Overview
We are an organizational committee mandated to evaluate organizational legal and ethical compliance at Johnson & Johnson, and develop recommendations to strengthen highlighted issues. We are going to review the organizational culture and values attributed to the two compliance aspects in your organization through stated mission, vision and leadership outcomes. The philosophy of Johnson and Johnson will also be evaluated in accordance to the workplace principles implemented to maintain current legal and ethical standards to understand compliance and identify opportunities for improvement. The main objective is to enhance legal and ethical compliance at Johnson & Johnson, by engaging proper ethics and policies using available resources to promote social and economic performance in the organization.
Name and Description of the Organization
Johnson & Johnson is an American multinational organization which specializes in healthcare products and services such as medical devices development, pharmaceuticals and consumer-packaged goods e.g. medical kits and first-aid supplies. Since its formation in 1886, Johnson & Johnson has aggressively grown in social and economic scales rising from 14 employees to 134,000 today and extending to global coverage. Consumer health products developed by Johnson & Johnson are developed through need-targeted approaches to enhance people's health by solving their problems and offering a unique experience. The wide range of products from skin, baby, wound and women care products are professionally designed for suitability and convenience. Medical devices are developed to change consumer experience through enhanced healthcare delivery and promoting healthy and longer lives. Finally, Janssen pharmaceutical division enhances research and innovation to adequately prevent, intercept, treat and cure diseases, especially those with devastating and complex characteristics. Common therapeutic areas are infectious disease, vaccines, cardiovascular, immunology, pulmonary and metabolic. However, Johnson Johnson has a strong medical vision to protect the most precious human sense-eyesight through medical research and innovative technology.
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Description of the Organizational Culture
Johnson & Johnson has cultivated a diverse and inclusive culture of leadership and innovation through strategic legal and ethical compliance to ensure consumers achieve quality products, and the organization succeeds. Johnson & Johnson utilizes its large coverage size and geographical coverage to promote a culture of innovation and women's leadership to enhance access and affordability of healthcare products in order to achieve optimum health in communities. The will to develop, science and ingenuity are the foundations of change at Johnson & Johnson. Cultural diversity has also been well implemented at J&J to adequately advance problem-solving potential and generate solutions which are culturally acceptable through workplace cultural diversity and competence. Women are central to achieving organizational success in ethical compliance. According to Sandi Peterson (J&J Homepage), the Group Worldwide Chair, women have helped the organization achieve the benefits, “because women are smart, they're good at listening and they're good at connecting the dots. Women park their egos at the door.” For this reason, Johnson & Johnson has cultivated on women leadership especially in corporate compliance with the current chief officer being a woman.
Mission, Code of Ethics, and Core Values of the Organization
Mission: “Our credo stems from a belief that consumers, employees and the community are all equally important.” Through the mission values, Johnson & Johnson employs diversity and inclusion in all stakeholder avenues to improve the lives of targeted consumers and actively engage, empower and develop the community.
Vision: For every person to use their unique experiences and backgrounds, together – to spark solutions that create a better, healthier world: using individual unique abilities to innovate and promote ideas of change and adequate community contribution in healthcare. Moreover, Johnson & Johnson believes in helping people see better, connect better and live better through the range of healthcare products.
Motto: “Don't think about the product, think about the patient”. This statement helps employees enhance focus on consumer benefits when developing ideas and products with the aim of health promotion, quality and safety.
Code of Ethics: Johnson & Johnson believes in ethical and responsible practice through correct procedures in business. This ensures that the organization upholds quality standards and meets mandated obligations to stakeholders. The ethical code places the patient well-being as the prime responsibility based on interest, quality research and medical interpretation to ensure ethical access to quality products.
Core Values: There are various integral core values of Johnson & Johnson i.e. growth and innovation, investing in the future, global diversity, citizenship and sustainability, and global supply base. These values have promoted the organizational cohesion and commitment to achieving global recognition in healthcare product development and providing solutions to modern health issues such as diseases.
Leadership Strategies to Promote Legal and Ethical Compliance
Johnson and Johnson applies various strategies to promote their quality and compliance core objective. First, the organization ensures the employees adhere to legal and ethical policies such as laws, regulations and standards. Secondly, Johnson & Johnson ensures that consumers receive quality products which are trusted through proper conduct in the workplace and corporate activities to mitigate adverse regulatory actions. Finally, the organization has designed quality assurance systems which also prevent ethical and legal violations which are annually reviewed and recommended by the Board of Directors and corporate compliance team. In policy aspects, Johnson & Johnson cultivates a strict guideline to employees on diversity and inclusion through self-reflection, enhancing diversity and ethical practice for employee and managerial positions. Leaders are responsible for ensuring that employment-related are non-discriminatory, providing reasonable accommodation to qualified persons, creating inclusive workplaces, cultivating a respectful culture and inter-professional or inter-departmental collaboration to prevent violations, lawsuits and unprofessional behavior and practice.
Legal and Ethical Issues
In 2018, Johnson and Johnson was engaged in a legal lawsuit by 22 female employees who claimed that asbestos in the organization's baby powder caused them to develop ovarian cancer. This led to product recall and punitive damages worth $4.69 billion. According to sources, the company knew about the presence of asbestos in the product, and would have incorporated ethical and legal practice relevant to its credo to mitigate the risks.
In 1982, 7 people died after consuming Tylenol capsules developed by Johnson & Johnson, which was later addressed as product tampering using cyanide.
In 2011, various ethical lawsuits led to product recalls due to quality-control breakdown and failures at manufacturing plants. In the same year, consumers also filed a lawsuit against Johnson & Johnson baby shampoo alleged to contain banned methylene chloride which potentially causes cancer.
Various women consumers from 2008 to 2011 also filed lawsuits against Johnson & Johnson's Ethicon vaginal mesh which caused them to develop serious reproductive injury and disfiguration.
The state of Oklahoma alleges that Johnson & Johnson created a public nuisance in relevance to the current opioid crisis which led to more than 70,000 overdose-caused deaths in 2017.
Recommendations to Strengthen Legal and Ethical Compliance
Redefining the Credo Code: Johnson & Johnson can enhance its legal and ethical compliance by integrating solutions to past issues and mitigation measures in cultural credo code. Updating the code will impart fresh guidelines and responsibilities based on modern medical and technological climate.
Adopting a risk-based approach in manufacture. Johnson & Johnson can mitigate compliance issues by identifying high risk areas of production and using proper regulatory guidelines such as from Food and Drug Administration to positively correct breakages and tampering.
Set the tone from senior management: rather than referencing on the code during a compliance issue, Johnson & Johnson should properly engage leadership to train, communicate and engage all employees on ethical issues and ways of promoting compliance. Individual responsibility and honesty in practice should also be central to organizational culture at Johnson & Johnson Company.
Reference
Johnson & Johnson Homepage. How Women at Johnson & Johnson Are Changing Healthcare As We Know It. Retrieved from https://www.jnj.com/innovation/how-women-at-johnson-johnson-are-changing-healthcare-as-we-know-it
