Business And Society: Ethics, Sustainability, And Stakeholder Management

Discuss about the case study Business and Society for Ethics, Sustainability, and Stakeholder Management.

 

 

It is needless to state that he ulterior motive of any organization is profit maximization. Every organization undoubtedly aims at earning an enormous amount of revenue and gaining as much recognition as possible in the consumer market. However, in order to ensure that the organization is capable of sustaining itself in a highly competitive world, it is important that its employees have sufficient knowledge about “who” they are, “what” they are aiming to achieve, and “why” are they aiming to achieve their objectives. This is the reason as to why each organization should have a clearly explained Vision, Mission and Value Statements (Lee etal., 2013). At the same time, if the organization is too pre-occupied in making profit to act responsibly in business, he may fail to sustain himself in future. Hence, the employees should also have a clear Corporate Social Responsibility strategy as well. However, in order to formulate the goals and strategies effectively, it is important to know if they are Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Relevant and Timely or not.

Australia as a nation is gradually emerging as an important center of various industries. CSL Limited is one of the very recognized organizations of the country, which is known for researching and developing products meant for treating and preventing serious health ailments. On the other hand, Macquarie Group is the largest investment bank located in Australia that is known for offering investment as well as funds management service to different institutions, and corporate and retail clients. In case of each of the organizations, the owners as well as the employees have developed the goals, mission and vision to know what they need to focus in a given period.

Although often the words Vision and Mission are used interchangeably, each of the terms can be easily distinguished from the other. The Vision statement of an organization helps an organization to understand how the business organization wants to develop itself in future, and as such it focuses on the long term ambitions and goals of the organization (David & David, 2016). However, the Mission statement defines the present purpose of the organization in the business world (Darbi, 2012). The Mission Statement of CSL Limited defines its functionto provide high quality, safe solutions to the customers who are suffering from life-threatening disorders, and the Vision Statement of the organization define the organization’s commitment to engage in research activities that will result in the creation of innovative products and improved therapies that will be useful in achieving better result in future.

On the other hand, the Mission statement of Macquarie is to realize the opportunity for the benefit of the organization’s clients, stakeholders and people, while the Vision statement of the organization is to emerge as Australia’s leading financial service provider, while unraveling new opportunities for the clients as well as themselves (Gurley etal., 2015).

The core values of an organization define the belief, principles and the philosophy that determines and shapes the goals and mission of the organization (Ferrell et al., 2015).The core values of CSL are based upon their commitment to offer safety as well as quality health solutions to the patients suffering from life-threatening diseases. The organization conducts sufficient researches in order to understand and valuate the changing needs of the customers. The organization believes in the principle of integrity, whereby it intends to collaborate with the patient groups and plasma donors for serving patients in a better way.

 Again, the core values of  Macquarie is based upon the organization’s commitment to do business by complying with the principles of opportunity ,accountability and integrity. While the organization believes in achieving the goals by identifying single opportunity for growth, it strives to act honestly, staying accountable to each of the clients. The organization recognizes the importance of fairness in business, and hence refuses to opt for fraudulent options by compromising the standards (Soltani&Maupetit, 2015).

It is important for any organization to think beyond its profit-seeking motives, and to operate the business activities in a responsible way. Bringing a change in the community, preventing environmental degradation, or improving the social condition of the downtrodden people can help an organization achieve greater recognition among the masses (Lee et al., 2013). Herein,lies the importance of the CSR strategies adopted by both the organizations. CSL funds various medical researches and sponsor patient programs, so that they can serve the patients better. It also introduces various educational programs with the purpose of educating the patient about various diseases and disorders. As the vision statement of the organization promises, CSL Limited fulfills its commitment of enabling sustainable operations in the communities they conduct business. It is worth mentioning here that the organization engages in Health, Safety and Environment program which assists it to protect the health as well as safety of the workers, while at the same time, conserving natural resources so that the organization does not have any hazardous impact on the environment.

Again, Macquarie also adheres to its Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) commitment, so that it does not overlook the importance of CSR activities, while being driven by profit-seeking motives. It is noteworthy that Macquarie invests for renewable energy, clean technology. It uses energy efficient products, and it also ensures that the organization treats each of its clients in a fair way. It is important to note here, that while CSL adopts CSR strategies which will assist it in promoting the health of the people, the CSR strategies adopted by Macquarie are meant to encourage the fairness in the business practice (Jang & Ma, 2014). However, both the organizations ensure that they take the issue of environmental sustainability and ecological balance into seriousconsideration (Thomsen et al., 2013)

A stakeholder is defined as an individual, an entity or an organization where he or it plays an important role, and thus has a concern in the activities of the business (Carroll &Buchholtz,2014). The stakeholders mentioned in the corporate statement of Macquarie are:

• Shareholders and investors, who are encouraged to participate in various business conferences and official seminars throughout the year
• Employees, who do not merely work for the organization, but are also offered lucrative remuneration and recognition to appreciate their efforts
• Government and regulators
• The suppliers

Again, the stakeholders mentioned in the corporate statement of CSL are:

• Patients
• Plasma donors
• Employees
• Shareholders
• Media
• Consumers
• Health Professionals
• License Partners
• In-license partners
• Suppliers
• Policy Makers
• Regulators
• Consumers
• Research Partners(CSL, 2016)

Given the mission and the visions of the two organizations, it is important to know if these statements fit into the criteria of SMART. CSL Limited intends to engage and invest in innovative technologies, so as to create better products and therapies than  the existent ones, and as such has a vision that is goal and time specific and realistic in the field of biotherapy industry. The vision is quite significant, and has a huge prospect to be accomplished in future, as the organization has made financial investment for profound research, necessary for the development of the plasma and therapeutic research(CSL,2016). Hence, the vision is achievable as well. Further, in order to ensure that CSL is able to materialize its objective of providing excellent health service to the patients in a given time, the organization has already established partnerships with various organizations and institutions of Australia, Asia, North America, and many more. Such partnerships enable the organization in fulfilling its goal of conducting thorough scientific researches, necessary for the creation of new, innovative products.

Again, in case of Macquarie, the goals of the organization are very specific and attainable as they intend to offer tailor-made banking solutions to enable various organizations grow and evolve in future. With a variety of banking, business and finance solutions, the objectives are very realistic as well, because the investment banks play a central role in the financial system of Australia, with the growing demand for investment among the newly emerging organizations of Australia. The organization’s commitment to work based upon the principle of integrity and honesty helps the organization earn credibility among the consumers who approach the organization for getting financial as well as business advises also (Macquarie, 2016).

In a strictly competitive world, it is important for any organization to set before itself a set of goals, objectives and vision, so that it can develop necessary strategies for the sake of its future development. An organization must have a clearly written and well-explained vision and Mission statement, explaining the goals of the organization. The vision as well as mission of the organizations such as CSL or Macquarie should be communicated to its employees, so that they can understand their responsibility to achieve these goals in a stipulated period. Again, the investors and the consumers also need to be aware of the vision, mission and goals, as well as the CSR activities of the organization, as these help them understand the motive of the organization in a better way. It leads to transparency in the relation of the stakeholders and the organization, ultimately leading to favorable returns for both the parties.

Carroll, A.B. and Buchholtz, A.K., 2014. Business and society: Ethics, sustainability, and stakeholder management. Nelson Education.

CSL, 2016. CSL. [online] www.csl.com. Available at: <https://www.csl.com.au/> [Accessed 11 Aug. 2016].

Darbi, W.P.K., 2012. Of mission and vision statements and their potential impact on employee behaviour and attitudes: The case of a public but profit-oriented tertiary institution. International Journal of Business and Social Science, 3(14).

David, F. and David, F.R., 2016. Strategic Management: A Competitive Advantage Approach, Concepts and Cases.

Ferrell, O.C. and Fraedrich, J., 2015. Business ethics: Ethical decision making & cases. Nelson Education.

Gurley, D.K., Peters, G.B., Collins, L. and Fifolt, M., 2015. Mission, vision, values, and goals: An exploration of key organizational statements and daily practice in schools. Journal of Educational Change, 16(2), pp.217-242.

Jang, S.H. and Ma, Y.J., 2014. The Effects Long-Term Orientation and CSR Activities on Business Performance in Social Enterprise. Journal of the Korea Academia-Industrial cooperation Society, 15(5), pp.2703-2712.

Lee, E.M., Park, S.Y. and Lee, H.J., 2013. Employee perception of CSR activities: Its antecedents and consequences. Journal of business research,66(10), pp.1716-1724.

Lee, K.H., Barker, M. and Mouasher, A., 2013. Is it even espoused? An exploratory study of commitment to sustainability as evidenced in vision, mission, and graduate attribute statements in Australian universities. Journal of Cleaner Production, 48, pp.20-28.

Macquarie, 2016. Contact Macquarie. [online] www.macquarie.com. Available at: <https://www.macquarie.com/au/about/contact> [Accessed 11 Aug. 2016].

Soltani, B. and Maupetit, C., 2015. Importance of core values of ethics, integrity and accountability in the European corporate governance codes.Journal of Management & Governance, 19(2), pp.259-284.

Thomsen, C. and Lauring, J., 2013. Sustainability in a global context: How does local factor affect the outcomes of CSR activities in international business units?.In European Academy of Management.