Ravishankar (2003), explains internal whistleblowers are employees who bring wrongdoing at their own organization to the attention of superiors. In the past a whistleblower was known as a snitch, or a lowlife who betrays a sacred trust largely for personal gain (Ravishankar,2003). In the late 1970’s laws were put in place to protect employees in private industry, including anti-discrimination legislation to control the hiring and firing polices. In addition, most of these laws had requirements preventing employers to retaliate against employees for reporting violations to public authorities (Ravishankar,2003). In 1980, protection to employees as a result of the corrosion of the at-will employment policy, which until very recently meant that private, nonunionized employees could be fired for any reason, including blowing the whistle (Ravishankar,2003). In the eyes of the court it is against the law for employers to be able to fire an employee at will for reporting unsafe or illegal conduct.
Dr. Jeffrey Wigand showed moral intelligence by choosing to do what he felt was right and overall the best for consumers as well. In my opinion Dr. Wigand took a stance even though he knew there might be unfavorable consequences he was willing to take that risk in order to save or help bring attention and awareness to the tobacco companies. Although, he did not stop the sale of tobacco companies Dr. Wigand still brought attention to the issue and cause buyers to stop and second guess. I am a firm believer in the motto if you don’t stand for something you will fall for anything and in my opinion that is the type of character Dr. Wigand displayed. If I was in Dr. Jeffrey position, I would have done the same thing. I am very passionate about my job and representing my company with the upmost respect, but I could not sit back and watch or know innocent people are getting injured or sick because I decided to look away instead of reporting the misconduct.
References Ravishankar, L. (2003, February 4). Encouraging Internal Whistleblowing in Organizations [Web page]. Retrieved from https://www.scu.edu/ethics/focus-areas/business-et”¦ (Links to an external site.)Links to an external site. (Ravishankar,2003)