Discuss about the Reciprocity and Stakeholder Responsibility.
Walmart is a multinational corporation, which operates as departmental stores, grocery stores or hypermarkets (Walmart.com. 2017) It is situated in America and having its headquarter at Bentoville. It was found in the year 1969 and was founded by Sam Walton. It has its wings in the other countries as well. By revenue, Walmart is said to be the world’s largest company and the supermarket is also having the largest private employer in the world. The business is family owned as the family of the Walton is controlling the company. It is also regarded as the largest grocery store in United States. By taking into account the business environment, the firm is as well looking forward to set up their branch in Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (Walmart.com. 2017; Laszlo et al.2012).
With the services of Walmart, one can find smarter solutions for everyday’s life at a very low price. The service of the Walmart can induce memories to life through the photo services, photo cards and albums and this even would not hurt the budget (Walmart.com. 2017). The Walmart through their services also take care of health of customers and their families. The Walmart’s grocery service can come in use while one can online order the groceries, even the pantry and food staples would be handpicked by the Walmart associate (Laszlo et al.2012).
The strategic decision of the company is also a direct understanding of the business or the mission of the company. The mission of the Walmart is “Saving people so that they can live better”. This statement at the same time is similar to the slogan of the company “Save money. Live Better” (Laszlo et al.2012). Through the statement of the business makes the business in today’s world much better and this statement as well looks forward to make the company better tomorrow. It is being the largest retail store in the world, it means more than 260 million customers each and every week (Walmart.com. 2017).
The company owes its success to the founder’s idea, Sam Walton. These ideas are being taken into consideration as the vision statement of the company (Fassin 2012). It focuses on becoming the best retailer in the minds and hearts of both employees and consumers. The company has set its aim to achieve the topmost position in the retail industry (Walmart.com. 2017). Based on the current situation of the company, the firm has fulfilled to become the best retailer as mentioned in the vision statement. The vision of Walmart also indicate the hearts and minds of the people, which matter the most in the sphere of business, that is to say both employees and consumers. Realistically, the company has influenced the consumer’s minds based on the financial benefits.
The probable stakeholders for Walmart in KSA are having their different levels of priority. The following are the group of stakeholders who are arranged according to the priority and they are
Investors: Investors always take interest in the profits. They demand that the Walmart to earn more profits, which would convert to dividends of the higher, rate or share of per earnings. In relation, the investors are taking interest in minimizing the cost of operations of the company. Walmart gives importance to the investors and this is why, the company would continue to minimize cost by minimizing wages (Walmart.com. 2017).
Customers: They are basically included in the group of stakeholder in the business forum. In the case of Walmart, customers take part in buying things in low prices as long as these goods have the quality of acceptability (Walmart.com. 2017). This is quite visible among the American consumers. The company in KSA has to address the interest of the customers as the stakeholders. The company through the maintenance of cost leadership involves while offering the lowest possible prices to their customers.
Employees: The employees of the Walmart are also considered as an important stakeholder. The employees working in the organization opt for two prime interests such as higher wages and security of jobs. The company would provide in KSA, programs and policies which would provide a greater or the considerable degree of job security (Walmart.com. 2017).
Suppliers: Suppliers are interested in achieving their products sold at the stores of Walmart in a more profitable way. This interest incorporates not only the selling of the products of the suppliers but also the selling of the products at profitable rates. Suppliers are in the bottom in terms of stakeholders at the priority level of Walmart (Walmart.com. 2017; Freeman and Moutchink 2013).
The different types of planning in the different levels of management incorporate strategically, tactical, and operational. Operational plans are required to attain the tactical strategies, which leads to the development of the goals of organization.
The goal of the Walmart would be sustainability goals as KSA always look forward for the environmental sustainability and the goals are described in SMART procedure.
Kingdom of Saudi Arabia develops comprehensive approaches and strategies that take into account all the elements, critical in nature, which is required for the organizational success. Accordingly, Value chain analysis of the Walmart can be utilized in this case
Primary activities:
Inbound logistics: KSA believes in punctuality and against this that the suppliers of the Walmart would be responsible for giving materials on time. The Walmart at the same time would also apply a code of conduct for the suppliers. The Walmart always focused on the long term relationships for the serious sourcing and keeping the prices low (Gereffi and Fernandez 2016; Wallmart.com 2017).
Operations: Walmart has targeted to create more than 100 retail stores in the KSA. There wuld be 100 Walmart stores in a small format and later on the firm has opened 700 neighborhood markets in KSA.
Outbound logistics: At the main centre of the Walmart’s Inventory management technique practices is known by the name cross docking (Gereffi and Fernandez 2016). The products that have been received from the suppliers would be cross- docked at the centre of distribution and then it would be forwarded to the stores. This would keep the transportation and inventory costs low and cuts down.
Marketing and Sales: The Walmart needs to keep in account the living standard of KSA and can increase their cost of their items. The strategy of low price is an essential part of the marketing of Walmart. For the promotional activities, Walmart can use the promotion of brands (Gereffi and Fernandez 2016).
Technology: From the point of technologies, Walmart has made the supply chain management as well as the customer care services. From the smarter apps to the e-commerce websites, the Walmart can obtain the use of technology in order to gain improvements (Walmart.com 2017).
HR management: The company faced several criticisms for the poor HR practices. In KSA, it can promote people who are having better pay and higher responsibilities.
Procurement: As the strategy of the market of KSA is to maintain relationships with the suppliers in order to maintain its cost, the Walmart there must follow the same rules and procedures with the suppliers (Walmart.com 2017).
The Walmart organization in Saudi Arabia needs to cooperate with the organizational culture of the company. The organization needs more foreign labors working for their form. It has been argued that hiring decisions made the private organizations are not based alone on the mandates of the government. As the organization of United States is a family owned, the country would welcome the family owned business in their country (Allverson 2012). The business of Saudi Arabia is family based and they believe in the loyalty culture with the employees. Every contact within the organization, the company needs to take into consideration as important. The leader of the firm would often include the group in the discussion based on consensus style. It is important for boss in the firm to have respected. The company of KSA encourages diversity, therefore, the managerial style can be well implemented through the mode of planning.
The visitors to Wallmart are even expected to dress up in the conservative manner and must wear smart fashion. In any meetings, the women must wear skirts ,which should well below the knee. (Alvesson 2012). Therefore, the company needs to adapt to these particular changes and it carries difference from that of the culture of United States. The Walmart would carry the culture of Kingdom of Saudi Arabia where the employees would be treated as family and accordingly, they need to wear cloths in a more traditional way. The employees will be given the prestige of being a superior part of the company. Unlike in USA, the lower levels of the employees must be given constant organizational support and generally in the organizations of Saudi Arabia, the middle managers as well get the prior importance in terms of their work. They also give approval to the workings of the employees. The Walmart would focus on rendering the greater services to the customers, giving respect to the individuals, it must strive for excellence and the company must take actions with the integrity.
Wal-Mart is a well known retail organization of U.S.A. However, there is some ethical issues in Wal-Mart working place one of the most important is the favoritism in the workplace. There is no promotion for the female candidates to upper level portion in Wal-Mart. That is a big ethical issue in this organization. On the other hand, the employees having only college degree fail to get promotion in Wal-Mart (Gereffi and Fernandez 2016). There is an Acquisition against Wal-Mart for being anti-union that hampers their ethics. On the other hand, the corporate responsibility is good in the context of Wal-Mart, which often affects the decision of management. The management of such organization often fails to make planning due to the strong and rigid corporate responsibility of Wal-Mart. Wal-Mart provides financial support to the charity across the United States. They donate for hunger relief, healthcare, natural disaster, military outreach, education and healthcare (Corporate.walmart.com 2017).
Their business ethics in KSA includes the maintenance of environmental sustainability by creating zero waste (Godkin 2017). However, the global ethics is associated in promoting the culture of Wal-Mart. Culture of integrity is established by the global ethics in context of Wal-Mart. The most important is to increase the awareness regarding the ethic policies. On the other hand, this organization aims to provide channel to the stakeholders to understand the concern regarding ethics. Global ethics of Wal-Mart must focus on the confidential reporting and it also acts as a resource to make any ethical decision. Regarding the quality of product Wal-Mart focuses on the development of goods, which are ethical and sustainable to environment. However, maintenance of the environmental sustainability is the main ethic of Wal-Mart. They focus on the CSR activities to reduce the wastage from their organization.
The policies and law of Wal-Mart include video monitoring. However, the pork supplier should have their firm monitoring video in the context of Wal-Mart. The Sow firms should have video monitoring and a third part audit by the help of technology before supplying the product to Wal-Mart. If the firm does not maintain the rules then they may get notice for 72 hours. Therefore, the fresh pork supplier needs to maintain an audit of annual animal welfare and must consist of grading system as well as the corrective action tracking system. According to the policy of Wal-Mart the suppliers should comply with local federal and state regulatory requirement. They need to follow the food and safety standard of Wal-Mart (Friedman and Gerstein 2017). This organization follows conflict mineral policies. The suppliers of this organization deal with the mineral sourcing policies. Therefore, they follow the OECD guidance to develop mineral policies. The coupon policy of Wal-Mart allows them to accept only the legible coupon. They maintain anti-corruption policy, which resists the method of corrupt payment while dealing with their clients in private sectors and the government. Wal-Mart develops policy to comply with the FCPA or US Foreign Corrupt Practice Law. By the implementation of such policy, any person that may act on behalf of Wal-Mart will not able to give or receive any kind of illegal payment (Corporate.walmart.com 2017).
Conclusion
Therefore, to conclude it can be stated that, various aspects have to be taken into account while implementing the functions of Walmart in Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. The introduction of Walmart gives an overview of the company and against this, in the topic, the vision and mission is being noted which describes about the goals or objectives of the company. In this context, the managerial functions, the contributions of the stakeholders, organizational culture, goals ethics and values of the company have been taken into account while addressing the important elements which are needed to be inculcated in the walmart business. Along with the business, the ethics and laws of the business have also been taken into account. Like the other walmart stores, the SKA must as well incorporate the same diversification, rules and regulations of the company, which would lead the firm to gain competitive advantages finally. In terms of culture, the KSA follows different rules and regulations in terms of organizational culture. As the organization has to be family oriented, where the employees would be treated in a much more respectable manner. The strategic management process of Value Chain is being analyzed by keeping in mind the environment of the organization of KSA. Ultimately, the laws and ethics that Walmart follows must be aligned with the cultural structure of the organization in general. Therefore, against this background, such aspects are needed to be taken into account while building Walmart in KSA. In the topic the important goal and objectives of the company is also being noted and such objective has been aligned with the SMART process. By considering everything, the company needs to go through the valuable details of the strategic management, which is being followed in KSA depending upon the standard of living as well as the profit that the company is looking forward to earn in the future.
References
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Corporate.walmart.com. 2017. Walmart Policies and Guidelines. [online] Available at: https://corporate.walmart.com/policies [Accessed 26 Oct. 2017].
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Freeman, E. and Moutchnik, A., 2013. Stakeholder management and CSR: questions and answers. uwf UmweltWirtschaftsForum, 21(1-2), pp.5-9.
Friedman, H.H. and Gerstein, M., 2016. Are We Wasting our Time Teaching Business Ethics? Ethical Lapses Since Enron and the Great Recession.
Gereffi, G. and Fernandez-Stark, K., 2016. Global value chain analysis: a primer.
Godkin, L., 2017. Organizational Learning and Activation of Virtue Ethics in Business. Handbook of Virtue Ethics in Business and Management, pp.1191-1206.
Laszlo, C., Brown, J.S., Sherman, D., Barros, I., Boland, B., Ehrenfeld, J., Gorham, M., Robson, L., Saillant, R. and Werder, P., 2012. Flourishing: A vision for business and the world. The Journal of Corporate Citizenship, (46), p.31.
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