Professional, Ethical, and Legal Issues in Human Services

I learned that in the beginning the Catholic Church provided human services. They supplied services for the poor, orphans, the elderly, and people with disabilities. People with deviant behaviors would be put into asylums.

Ethics are statements written that mirrors the principles of society it reflects society’s views of what is right or humanitarian. However, morals are not written and are codes setting out what is thought to be good enough or offensive behaviour.

Ethical Considerations The human service profession requires a high degree of ethical considerations when working with clients. Ethics are thoughtful professional lists of do’s and don’ts for our profession (Ivey & Ivey & Zalaquett, 2016). When clients come to see a human service worker it is usually during a traumatic time in their lives, during these times the human service professional should help the client ethically over come the trauma. When conducting an interview there are many ethical considerations the helper must keep in mind especially when working with clients of diverse cultures.

In a human service profession should be based on six principles: autonomy, nonmaleficence, beneficence, justice, fidelity, and veracity. The autonomy meaning to respect a clients rights, while nonmaleficence means the professional will not harm the client, and beneficence means to act in the clients best interest. The principle of justice means to dedicated and promote equality for clients and fidelity is respecting the trust client places on the helper for guidance. The last principle veracity means to be honest with client no matter what conflict comes along. In Grace Place I saw four of the qualities of ethical practice as I spent time helping the service field. The four qualities I saw was autonomy, nonmaleficence, fidelity, and veracity. The way the workers show autonomy was first telling the client their rights and letting them decide what was best decision. The human service agency showed nonmaleficence and fidelity by showing calmness to the patient even if the patient did not cooperate and helping the patient trust the workers. The way the workers handle certain situation were great and the employers would also be honest even if it was not in their favor to tell the

Nutritional well-being plays an essential role in the overall health, independence, and quality of life of older persons as well as disabled persons. This nation has a responsibility to at risk populations such as the elderly. Today, there are close to 6 million seniors in the United States facing the threat of hunger. Some of these citizens were raised during the Great Depression, they went on to protect our independence in the Second World War and won the cold war. America's older citizens have been called the greatest generation by many. It is morally wrong that the citizens that built this country should suffer starvation in this land of plenty, which they helped to form. Our country

In today’s society it is hard to find a good paying job. When one finds a good paying job, that person needs to do whatever he or she can do to keep that job. Ethics can be a problem in a workplace if someone is asked to do something that they do not feel is right. “Ethics are about making choices that may not always feel good or seem like they benefit you but are the "right" choices to make” (Curry, 2011; para 2). In the following, I will discuss a workplace ethical dilemma that I have witnessed in my current employment. I will discuss the essential points of the dilemma and how this dilemma intersects with my personal values.

There is a pressing need for a high level of worker/client boundary identification when working within a client population, however realizing a conflict of interest scenario is vitally important when facing a dual relationship with a client. There are so many issues that are faced by a human service professional, explaining all of them may be difficult. In this field there are issues such as burnout, secondary trauma, compassion satisfaction, dual relationships, and boundary issues. (Reamer, F. (2012). As human services professional or social workers there is a code of ethics. In statement 6 of the code of ethics, it states human services experts must be mindful that in their associations with customers/clients power and status are

Everyday individuals are faced with issues associated with ethical dilemmas. Ethical dilemmas involve an individual’s behavior toward a moral standard, which may have been established from previous generations and passed along. In upholding the standards taught individual may be forced to take a particular action involving a decision when a behavior is considered non-ethical is when an ethical dilemma occurs. It can become difficult at times in making the correct decisions or solutions to the situation, which is why a code of ethics is established in the workplace. The code of ethics in the

Jill is a social work student working under her field instructor, Jack, who is a registered social worker employed within Child and Youth Services (CYS) in St. John’s, NL. In child protection, social workers have a number of duties to complete under the Children and Youth Care and Protection Act. These duties include handling reported referrals. This means receiving information from an outside source who is reporting that they believe child abuse may be occurring, normally in a family home. The social worker then proceeds to action this referral, which means going out to observe/interview the family and the child, to determine if there is in fact child abuse occurring (Government of Canada, 2015).

Social work practice is one which would always lead you back to the code of ethics when we are faced with difficult circumstances involving ethical and legal issues. It is pertinent for social workers to always assess a situation and decided what is right from wrong versus what is their duty and obligation towards clients. It is important to realize the social issues associated with law and social workers because the outcomes are different on each of the end spectrum. A social problem between the two is institutional racism in the court and how it is displayed in the practice. Additionally, a majority of social work practice is geared towards diversity of the clients. Social workers are aware of the sensitive culture and religious background of the clients we served and how to appropriately assess each case individually. Social worker are taught to assess client’s systemic environment-related problems to help construct a useful plan for clients. On the other hand lawyers rarely consider these components because their main focus in the court are the facts of the case which differentiate the two.

Due to tremendous advancements in technology the social work environment has changed. How social work practitioners function in the professional setting has expanded through the utilization of technology, more specifically the internet. The internet has created venues and opportunities for partnership and promoting varying interests relating to social work in what is called social networking sites (Hu & Bryer, 2014). It is through the diversified mediums, purposeful dynamics, and integration of ethical frameworks that the existence of social networking sites for social workers has blossomed into a significant presence in operational practice.

Assessment Task - 1 Introduction – “The social work profession facilitates social change and development, social cohesion and the empowerment and liberation of people”. (AASW, Australian Association of social workers, 2015). This profession deals with society and individuals. This aim of this paper is to provide the understanding of connection between purpose of the social work and communication skills. It also discusses the broad range of challenges, limitations, code of ethics, and policy issues faced by the social workers.

The Fear Factor – Humanity has an almost inherent fear of that which they don’t understand, appears foreign, and is construed as a threat to predefined norms. Some classic examples include the treatment of Native American Indians, Afro-Americans, Females, and now the LGBTQ community. Fear has torment and often manifest in bullying and violence.

Ethical behavior in the workplace is paramount to a successful organization. Commitment to supporting ethical behavior in the workforce must be a top priority for all public service employees. The ethical culture of the organization starts at the very top of the organization. The standards of the agency are adhered to across the entire structure through fair and consistent ethical conduct as defined by leadership. Effective leaders must demonstrate through their behavior that they believe what they say. Those who pronounce that their supervisors and street level workers must adhere to the highest ethical standards must themselves adhere to those same standards (Menzel, p. 70, 2016). Actions may not be considered illegal, however if the action is contrary to organizations

the reality in most cases. Conversely, however it is also important to realize that most individuals do not seek employment for purely selfish reasons. The fact is that the truth, as with most things, lies somewhere in the middle. Public employees come from all segments of our society and bring sets of values, which may be quite divergent from those of the organization. Further, the workplace is often fraught with ethical dilemmas, which can threaten our adherence to our espoused ethical ideologies. Each one of us will encounter situations in life that will challenge our ethics and therefore, one needs to have a self-awareness of our ethics, beliefs and values. It is for reasons such as this that the organizations values must be inculcated all employees especially those in leadership positions.