Analysis Of Ethics And Culture At HE

Consider the apparent contradictions between HE’s espoused culture and its recent actions. Why might they occur? How could they be resolved?

Do the two challenges discussed represent ethical or moral issues? Please use relevant theories to support your answer.

Does a ‘tiger’ culture inevitably lead to the exploitation of employees, or is it possible that company and employee needs can both be accommodated?

What advice would you provide to (a) the CEO and (b) the union leader concerning future approaches to these issues in HE?

HE’s Business culture

HE is one of the leading company’s in the world but has been faced by several internal struggles or challenges. Though out this study, different areas within the management and the employee company relationships will be addressed. The company business culture will also be identified and discussed into detail to help clearly identify the challenges. Finally, possible recommendations or advice to the CEO and the Union Leaders will be addressed with the hopes to change the course of flow of the company’s events such as the suicides by the company employee within the company premises or the burnout cases reported by the company employees.

It is important to first get the clear definition of what a business culture is and how it affects any business. A culture in a business can be defined as an evolving set of collective beliefs in a business, values and attitude within the business. It has significant impact on the business since it affects the strategic direction of the business. From the provided case HE has identified its culture as well as the set cultural requirements but its evident that the cultures identified is more of an oral or a documented culture but not the one carried out in the company’s practice. It is evident the company’s culture seems to be oppressing the employees and from the identified cases it is possible to mark out the processes of slavery workforce structure in the company (Atherton, and Newman, 2017).

The company has been described as a tiger culture which is well integrated for an aggressive global competition which the company meets via efficiency, innovation, ‘cooperation and self-discipline’, and commitment. A culture is a company way of carrying out different operation that the employees have agreed to and have contributed to the formation. This has not been experienced in the company since the different events that have happened within the country seem to contradict the company’s culture (Trevino,and Nelson, 2016). The death of six employees of the company bring out a different picture of that the company’s culture is in the actual sense. The few interviews with different employees have also brought out an issue that has captured the attention of many. The claim by employees working in a manner that reflects a slave master relationship.

‘I feel like somebody is cracking a whip behind me’ this clearly portrays a culture depicted back during the slave era. A claim like this from an employee implies that the company’s culture does not give its employees the chance to express there feeling, there thought or their interests in the company. This first goes against the claim by the company that it is owned by the employees, since if that the case the chances of an employee to take their life fir a business they own would hardly happen since one would be in a position to rectify the issue that affects them probably psychologically to the extent of taking their life (Cohn, Fehr, and Maréchal, 2014). The situation painted by the current challenges give the impression that not that the company is owned by the employees but the company owns the employees. The company culture also seems to support employees’ safety and health although the death od six employees of the company vi suicide does not support the claim by HE’s HRM values. The company values are meant to reflect its culture. This is because the company values are built on the company’s culture. For the company to support a health and safe environment for its employees, it implies that all the activities or the work carried out by the employees do not interfere with the employee’s wellbeing. HE’s has challenged the legitimacy of this issue since the several deaths within the workplace emphasises on the need for an extensive review on the matter.

Possible causes of the Contradictions with the stated company culture and the actual state among the employees.

It is evident that there are a number of things that may lead to the growing contradiction of how the company is running. One of the most evident case within the company is that the employees are overworked. From the claims raised by the managers in relation to a mattress culture. This is where the employees find them self-working and spending the nights in the office. This nature of working sees to be affecting most of the employees and has raised a number of alarms within the operations of HE. Overworked employees lead to a number of issues that may highly contribute the increase in suicidal cases with the company (Pearson, 2017). Overworking leads to job dissatisfaction in most cases. This normally happens when a person lacks any chance to have a social life where thy can freely interact with the society and get a chance to breath away from their work places. This is a major challenge that has been identified with the HE employees. With the employees expected to be available 24/7 means that at any given minute one will be forced to think about their work. Accumulation of this form of setup leads to job dissatisfaction, one fills the need for a different job that allows them get the slight time needed for personal time. Research shows that such a mind set may significantly affect one psychological state and result to cases such as suicide. This normally happens when an employee lacks another opportunity out in the job market, where they could get another job to replace the current one and as a result they end up breaking down both physically and psychologically.

Apart from job dissatisfaction, it is evident that the employees suffer from poor management. The company has a management body that seems to overlook the interest of its employees. The company being a big team of employees it may become evident that the management may take advantage of the numbers and misuse these resources since they ae aware that the employees may be desperate for a job. This has been witnessed in the company. The management needs to establish a connection with its employees for effective productivity of the team. Unlike this case, the company seems to be operating on a master slave relationship as identified earlier. Demonstrations by the employees to the extent of the protestants committing suicide shows the level of oppression the employees of HE are facing (Chonko, 2016). Employees need to be heard by the company a thing that seems not to be present in the company. The company claims to advocate for fairness but there is no fair ness exercised by the management body the minute the employee demands or claims are not heard. In a simple case analysis for a company to claim fairness in its operation, it means there needs not to be stand-off between the employees and the management to the extent of a protest. Matters within a company practicing just and fairness implies that in case of any conflict between the management and the employees would be dealt with before reaching the public. The employees have been seen demanding for the current mattress culture to be abolished but the management seems to fail and highlight the issue.

Recommendations for HE’s CEO and Union Leader

Lack of communication between the management and the employees leads to such reported cases as well as impacts the company’s brand. The deaths of the employees have significantly affected HE’s brand with different parties getting interested to identify what the company’s management are failing to do or are the employees the problem. The minute the company image is affected, this leads to the loss of customers, as well as a drop in the productivity of the company. This is first because the customers fail to marry with the company policies and this affects their attitude towards the company (Lewis, and Rowley, 2014). On the other hand, the minute the company tarnishes its reputation, it leads to the need of the employees wanting to end their relationship with the company and in several cases the employees have reportedly shifted to other competitor companies due to the frustration.

There are possible solutions that the cases identified before. First the company needs to identify the communication problem between the management and the employees. The company needs to hear out its employees and come to agreements on how to address these issues affecting the employees. It is evident that the master slave culture implemented in the company is not agreed upon by the employees but the company management seems to be un disturbed by it. This points out the main issues. It is up to the management to take a look ait its stated culture and acknowledge the fact that they have deviated from their first highlighted culture. The company needs to respect its employees, come up with communication forum where the employees get to interact with management, and share ideas on the way forward (Ferrell, and Fraedrich, 2015). With this in mind, the company will manage to hear what its employees are requesting and will be able to void any further suicide cases. This is a strategy that needs to be tied down to the company’s culture. The company needs to revise the management structure in relation to the changes in the market since wit the on-going pattern, the company may manage to meet the market demands but lose its customer base dues to the unfair treatment of its employees which continues to build u and ruining the company’s brand.

Secondly the company needs to identify the need for labour delegation. The employees are being force into a new culture within the company due to the increase of the workloads they have to work on. This is a problem that the company can approach in a different manner. The increase in the workload size implies that the company has increased revenue but does not want to incur expenses such as hiring more employees (Lewis, and Rowley, 2014). This brings in the new culture of mattress culture as identified in the case. the employee has to work twice so as to be able to meet the new goals. This should be the case and the employees needs to be respected by the management. The management needs to accept the changes in the market and the growth of the company at the same time. By embracing this the company will employ more employees who can be operating in shifts and help reduce the workload and in the process shift back to the values and culture the company has claimed to have. But achieving this within the company ha become a problem since the company is interested in maximizing its income by reducing its expenses to the list cost possible, hence promoting the master slave culture.

The case has provided a number of challenges facing the company. it is possible to identify the ethical implications of the challenges. The challenges facing the company include the mode of treating their employees. The has brought up the need to address the ethical stand of the company. It is evident that the company has managed to overlook several ethical principle and theories in in their mode of operation (Chell, Spence, Perrini, and Harris, 2016). The first challenge where the company forced 5000 of its long-term employees to resign and re-join the company on short term contract shows the violation f multiple ethical principles. The company first against the principle of promise keeping and trustworthiness. The minute the company decided to go against a contract of more that 5000 of its employees this clearly labelled the company as an untrustworthy organization which significantly affected the relationship between the company and its employees. This meant that the employees we no longer in the same trust relationship with the company. This significantly affected the employees’ productivity in the company. Some ethical principle such as this hold the company together and help the productiveness of the company (Crane, and Matten,  2016). The company also affected the relationship with the customers since most of the customers raised their concerns regarding the decision by the company. During the decision making, the company failed to put into consideration some of the most essential ethical principle among the rest. This affected the company’s competitive position since most of the the company’s employed some of the employees who were forced t resign hence giving them a competitive advantage.

The decision by the company also went against the ethical principle of loyalty, a company is expected to be loyal to its employees. This gives the employees the secure feeling of comfortably operating and working for the company. But the minute the company displays such a huge level of disrespect to the employees. This sabotaged the loyalty code built over time between the employees and the company (Donaldson, 2016). Also interfered with the ethical principle of respect for others, the company failed to honour all the mention ethical principles.

Also, the company goes a head and fails to get concerned of its employees, this leads us to the second challenge, it is evident that the company is not bothered by the concerns of the employees, this is why the employees go ahead and protest to the extent of committing suicide so that their employers may get their attention but fails to work out. The minute the number of deaths continue increasing, implies the level of ignorance by the company. The ethical principle of concern for others does not advocate for such case. It is up to the company to ensure that the concerns of its employees are addressed (Ferrell, and Fraedrich, 2015). The company fails to respect most of the ethical principles that hold the company together. The act of the company failing to get concerned of the needs of its employees calls out for disrespect which again is in violation of the ethical principle of respecting others. The employees of the company go on demonstrations to try an get the attention of their employers but it is also evident that the employers find these demonstrations les of an issue since they respect less their employees (Yin, and Quazi, 2018). With such a placed set of governance it is evident that the company has violated multiple ethical principles.

Looking at the challenges and the mode of running the company, it is evident that the management of the company has applied the utilitarian theory in governing the company. The company manages to run its operation by applying the ethical theory to the employees without taking a second and reflecting in the impacts it has on both the company and the employees. The company utilizes the theory where they are only concerned of there income and do not take a second and reflect on how they get to these high scoring. Utilitarian theory implies that the end goals are the goals that matter but not how these end goals are achieved (Ni, and Van Wart, 2015). The company is seen to exploits its employees by overworking then and other challenges but on the end result the company has managed to become one of the leading company’s in its industry. These can be categorised as the end results. For HE’s operation, it is evident that the integrated ethical theory has failed to be effective but ends p introducing new challenges for the company. These challenges ca be directly linked to the ethical theory applied, it’s evident the company has a chance of achieving greater goas the minute some of these matters are addressed.

The application of the deontological theory can become of the best applicable theories to help solve the challenges faced by HE. The company can act by during what is right according to the company culture. This means that first the acknowledgement of the fails the company has already incurred (Mackie, 2018). With this being established, the management can work on building the bridge between the employees and the company for instance in relation to the increased work load, the right move for the company is adding the number of workforces which in this case means hiring more workers. This can be termed as doing the right thing which is advocated by the deontology theory. The company can go ahead and also establish effective communication between the employees and the management which in return increase the flow of information and communication within the company.     

From the analysis of the case it is possible for one to clearly state that the tiger culture has led to the exploitation of the employees by the company. The culture calls for the excessive and over working of the employees but different concepts fail to be addressed the culture has led to the increased growth of the company but in return the culture has led to the burnout o the employees. The concept on improved output as a result of the culture has not be put into account s well as the need for growth of the employee sector as the company grows. It is evident that the culture has led to the growth if the company and its demand in the market but the culture has not advocated for growth for the employee sector of the company. With the growth rate of HE as a multinational company means that the production requirement off the company keeps growing but the workforce remains constant (Guo et al., 2018). To make the matters worse the company goes ahead and tries to reduce the workforce since the culture give room for the constant working of the employees without questioning. This shows a weakness in the culture and the room for exploitation. The tiger culture is more concerned with the results of the company and less concerned of the employees responsible for the actual operations of caring out the work. This has ed to the exploitation of the workers with the aims of increasing productivity. A company culture needs to address the needs of the employees as well as the company needs. The needs of the employees include work ethics, among other needs such as care by the company, while on the other hand, a culture for the company means good productivity by the company. But in our case the tiger culture is concerned only of a sing le side of the case which is the company. The employees side flacks to receive the attention it needs. This also brings us t the next point where the company needs to identify a new culture that favours both the company and the employees. Such a culture does not provide room for exploitation (Luo, 2018). This exploitation has already taken the lives of six of HE’s employees and continues affecting the company’s bran. In return this starts affecting the company’s productivity hence living the tiger culture less effective for the company. It is the high time for the company to embrace a different culture before the current culture drains the company by exploiting the workers as well as bringing the company down.

With the analysis of the current state of the company, it is evident that change is inevitable if the company is to remain relevant to the industry, the death of six employees of the company has significantly tainted the name and brand of the company t the customers and the change of contract of over 5000 employees on long term contract to small contract has brought the company’s downfall closer. It is important for the company to first re establish the relationship between the employees and the management. It is the role of the CEO to see this happens within the company. the CEO needs to formulate means of how to create a bride between the management and the employees. This calls for a different culture in the business, this means the introduction of new changes in the company. currently the employees are frustrated by the mode of operation in the company hence as the CEO it is important to reinsure the employees’ position in the company. this will help bring confidence of the employees back to the company (Du, Weng, Zeng, and Pei, 2017). with the confidence being boosted, the CEO can make further measure such as adding the number of employees to the different sectors of the company that are over loaded with operation. This means the company will have to incur slightly more cost of employment but this on the other side will increase he productivity of the employees. The employees will also get a chance to rebuild their connection with the work since the dissatisfaction with their current jobs will be evident (Jakubczak, and Rakowska, 2018). The CEO needs to focus much on the well being of the employees and the different mentioned strategies can significantly help them.

The union leaders on the other hand needs to be focused on rebuilding the company’s image. To achieve this the Union leaders, need to get to the bottom of the issues that have led to the down fall of the company’s image. This has already ben identified and to help rebuild this the union leaders need to strengthen their relationship with the employees of the company. this relationship can help the union leaders ensure that the employees are not exploited, this also helps ensure that the management will respect and ethically manage the employees. Rebuilding this relationship implies that the company will slowly rebuild its image which is not expected to be instantly. The Union leaders should also have the back of the CEO in helping them achieve the set goals and rebuild the company employee relationship.

Conclusion 

It is evident that HE needs to revisit its business culture as well as integrate ethics in the daily operations of the business. From the study, it is evident that the company has failed in different areas to uphold and effective ethical working environment, also the company has failed to integrate employee change as the company keeps growing. In return this has led to the exploitation of the company employees which has lead to the employee suicide cases and the affected employee performance. This is an issue that need to be addressed by the company to help avoid the downfall of the company as well as avoid the tainting of the company’s brand. 

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