The Issue of Discrimination in Workplace at Nike

Discrimination is a disgusting practice that has been around for many years. The culture and bad teaching have kept this unfair act of exclusionary favor of one group over another alive by means of unchanging learned behaviors, misconceptions and stereotypes. Discrimination is an uncomfortable topic that is often an issue that no one likes to discuss. Whenever approached the subject of discrimination, tends to make people shy away from the topic when encountered. According, to the EEOC (equal employment opportunity commission), it is prohibited by federal law to discriminate against a person regardless of their race, gender, age or disability. Although, there are many ways in which a person can be discriminated against, when it happens in the workplace it creates a toxic environment, stunts the growth of a company, ruin the public representation of the company, and eliminate potential growth talent.

Discrimination in workplace destroys the effectiveness/desire of wanting to do a good job, loyalty of employee to the company, kills longevity, and a distrust for management. Lawsuits are the end results when an employee knowledge feels that they have been passed over for a raise while performing the same job as their counterparts, or for that matter getting paid a smaller salary for the same amount of work. Nike a well- known company who is facing a major class- action gender discrimination lawsuit from former women employee based on the complaint claiming discrimination and that Nike violated the Equal Pay Act by engaging in systemic gender pay discrimination and ignoring rampant sexual harassment. According, to Campbell the lawsuit also describes an abusive and demeaning work environment for women. The allegations have led to a staff shakeup and departure of nearly a dozen top executives at Nike, and a commitment form CEP Mark Parker to the revamp the company’s hiring and compensation practices. The women in the Nike lawsuit want the federal government to force Nike to establish and implement a protocol that evaluates job performance, determining pay, and make sure Nike complies with the plan.

Reformation of current company policy is one way a company must implement in order to reduce the risk of a company losing their reputation, regain the publics trust, and to prevent further unethical behavior amongst employee. The acknowledgement that a problem does exist should be confronted internally in a company before the situation is forced to be handled externally and then legal actions are be taken. Wrongdoers should be removed immediately when they break their company’s ethical by-laws. In our every changing culture a company must remain culturally aware and informed; their ethical rules must be consistently updated in order to prevent ethical tapping into powerful human impulses for moral thought and action. It is imperative that ethical training occur, and employees are tested/monitored periodically for unlawful conduct; the fears of being fired must be removed and actions must be taken seriously for reporting once misconduct has been made known to management. Managers must be trained properly and a company ethical codes/ rules must be clear and understood. Nike has made strides when in their efforts to clean up their act, by focusing on female empowerment and inclusiveness in their recent advertising campaigns, the women who work in Nike’s factories are seeming left out of this picture. However, Nike received a C rating in the 2017 Ethical Fashion Report showing no improvement over the 2016 ranking. Nike was also given a score of 36 out of 100 in Fashion Revolution’s 2017 Fashion Transparency Index, indicating that the company does not make enough information public about its environmental and social practices. Nike simply must do better.