Wal-Mart started as a single discount store and has grown into one of the largest retailers. It uses an ends-driven ethical approach where actions are judged based on their outcomes. Wal-Mart's management code of ethics applies to all employees involved in purchasing and aims to ensure honesty, confidentiality, and avoiding conflicts of interest. The board of directors' code governs board members' conduct during business. Managers must comply with applicable laws and regulations. Wal-Mart may need to modify its existing code to align with changes in laws and regulations.

1. Wal-mart cooperation’s Statement of Ethics
WAL-MART COOPERATION’S STATEMENT OF ETHICS
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(28, November, 2010)

2. Wal-mart Cooperation’s Statement of Ethics 2
Wal-mart cooperation’s Statement of Ethics
Wal-mart started just as a single discount store in Northwest part of Arkansas, which
has specialized in general merchandisers with discount stores. Its operations took less than
five decades before it grew to being one of the largest retail stores. The store comprises of
thousands and thousands of clubs and stores as well as millions of associates. Its culture of
ethics o top of the integrity has since from formation remained constant throughout its
transformation. From the start, the retail store has defined who the employees are to the
company, and how every person starting from the management to the lowly paid workers,
relate and treat each other, as well as how to treat its suppliers and clients. The slogan that
Wal-mart uses in its advertisement is “wal-mart. Always love price. Always” (Murphy,
2011). The mission statement and vision statements were written for clients and workers of
the cooperation. The company has used it for the reflection of its main objective,
identifying, valuing and principles aims of the business. The mission statement of Wal-Mart
is "Wal-Mart’s mission is to help people save money so they can live better." (Murphy,
2011).
The ethical statement used by Wal-mart store retail cooperation end-driven. This is
an ethical theory that states that the right practice is one that looks at a certain objective or
the result. There exist different forms of theories that expound on end-driven ethical system.
Amongst the well known theories include; Aristotle’s ethical theory, which states that,
happiness is the end of human practices. It is said by the utilitarianism that the end is the
creation of the most happiness for many individuals. On the other hand, Kantian ethics
explains that, the action that is perceived to be right, if bin it is right and of itself with no
appeal to ends, in other words, it speaks of the end’s kingdom that most individuals try to
achieve.

3. Wal-mart Cooperation’s Statement of Ethics 3
This ethical system is used because; it looks at why moral systems are needed as
well as prescribing norms that are necessary in meeting these ends. For instance,
objectivism accepts its norm of being self-evident, that due to man’s specific nature of
being an animal that is rationale. This is because; wal-mart ought to do good things always
for themselves consistent with their nature. According to the law of objectivism in end-
driven system, Wal-mart has accepted that, it is a store that is sovereign retail store; it does
whatever it wishes to do, provided that no one is harmed. The cooperation has stated that,
by doing no harm to any one, they ought to do, but puts no norm in place for what the
cooperation wants to do. The cooperation believes that, its survival is already determined by
nature and is not open for it to make a decision. The only decision that the cooperation
believes to have is to discover what it has to do to ensure that it gets to that predetermined
end, by choosing the right objectives and values.
The management code of ethics applies to all employees that are involved in the
purchase processes within Wal-mart. All employees that are affected by this code need to be
honest and ethical when caring out their duties. They need to maintain the principle of
confidentiality of some privileged information that might have been acquired during their
daily responsibility. Employees need to avoid circumstances that might lead to the conflict
of interest. Employees need to avoid either apparent or actual conflicts of interests
concerning individual and professional relations. They also need to comply with
government regulations and rules. This is applicable when undertaking obligations that are
in accord with applicable laws, regulations and rules. During supplier selection, they ought
to follow the right procedure and be much fair. This will enhance confidentiality in the
cooperation, (Philips, 2011).
Board of directors’ code of ethics; these functions as a code of conduct for these are
members of the board. Its violation by any member may lead to consequences provided by

4. Wal-mart Cooperation’s Statement of Ethics 4
the review of board member conduct. In conducting business affairs, the board members
will conduct them in good faith, honesty competence that is reasonable, due diligence as
well as integrity. When exercising judgment, they are supposed to exercise it with proper
authority when judging association staff, cooperation suppliers, as well the public in
general. This will enhance respect and professionalism at the work place. Another use is
dealing with conflicts of interests. The board members have to identify the conflict. As a
matter of fact, they ought to remove themselves from all discussions and voting on the
issue. The members in such a circumstance, they are not to receive any gift or any form of
bribes from any party, (Asaecenter, 2011).
According to the manager code of ethics, managers are needed to comply with
present practices and standards as established by the CAI topic to all governments and rules
that are in effect where actions of managers apply. They are supposed to undertake
engagements that are much reasonable, all these aims at improving professional competence
in Wal-mart.
Wal-mart needs to modify their existing code of ethics after recognizing that some
of the laws that are inexistence might be immoral or much inappropriate. As a result, they
have to be changed for them to be in accordance with the current rules and regulations. The
violations of such laws might be ethical, when the content of that rule conflicts with other
laws that have been judged to be more significant. If some individuals decide to violate the
rule, as it is viewed being unethical, or for any other purpose, individuals need to accept the
responsibilities fully for their practices and for the impacts.
The best way to modify the laws is by bringing together employees from different
disciplines in all aspects of the company to form a team. For the implementation, workers
need to be trained about the meaning of the code and its application in the dilemmas that do
happen in the real life, especially encountered during work. Undertaking regular refresher

5. Wal-mart Cooperation’s Statement of Ethics 5
causes will be much significant during implementation, as training in ethics is much
perishable, since is usually forgotten by individuals.
The managers and employers are expected to react positively to the new code. This
is because the former code was made long time ago, and since then, many things have
changed which have been affecting managers and employers. As an effect, they are
expected to welcome the new code. This will also happen because, they were involved the
code drafting procedure. Research has shown that culture has some impacts on code of
ethics. The identification of cultural differences might lead to the misunderstanding of
behaviors and policies that might be improper in an organization.
The code will make the organization appeal as it will have a good ethical reputation,
this in addition will make the organization stick to the ethical code that stands as per that
time. In addition, the code will add to the organization’s reputation. Lastly, the code will not
lead the standards slip away, (Rance, 2010).
In summary, Wal-mart is a specialized in general merchandisers with discount
stores. The ethical statement used by Wal-mart store retail cooperation is end-driven. The
management code of ethics at Wal-mart applies to all employees that are involved in the
purchase processes. On the other hand, board of directors’ ethics is governed by Board of
directors’ code of ethics. On their side, managers are governed by manager code of ethics.
There are circumstances under which the organization might wish to change its existing
code. The managers and employees view on the new code in mostly is positive, as they
view it as their own. The new code has positive effects to the organizations operations.

6. Wal-mart Cooperation’s Statement of Ethics 6
References
Asaecenter. (2011). Model Board of Directors Code of Ethics. Retrieved on 23 January
2011from: http://www.asaecenter.org/Resources/EURelated.cfm?
ItemNumber=11611
Murphy, J. (2011). The Concepts of Vision & Mission Revisited. Retrieved on 23 January
2011from: http://www.calumcoburn.co.uk/articles/articles-vision-mission/
Philips. (2011). Supply Management Code of Ethics. Retrieved on 23 January 2011from:
http://www.philips.com/shared/assets/Investor_relations/pdf/businessprinciples/Su
pplyManagementCodeofEthics.pdf
Rance, P. (2010). What Are the Effects of Having a Code of Ethics on Organizations?
Retrieved on 23 January 2011from: http://www.ehow.com/list_7452930_effects-
having-code-ethics-organizations_.html