Chapter 10: Ethical Challenges Human Resources Managers Experience in Healthcare Organizations

Organizations typically have a system or code of ethics by which employees are expected to operate and behave with the customers of the enterprise. In the healthcare arena, there are specific published ethical standards that prescribe the requirements and standards of conduct expected from medical professionals as well as human resources professionals (American Society for Health Care Human Resources Administration, 2020). Those who choose to enter into medical professions are expected to embrace this code of ethics in service to their patients. Additionally, according to Dowd (2018), many of the ethical issues faced by medical professionals are emotionally charged, put them at risk for burnout, but also may not impact all the employees within the organization. However, the intersection of business ethics, which is typically less emotionally charged than medical ethics, and medical ethics poses a challenge to human resources as there is application to all employed within the organization (McConnell, 2021).