Whistle-Blowing and Workplace Ethics - Coursework Example

Reflective Portfolio Introduction In this era of global competitiveness, all the national and multinational companies have adopted a fast paced business approach.Analysing thecurrent functioning of the global business organizations, I have understood that complexity in business environment has increased in such a manner that it has become difficult for the companies to conduct business complying with the code of business ethics and sustainability norms.Deviation from ethical considerations has also increased the scope for whistle-blowingfor safeguarding the sake of individuals in the organization as well as the organization as a whole. My understanding regarding recent awareness on sustainability concern indicates that such initiative has made the activities of global companies more inclined towards environmental norms and their social responsibilities. In this paper, I will review the sustainability strategies of the Netherlands based famous furniture retailing company IKEA;illustrate the whistle-blowing activities of Sharon Watkins, the vice-president of Enron Corporations and evaluate the incentive of Chinese companies and government to carry out their social responsibilities. Part I Topic 1: Sustainability Strategies Preparation Sustainability strategy helps an organization to conduct its business activities in a way that will include utilization of those resources which will ensure long term orientation of the business. In this contemporary business era, rapid technological disruption followed by continuous strive for innovation is considered to be the foundation of its swift progression. However, we experience that technological innovation and modernization of business process also tends to exploit natural and environmental resources which lead to create environmental imbalances that have threatened the equilibrium of ecosystem (Fonseca, McAllister and Fitzpatrick, 2014). Therefore, it has become imperative for us to understand the importance of sustainability in order to safeguard the interests of our future generation so that they can also get an access to the critical and non-renewable resources. According to the neo-classical theory of sustainability and growth, the business organizations should aim to create greater opportunities for a diversified group of people to have an access to the means of production and consumption. As resource constraints prevail in the global economy, in order to comply with the theory, the business organizations must start practicing measured utilization of scarce resources in order to obtain a sustainable growth in the long term. Several studies have shown us that sustainability strategy attempts to create long term value addition to the internal as well as external stakeholders of the organizations. Such value addition aims to facilitate mainly four significant business aspects such as people, community, marketplace and above all, environment. While studying sustainability strategies, we should also remember that such strategies are not at all firm specific. In other words, if only one firm shows application of sustainability strategies in its business process, it will hardly leave any impact on the environment at large. Therefore, all the firms operating in this global competitive environment should come forward and collectively strive to incorporate sustainability measures and mould their production and manufacturing process into environment friendly ways. In this way, the corporate will be able to cope up with the environmental and economic issues such as weather changes and scarcity of economic resources through prioritizing utilization of renewable energy sources and exercising environment friendly production methods (Hang Seng Bank, 2013). Seminar Discussion In the seminar, I have discussed the sustainability strategies of IKEA Group. In my opinion, IKEA is one of the best companies in the world in terms of its effort towards utilizing sustainable strategies and maintain its social and environmental responsibilities to the maximum. I have studied the statistics of the company which has revealed that 47% of the workforces in the company, who are in managerial posts, are women. In fact, the company has designed its energy consumption in such a manner that one third of the energy consumption come from renewable energy. My review has explored that sustainability strategy ofIKEA is carried out in the name of People & Planet Positive with a mission to create a better life for people every day. In fact, the company has also installed 50,000 solar panels by the end of the financial year of 2012. According to my research,the company has achieved sustainability in business process through integrating the customers, employees and suppliers associated with it (Forbes, 2013). In the seminar, one of my friends has highlighted the stakeholders’ theory and related it with sustainability approaches. Therefore, from the discussion I came to know that stakeholder theory tends to establish a uniform relationship between the stakeholders of the organizations including its employees, customers, distributors, suppliers as well as all other entities directly or indirectly associated with the organization and the internal and external environment in which the organization is operating. Organizations that follow stakeholder theory aim to establish long term relationship with the stakeholders which in turn help the organization in ensuring sustainability of the business in the long run as well. I was also enlightened with new source of knowledge when another member discussed the sustainability approaches of Jonson & Jonson. I felt simply astonished to know that long enduring vision of the company has influenced it to predict the possibilities of tremendous scarcity of resources within upcoming 30 years. What surprised me more was that the company, understanding the future condition, has already directed the strategic management team to formulate strategies to sustain and started using alternative sources of energies such as solar power to a great extend. Another member presented the sustainability report of Nissan Motor Corporation. The efforts of the company to integrate the business perspective with the environmental and social causes are highly reflected in their green initiatives named Nissan Green Program 2016. I also came to know about Proctor & Gamble and the company’s effort to infuse sustainable business approach that the company practices in each and every step of its operations, starting from production to packaging and distribution. Reflection Prior to the seminar, my knowledge about sustainability approach was only limited to its theoretical perspective. From the seminar discussion, I have come to know about the application of sustainability strategies in real corporate world. Long term vision of the corporate regarding the possibility of unsustainable environmental and business aspect and accordingly their endeavour to make strategies so that sustainability can be achieved in long term, really mesmerised me. Further investigations have enlightened me about the corporate social responsibility and eco-friendly business approach of IKEA. The corporate responsibility of the company is best reflected from continuous investment of IKEA Foundation in child right projects in collaboration with UNICEF and Save the Children. In order to ensure long term sustainability of the critical economic resources, emphasis has been given on maximum utilization of renewable energy resources such as solar power, using LED lamp instead of normal lamp that consumes more power as well as using the disposable and recyclable items for packaging purpose.I have also noticed that the company tries to save, reuse and recycle water in the production process and also planning to procure raw materials such as wood and cotton from various reliable sources so that supply can beuninterrupted and sustainable and to comply 100% with the forestry requirements (Willard, 2013). Strive for ensuring zero waste has enabled the company to reach at the level of 90% low wastage in 2015. I have highlighted a few examples among 165,000 environmental and social improvement initiatives taken by IKEA. The full list of their initiatives towards achieving sustainability is long enduring (IEKA Group, 2015b). Reflection Topic 2: Whistleblowing and Workplace Ethics Preparation My research on workplace ethics has expressed it as an important consideration for every organization to carry out its operations complying with high morale. Workplace ethics is still considered to be the foundation for any business. According to my opinion, workplace ethics helps the workers to align their organizational activities adhering to the guidelines, specific to the industry (Brown, Lewis, Moberly and Vandekerckhove, 2014). According to the report of BBC News (2006), I have also understood that such ethical considerations enhance integrity, accountability and commitment among the workers that facilitates teamwork and higher productivity within the organizations. However, many a times I have noticed that a group of employees or an individual employee deviates from such ethical consideration, prioritizing their self interest beyond the organizational interest. Following the research work of Upshur and Bernstein (2014), I have also observed that sometimes unethical considerations are included intentionally in order to keep the organization’s reputation unchanged in the industry or to complete a particular task easily, without much hassle. Representing financial statements wrongly, bribing etc are widely practices these days in corporate world. However, you must be agree with my opinion that in today’s business world as well, there exists some employees, the ethical morale of whom restrict them from involving in any illegal work. In fact such people consider it to be important toreport all these wrongdoing within the organization for the sake of public interest. According to the reports from Wainberg and Perreault (2015), the system of disclosing the unethical activities happening in the workplace is known as whistleblowing and those employees who come forward and report the misconducts are known as whistleblower. In my words, those people who observe that any person is neglecting his or her duties and responsibilities at workplace or the management is ignoring the health and safety measures of the workers tend to report such occurrences to the concerned departments. This incident is known as whistleblowing. In today’s complex business world, the scope of unethical practices has increased in order to retain the company’s position in the competitive industry segment. Therefore, my research in this concerned area has exposedabout many leaders from the workforce have come forward. Seminar Discussion In the seminar, I have discussed the case of the courageous whistleblower from the American energy and commodity services company Enron Corporation, Sherron Watkins (Forbes, 2002). Sherron Watkins was the Vice President of the Corporate Development in Enron Corporation. Watkins is famous for her leadership and ethical considerations throughout the globe. I have gone through her lectures on how to identify themisconducts at workplace and prevent such occurrences though motivating people to speak the truth. I think through her lectures she attempted to stop the incidents such as Enron bankruptcy in the future (Sherronwatkins.com, 2015). The Enron scandal that had led the company towards bankruptcy came into public in 2001. My investigation on this particular case has revealed that Enron Corporation was first suspected on the ground of representing misleading financial statements that had made the shareholders more confused regarding their analysis on the company’s present status and such ambiguity led the investors loss 740 hundred million dollars in aggregate over a short period of time. Moreover, the complex business structure, inclusion of high amount of off-balance sheet loans, use of marked to market accounting that resulted in inflated financial statements and continuous modification of the balance sheets for showing a positive performance of the company etcfurther dragged the company towards bankruptcy (The Gazette, 2013). What I feel is most commendable that theexpertise of Sherron Watkins to bring forwards such discrepancies in the light and challenges her superiors on the ground of providing theUS people for justice.She sent a memorandum explaining all the accounting irregularities happening in the company to the then CEO of the Enron Corporation, Kenneth Lay. She also highlighted the off the book arrangements practiced by the accounts department that may lead the CEO and other executives to imprisonment.Though she could not save that 7th largest company in America from bankruptcy in 2001as the auditors exposedmillions of dollars of losses and debts that the executives suppressed for a very long time, we still exemplify her courage and kind efforts to restrict such incidents. The other member put forward the case of whistleblowing in South Africa when Marsha Coleman-Adebayo, a Senior Policy Analyst of US Environmental Protection Agency blew whistle against drastic gender discriminatory practices in the organization. As an immediate consequence, she lost her position in South Africa even when she was responsible for monitoring the work of South African government to improve the public health issues. Though in this case, the outcome was not favourable for Coleman Adebayo, her effort to comply with justice and ethics leaves example for the entities in present generation like us. Reflection Though it is evident how Sherron Watkins became a prominent example of whistleblower, I have gone through many news articles and research papers whereshe is criticised on several grounds. In fact, I also agree with many researchers that instead of submitting the memo to the Chairman of Enron Corporation, she should have sent an anonymous memo to the congressional subcommittee so that external investigation could be run well in advance. My research on the theory of whistleblowing has also made me understand that the main aim of whistleblower is to aware the public about the wrongdoing happening in the organization (Whistleblower.org., 2015). However, she did not take any effort to make the misconducts of the company public. In fact, some of the experts are of the opinion that she helped the Chairman Kenneth Lay to outlast where she could have made him imprisoned through making all the evidences of fraudulent public (Kamakshi, 2014). Hence, I will not judge whether Watkins safeguarded Lay or Lay protected Watkins during the crisis period of the company; rather observing the initiative taken by Sherron Watkins I would like to infer that if all the leaders andother members of the workforce started taking such initiatives in corporate, the global business world will definitely be able to company their activities with the ethical norms and bring transparency in their practices. Topic 3: Effective World Approaches to CSR Preparation As per my understanding, Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) is a strategic technique that aids the companies to incorporate the concerns related to society and environment in their business activities and corporate goals through interacting with the stakeholders of the company at various levels (Coombs and Holladay, 2011). As a result of rapid expansion of cross-country trade and globalization, many corporate has taken initiative to expand their business globally. Such companies are making huge profits through operating in low cost countries. Obtaining an access to the cheap resources in such economies has helped the companies to lower their production cost. Therefore, it becomes the responsibility of such companies to protect and promote the environmental and social needs of such countries (Goyal and Rahman, 2014). Such need has emerged as world approaches to corporate social responsibility. In order to ensure their responsiveness towards the external stakeholders, the global companies are planning to establish similar kinds of environmental and social activities that they practices in their home-country. In this way, the guest countries are facilitated with similar types of social governance and environmental protection initiatives that the corporate practices in the greater world. By incorporating such CSR practices, both the parties involved are greatly benefitted. The host country is facilitated by up-gradation of social causes and environmental aspects whereas protecting such causes helps the company to promote their brands images. Analysing the world approach to CSR, it becomes prominent that it is difficult to implement CSR globally because different companies follow different approaches of CSR. In fact, the idea and insight about CSR also tends to be company specific. For example, a company may strive towards protecting human rights whereas another company may put effort to safeguard environmental issues or animal rights. Hence, it depends on the company, on which part of the society and environment it is planning to protect and promote. Therefore, in order to establish world approach to CSR, it appears to be important to introduce government intervention in CSR activities. This will aid the global society and environment to resolve all its issues uniformly. Moreover, if proper distribution of CSR activities can be ensures, not a single societal and environmental segment will go neglected and an equitable world approach of CSR can be instituted as well. Seminar Discussion In the seminar I discussed, how the world approach of CSR has benefitted developing nations such as China. The seeds of CSR have brought enormous advantages for this country as well. I exemplified that by showing the initiative of Hangzhou government to reward 34million to 2645 companies and to save 65% on the airtime advertising costs through establishing official public service announcement services (Hang Seng Bank, 2013). Another member present in the seminar represented the CSR activities of the leading computer hardware company Lenovo. From the discussion, I came to know that similar to Hangzhou government, Lenovo also is famous for its CSR practices. Kind effort of the company has enabled it to reach new heights and achieve the glory of Corporate Knights 2015 award of Global 100 Most Sustainable Corporations in the World. He also enlightened me about this company’s effort to comply its business process according to the climate changes and pursue its supply chain management as well as resource procurement process in most environmental- friendly way. Moreover, the company also concentrates on ensuring employee welfare as well. However, my idea regarding the world class brand Apple Inc. has been drastically changed when one of the members presented the case of Apple’s CSR issues in China. During the seminar, he put forwards the poor working condition in the factories of Apple Inc., the company’s strategy to provide a very low wage rate ($100 per month) and excessive long working hours. He also highlighted that such poor work environment and bureaucratic behaviour of management compelled some of the workers to commit suicide. I showed my remorse to such a big company, for their poor ethical standards and non-compliance with world CSR measurements. Reflection I have observed that in the last decade, as the companies have understood the contribution of nature and society in their businesses and the importance of sustainability of natural resources in the longevity of their business, they have largely inclined towards CSR activities. Moreover, I think the corporate are striving to optimise their profitability rather than maximizing it, following the traditional norms. This corporate attitude comes from following triple bottom approach which influences the contemporary organizations to maintain parity among three attributes such as society, economy and environment. In fact, the big corporate from various parts of the world are putting effort to rectify social and environmental concerns from the other parts of the world as well (Grinstein andBlekher, 2015). In this way, the social and environmental issues in the developing and under-developed countries are addressed by the corporate from developed nations, through their subsidiaries in those nations (Hens, 2015). I’m sure that if such collaborative nature remains in the corporate, especially among the multinational companies, the issues related to resource allocation, protection of non-renewable energies etc. will be resolved efficiently. Part II Contrasting theLearning from the Three Individual Topics Corporate Social Responsibility From the above analysis on sustainability, whistelblowing and corporate social responsibilities I have obtained an aggregate outcome of the entire learning. My understanding of corporate social responsibility is associated with some of the elementary responsibilities of the corporate towards the environment as well as the society. I have observed that the business organizations gain a lot from the society and environment (Mullerat, 2011). For instance, the resources required for ensuring uninterrupted production and manufacturing process are acquired from the environment and natural sources only. In fact, the end products procured by the companies in the market are consumed by the societal entities like us which in turn help the companies to generate revenue and thus ensure profitability. Therefore, I strongly believe that it becomes the responsibility of the corporate to address the issues related to the society and environment (Grünewälder, 2008). Moreover, we all know that such issues are more prominent in developing and under-developed countries as compared to those developed nations. I have observed that the big multinational companies tend to expand their business in emerging nations in order to generate more profitability through using cheap resources available there. Hence, according to my opinion, such companies must return the favour to those nations. Such favour can be channelized through CSR activities of those companies (Hopkins, 2012). My research on the CSR activities done by the corporate in the developing nations such as China and India has revealed a sound level of corporate inclination towards environmental and societal responsibilities. Contrasting the Concept of Sustainability and Whistleblowing with CSR Analysing the core concept of sustainability one thing has become prominent to me that IEKA establishes the best example of how sustainability can be instituted through the daily activities and practices of the company (Fonseca, McAllister and Fitzpatrick, 2014).I have realised why the issue of sustainability has taken so importance in the contemporary business world.According to my consideration, as a result of massive technological development and rapid exploitation of critical economic and natural resources,today the whole world is witnessing the threat of continuously degradation of the level of non-renewable energies and destruction ofnatural entities. Therefore, all the business houses are searching for alternative sources of energies as well as they are striving for protecting the existing resources as well. I have drawn the example of IEKA Group because this company has shown maximum effort for ensuring sustainability through each and every steps of their business activities (Randolph and Masters, 2008). Starting from reducing energy consumption to utilizing alternative energies, I have found no company that can match the efforts taken by IEKA Group (IKEA Group, 2012).In fact, according to my opinion, sustainability should not only be defined in terms of utilization of energy and natural resources. It is achieved only when a sustainable workforce can be attained. Regarding this parameter as well, we can observe that IEKA Group has been able to construct a workforce in which participation of male and female employees is almost equal. Hence, I can infer the comparative analysis by stating that through practicing sustainability, the corporate in turn contributes towards their corporate social responsibility. Apart from all these, in my view, corporate social responsibility includes another important consideration i.e. compliance of the contemporary businesses with the ethical consideration. As the global competition is increasing, the companies operating in this challenging world, they are deviating from the ethical considerations in the workforce (Visser, 2012). Taking the evidences from the past, we can prove that no business can sustain for a long period of time if it forgoes its basic ethical practices in its ongoing business activities.Be it Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc or Enron Corporation, no companies sustained in the long run as they adopted unethical ways to retain the goodwill of their businesses. What I feel in this regard is that, involving in unethical practices may be expected for a part of the workforce; however, the world needs leaders like Sherron Watkins who can put forward such illegal activities in public knowledge. This indicates the importance of whistleblowing and emergence of whistleblowers in the business world for ensuring sustainability in broader term. In fact, we have to consider that the technological progression have multiplied the scope for unethical practices for wrongdoer as well as simplified it. In this scenario, if we consider it to be important to institute sustainability of business organizations, we should educate the global workforce with the laws and regulations regarding whistleblowing, why they should opt for this option and how a small initiative of them can safeguard the organization from collapsing overtime (MacGregor and Stuebs, 2014). In fact, I believe the best way to lead the workforce by examples i.e. topresent examples of companies that has collapsed in absence of any whistleblowers, who could have emerged from within the workforce of the particular company and protect the company from collapsing in near future (Liu, Liao and Wei, 2015). In such corporate learning sessions, I think the most important part is to bring examples of eminent whistleblowers such as Sherron Watkins. Such examples from practical corporate world will help the employees to understandthe waythrough which they canhighlight the unethical issues they witness in workplace.Therefore, I believe that promoting the importance whistleblowing and consequently letting the employees understand the process of applying it in real corporate world can shift the contemporary business world a step ahead towards sustainability (Rupp, Wright, Aryee and Luo, 2014). Conclusion Analysing sustainability, whistleblowing and corporate social responsibilities, I have understood that all these three issues are highly integrated and interdependent. Sustainability is a major concern in today’s business environmentwhich can be resolved through practicing of whistleblowing and corporate social responsibilities. In turn, as the societal environmental factorshelp the corporate to achieve sustainability, it becomes the responsibility of the corporate to design their business activities aligning with social, environmental and ethical norms. Therefore, according to my opinion, if these three processes keep working in this mutually-dependentway, the global business world will also continue to perform efficiently forever. Reference List BBC News, 2006. Whistleblower recalls Enron crisis. [Online] Available at: [Accessed 27 April 2015]. Brown, A. J., Lewis, D., Moberly, R. and Vandekerckhove, W., 2014. International Handbook on Whistleblowing Research. Cheltenham: Edward Elgar Publishing. Coca Cola, 2013. Water Stewardship. [Online] Available at: [Accessed 27 April 2015]. Coombs, W. T. and Holladay, S. J., 2011. Managing Corporate Social Responsibility: A Communication Approach. New York: John Wiley & Sons. Fonseca, A., McAllister, M. L. and Fitzpatrick, P., 2014. 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