Although organizations aim at making a profit, there is a need for them to act and do business in a way that accounts for the societal as well as environmental impact shaped by the business, this concept has been dubbed corporate social responsibility. There are several examples of CRS undertaken by Starbuck Corporation.
Starbuck does have an environmental mission statement, “Starbucks is committed to a role of environmental leadership in all facets of our business” (Schulz & Yang, 1997) this is fulfilled by the company’s commitment to understanding environmental issues, coming up with innovative and flexible solutions, striving to buy, sell as well as using products deemed environmentally friendly, instilling environmental responsibility incorporate values and measuring as well as monitoring various company projects. This has been done recently by partnering with Conservation International in a project dubbed “On Good Grounds”
Additionally, the organization has strived to create a highly satisfied and motivated workforce. The working environment is very conducive as they are actively involved in decision making, called partners, provided with several benefits such as tuition reimbursement, healthcare benefits, employing a diverse workforce in terms of cultural background among others (Visser et al., 2007).
Regarding a CSR program for a company, I will develop one for Starbuck to help it curb hunger in developing countries where coffee is produced. This can be accomplished in several ways, for instance for every kilogram of coffee beans, the company can commit a dollar to feed the hungry. Similarly, employees can take a day to donate food collected from their contribution for four months running especially when hunger is acute in the target region.
According to Boatright, 2009 organizations have been compelled to act in a manner that they uphold high standards of morals or are in line with a certain set of principles aimed at doing things the right and acceptable ways. As noted in various literature employees are the most important resource in propelling an organization to a greater height. However, without a proper code of conduct as the guiding principles, they can indeed be a disguise and bring an organization down to its knees.
For Sears Auto, the kind of commission structure to a sales representative on an hourly basis led to the following; fraud, making of false statements to buys, false advertising, not stating the parts as well as labor charges clearly in invoices. More importantly, the organization needs to have in place a committee that will oversee compliance to the ethics program and codes of conduct. The program including code of ethics that could help the automobile industry from the problem it faced includes;
Employees are not to in any way influence any customers, suppliers by either bribing or offering kickbacks among others, it is the responsibility of employees to offer accurate and honest information to customers, repairs should be carried out carefully and completed within time, during advertisement only authentic information will be made public, employees at all time will uphold and do business in line with the existing laws, policies, and regulation of the jurisdiction within the business empire, all workers are to quote only all-inclusive prices and issue customers invoices that match them, employees will report any business misconduct they observe to their supervisors and they will also not indulge themselves in illegal business practices. The penalties for violating one or several of these conducts lead to, facing a court of law, paying fines, termination of the contract, demotion, suspension among others determined by the ethics and compliance committee (Visser et al., 2007).
All these steps could have helped Sears Auto escape the serious allegations. For instance, the provision of true information during advertisement and selling could help avoid the claims that customers were cheated. Reporting of business misconduct could make the organization take corrective measures at very early stages.
References
Boatright, J. (2009). Ethics and the Conduct of Business. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall.
Schulz, H. & Yang, D. (1997). Pour Your Heart Into It: How Starbucks Built a Company One Cup at a Time. New York: Hyperion
Visser, W. et al. (2007). The A to Z of Corporate Social Responsibility. New York, NY: Wiley.