Whistle Blower Protection Act of 1989 Pub.L. 101-12 is a U.S.

federal law that protect workers

against reprisal for complaining to their employers, unions or other government agencies about
unsafe and unhealthful workplace condition, environmental problems, public safety hazards, and
securities fraud. Whistleblowers or any employee who raised concerns regarding workplace issue
should not be transferred, denied a raise, have work hours reduced, or be fired or punished in any
other way because they have exercised any right afforded to them under one of the laws that
protect whistleblowers. The discrimination complaints should be filed within 30 days of the
alleged reprisal (Whistleblower Protections, 2015).
One of the weakness of Whistleblower laws is that they come into implementation only
after disclosures have been made and reprisals have started. Another problem remains when
employers uses subtle ways to undermine employees without any clear evidence of reprisal.
Rumors or expulsion are common action used towards whistleblowers and such actions are very
difficult to document as proof in court. In serious cases jobs are reassigned that changes work
demand and making job wearisome. Hence in most cases it is easy to disguise the change as
change in work environment or restructuring organization. Hence such subtle harassment can
make employees blame themselves instead of direct approach (Martin.B, 2003).
Given the circumstances whistleblowers can collect the data and make copies in a safe
place. Employees should collect data on employment performance. Another practice is writing
concise, informative, unemotional account of an issue, in order to make others aware of the
issues quickly and efficiently. Other important issues remains understanding the company
subtleties, using media coverage, understand ones own motivations, aspirations, capabilities and
vulnerabilities of whistleblowers. The very concept of whistleblowing is only decades old, even
though abuses of employees are as old as organizations as is the visiting of reprisals on those
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who expose the problems. The legislation, which serve primarily as a form of symbolic politics
only gives the illusion of protection, nevertheless reflects social expectations that something be
done about organizational abuses. The materials on whistleblowing approach like books and
articles and personal experience on internet provides a rich form of learning experience for
everyone. Hence over the years there will be proper implementation of Whistle Blower
Protection Act (Martin.B, 2003).

Reference
Martin.B, (2003). Illusions of whistleblower protection. University of Wollongong
Research Online. Retrieved from http://ro.uow.edu.au/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?
article=1016&context=artspapers on October 18,2015

Whistleblower Protections, (2015). United states department of labor. Retrieved from

http://www.dol.gov/compliance/laws/comp-whistleblower.htm on October 18, 2015