BU1104 Chapter Notes - Chapter All chapters: Sustainable Development, Human Resource Management, Quality Management
BU1104 CONTENT SUMMARY
SUSTAINABILITY:
➢ Sustainability is improving the quality of human life while living within the carrying capacity of
supporting ecosystems.
➢ Sustainable development is development that meets the needs of the present without
compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs.
• The three pillars of sustainability – social, economic & environment, commonly known as
the triple bottom line. The balance of these pillars is called sustainability.
➢ External environment is outside the organisation. They only impact eventually.
• Politics (includes society’s legislation, regulations and court decisions),
• Economy (business confidence is affected by whether the economy is growing or in
recession),
• Socio-cultural (is the demographic, belief systems, values and attitudes of a society),
• Technology (is knowledge, tools and techniques to transform inputs into outputs/ can
improve productivity and reduce costs).
➢ Specific environment has an immediate impact.
• Customer (customer management can be reactive – after the event or proactive – analyse
and respond to customer needs before they occur),
• Competitor (companies in the same industry that sell similar products or services),
• Supplier (provide resources e.g. information, material and HR. Managers seek to reduce
their supplier dependency as the higher the dependency, the more vulnerable and less
flexible the business becomes),
• Industry Regulation (protects customers, workers & society as a whole),
• Advocacy Groups (concerned citizens who band together to try to influence the business
practices of specific industries, businesses and professions).
➢ Making Sense of the Environment:
• Environment scanning is searching the environment for event/issues that might affect the
organisation. It keeps companies current on industry factors, reduces uncertainty, alters
organisation structure and contributes to organisational performance.
• Situational Analysis - SWOT (Strengths, Weaknesses [internal] / Opportunities, Threats
[external]).
➢ Organizational culture is a system of shared assumptions, values, and beliefs, which governs how
people behave in organizations.
• 3 levels:
Seen (Surface level – symbolic artifacts and behaviours),
Heard (Expressed values and beliefs – what people say/how decisions are made),
Believed (Unconsciously held assumptions and beliefs – beliefs and assumptions,
rarely discussed).
• Successful organisational culture: created by vision, involvement, adaptability and
consistency.
• Results: increased sales, employee satisfaction, return on assets, net profit and quality.
• Changing organisational cultures:
Behavioural addition (the process of having managers and employees perform a
new behaviour),
Behavioural substitution (having managers and employees perform a new
behaviour in place of another behaviour),
Change visible artefacts (such as office design and layout, company dress code etc.)
GLOBAL AND REGIONAL CHALLENGES OF SUSTAINABILITY:
➢ A Green Economy is an economy that results in improved human well-being and reduced
inequalities over the long term, while not exposing future generations to significant environmental
risks and ecological scarcities (The UN Environmental Program’s Green Economy Report).
• Organisational challenges: recycling, energy efficiencies, etc.
➢ Hofstede
• Cultural Dimensions (Power distance, individualism, masculinity/femininity, uncertainty
avoidance, short term/long term orientation).
• Cultural Differences – Recognise cultural differences, decide how to adapt your company to
those differences, do not base adaptations on out-dated and incorrect assumptions about a
company’s culture.
➢ Innovation
• Technology Cycle – begins with the ‘birth’ of a new technology and ends when that
technology reaches its limits and is replaced by a newer better technology.
• Innovation Streams – patterns of innovations over time that can create sustainable
competitive advantage.
• Technological Discontinuity – a unique combination of existing technologies that creates a
significant breakthrough in performance or function.
➢ Managing Sources of Innovation
• Creative work environments – workplace cultures in which workers perceive that new ideas
are encouraged.
• Flow – the psychological state of effortlessness in which you become absorbed in your
work and time seems to pass quickly.
ETHICS AND SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY:
➢ Ethics is an important concept in personal as well as organisational life. It is a set of moral principles
or values that defines right and wrong for a person or group.
➢ An ethical behaviour is one that conforms to a society’s accepted principles of right and wrong.
➢ Unethical behaviour contravenes society/group norms.
➢ Practical steps to ethnical decision making:
1. Select and hire ethical employees,
2. Establish a code of ethics,
3. Train employees to make ethical decisions,
4. Create an ethical climate.
➢ Principles of Ethical Decision Making:
• Principal of personal virtue (include honesty, openness, and truthfulness. Don’t do anything
that you would be embarrassed by if action is picked up by the media),
• Principal of religious injunctions (do good [as detected by religious principles]),
• Legislative requirement (business should operate within the law),
• Utilitarian principle (choose an action that results in the most benefits to the most people),
• Individual rights (includes rights to fair pay/personal rights),
• Distributive justice (an ethical action is one that does not harm the least fortunate in
society).
➢ Social Responsibility: An organisation’s responsibility to pursue policies, make decisions and take
action that benefit society. Two perspectives:
• Shareholder model (Business has only one responsibility and that is to maximise profits and
satisfy shareholders).
• Stakeholders model (Business have multiple stakeholders with multiple interests).
➢ 4 Levels of an Organisations Social Responsibility (Shareholder
Model):
• Pros (Firm maximises shareholder wealth & satisfaction.
The company stock increases in value).
• Cons (Organisations cannot act effectively as moral agents
for shareholders. Time, money and attention diverted to
social causes undermine market efficiency).
HISTORICAL AND SCIENTIFIC PERSPECTIVES OF MANAGEMENT:
➢ The study of management occurred when organisations changed rapidly during the industrial
revolution. Management practices were evident from as early as 5000BC.
➢ Scientific management: studies and tests methods to identify the best and most efficient ways to
complete a certain task. Seat of the pants management: no standardisation of procedures and
there are no follow up on improvements.
➢ Frederick Taylor’s Four Main Management Principles:
1. Develop a science for each element of a man’s work, which replaces the old rule of thumb
method.
2. Scientifically select then train, teach and develop the workman.
3. Cooperate with the man to ensure all work is done in accordance with the principles of
science.
4. Divide responsibly between management and workmen to ensure there is an almost equal
division of the work and the responsibility.
➢ Frank & Lillian Gilbreth:
• Time study: timing how long it takes good workers to complete each part of their jobs.
• Motion study: breaking each task into its separate motions and then eliminating those that
are unnecessary or repetitive.
➢ Max Weber (Bureaucratic Management): the exercise of control on basis of knowledge, expertise
or experience.
Aims of bureaucracy:
1. Qualification based hiring
2. Merit-based promotion
3. Chain of command
4. Division of labour
5. Impartial application of rules and procedures,
6. Recorded in writing,
7. Managers separate from owners.
➢ Henry Fayol (Administrative Management):
1. Division of work,
2. Authority and discipline,
3. Unity of command,
4. Unity of direction,
5. Subordination of individual interests. Efficiency alone is not enough to produce
organisational success. It involves treating workers well.
Document Summary
Sustainability is improving the quality of human life while living within the carrying capacity of supporting ecosystems. The balance of these pillars is called sustainability. Managers seek to reduce their supplier dependency as the higher the dependency, the more vulnerable and less flexible the business becomes), Industry regulation (protects customers, workers & society as a whole): advocacy groups (concerned citizens who band together to try to influence the business practices of specific industries, businesses and professions). Making sense of the environment: environment scanning is searching the environment for event/issues that might affect the organisation. It keeps companies current on industry factors, reduces uncertainty, alters organisation structure and contributes to organisational performance: situational analysis - swot (strengths, weaknesses [internal] / opportunities, threats. Organizational culture is a system of shared assumptions, values, and beliefs, which governs how people behave in organizations: 3 levels: Seen (surface level symbolic artifacts and behaviours), Heard (expressed values and beliefs what people say/how decisions are made),
