. For example, when a 4 and a 5 are rolled, a player has two options: he may move one checker four spaces and another one five spaces, or one checker can be moved a total of nine spaces. To formulate strategies in backgammon it is helpful to know some basic probabilities. Since a player can use one or two dice to move a particular checker, any calculation of probabilities will keep this in mind. For our backgammon probabilities, we will answer the question, â€Å"When we roll two dice, what is the probability of rolling the number n as either a sum of two dice, or on at least one of the two dice?† Calculation of the Probabilities For a single die that is not loaded, each side is equally likely to land face up. A single die forms a uniform sample space. There are a total of six outcomes, corresponding to each of the integers from 1 to 6. Thus each number has a probability of 1/6 of occurring. When we roll two dice, each die is independent of the other. If we keep track of the order of what number occurs on each of the dice, then there are a total of 6 x 6 36 equally likely outcomes. Thus 36 is the denominator for all of our probabilities and any particular outcome of two dice has a probability of 1/36. Rolling At Least One of a Number The probability of rolling two dice and getting at least one of a number from 1 to 6 is straightforward to calculate. If we wish to determine the probability of rolling at least one 2 with two dice, we need to know how many of the 36 possible outcomes include at least one 2. The ways of doing this are: (1, 2), (2, 2), (3, 2), (4, 2), (5, 2), (6, 2), (2, 1), (2, 3), (2, 4), (2, 5), (2, 6) Thus there are 11 ways to roll at least one 2 with two dice, and the probability of rolling at least one 2 with two dice is 11/36. There is nothing special about 2 in the preceding discussion. For any given number n from 1 to 6: There are five ways to roll exactly one of that number on the first die.There are five ways to roll exactly one of that number on the second die.There is one way to roll that number on both dice. Therefore there are 11 ways to roll at least one n from 1 to 6 using two dice. The probability of this occurring is 11/36. Rolling a Particular Sum Any number from two to 12 can be obtained as the sum of two dice. The probabilities for two dice are slightly more difficult to calculate. Since there are different ways to reach these sums, they do not form a uniform sample space. For instance, there are three ways to roll a sum of four: (1, 3), (2, 2), (3, 1), but only two ways to roll a sum of 11: (5, 6), (6, 5). The probability of rolling a sum of a particular number is as follows: The probability of rolling a sum of two is 1/36.The probability of rolling a sum of three is 2/36.The probability of rolling a sum of four is 3/36.The probability of rolling a sum of five is 4/36.The probability of rolling a sum of six is 5/36.The probability of rolling a sum of seven is 6/36.The probability of rolling a sum of eight is 5/36.The probability of rolling a sum of nine is 4/36.The probability of rolling a sum of ten is 3/36.The probability of rolling a sum of eleven is 2/36.The probability of rolling a sum of twelve is 1/36. Backgammon Probabilities At long last we have everything we need to calculate probabilities for backgammon. Rolling at least one of a number is mutually exclusive from rolling this number as a sum of two dice. Thus we can use the addition rule to add the probabilities together for obtaining any number from 2 to 6. For example, the probability of rolling at least one 6 out of two dice is 11/36. Rolling a 6 as a sum of two dice is 5/36. The probability of rolling at least one 6 or rolling a six as a sum of two dice is 11/36 5/36 16/36. Other probabilities can be calculated in a similar manner.