Ethical issues concerning the advertising and marketing of a specific business is a very critical and hot topic until now. As consumers, I think we all might have had experienced times when we feel like we were given untruth advertising or marketing and we feel violated because it is our right as buyers or customers to know the truth. We can say that it is for the benefit of the business to make their products or service appealing, but then again the truth will always be set free and then we will know if the business is truly giving out what is real about their product or service to the public. In the long run, the business will be the one affected by this because it will hurt their reputation, that's why in the first place they should have not done the untruthful advertising/marketing. What they can do is to just improve on their product or service and make it truly appealing to the market, and that's what they should market and advertise to the customers.
For this journal I will talk about another employee-related concern again which is the existence of sweatshops. We are aware that there are sweatshops present all around the world and we do know that it is very unethical. I think that we should try our best to eliminate these types of businesses because it hurts the innocent people who just want to make their lives better by working. But then again, the sweatshops actually make their lives worse because of the working conditions in these businesses. The poor people suffering from poverty should be helped to improve their lives with working, but since they find it hard to find work they tend to have to settle for jobs like that of sweatshops. Their specific country should do their best in order to eliminate the sweatshops and actually provide better work for the poor such as by making laws and enforcing it strictly. It is important to do this because it involves the lives of these people, their dignity and even their health. If it were our family member, I am sure that we will never want them to experience such act. I do hope in the future I can contribute to the elimination of the sweatshops all around the world and I will try to start it in the Philippines.
For this particular journal on our discussions, I would like to talk about downsizing. There are times that it is possibly really needed for a company to downsize because manpower is too much and not efficient anymore. The effect to the employees are that they are the ones who gets hurt in this process, but then again as employees they should know that scenarios like this may happen. I think that in the future, when I put up my business and such ethical decisions such as downsizing will occur, I will do my best to help the employee with their job. Losing their job will very much have a big effect in their lives and thus I am to help them recover because of the decision I have made. If I can not instantly just provide them a new job, I will try my best to give them some benefits and also give them time to actually be prepared for when they will be terminated. I will give them a month to prepare so that they can look for other possible jobs so that when the termination comes, they will have a new job that could be their new source of income. Lastly, I will do my best to listen to the employees side and as well as letting them understand the situation fully so that they would not have hard feelings to my firm. People should be wise enough to accept situations like this happens and sometimes are not inevitable, it's just how we approach it that would matter more and how we may help it.
We do understand that CSR is when a business takes responsibility and initiative to assess its effects to environmental and social well-being. Although there are different models that a business may follow when they do implement their CSR initiative. I would like to emphasize three of the business models that I think are most interesting, the economic, social web and philanthropic. To me, in the case of economic model, it is very narrow because a business is considered to exist just to earn profits. The fact that a business exists, it is part of the economy and society and thus it has responsibilities to fulfil. If it does not participate in fulfilling its responsibilities, such as if a business pollutes the earth, then it will be only giving negative effects which we do not want to happen. We want to prevent this. The social web model now is more considerate because this time we consider the society, since the business is part of the society we live in, it does have responsibilities to the social well-being and I think that's important because a business must not cause harm to the society. A business that harms the society must be stopped or improved so that no one will be affected negatively. Lastly, I believe that the philanthropic model is the best among it all, because it can cover both economic and social web models and at the same time the goodness of the CSR activity depends on the intentions of the business, whether they do really want to do good for the world or they just want it for their reputation. I salute business who do the CSR activities truly with a sole purpose of contributing to the development of the world.
We had a conflict with Asociacion De Damas De Filipinas regarding their available time for the Service Learning activity we have prepared for them because they were fully booked until January. This led our group to think of a contingency plan and luckily we had an easier access this time because one of my groupmates was friends with someone from the new barangay. As soon as we have confirmed that we're allowed to change our chosen beneficiary, we gave the agno barangay (families who live in the area) a visit. They were accommodating and friendly which I am very thankful for because this made me feel that they would appreciate anything that we offer to them. We did see that one of the main problems of most of the families in the agno community is their poverty and thus we thought of ways in how to help them control poverty and little by little be able to overcome it. Education is key, if we are able to educate them on what are the possible ways they can do to save money, then that would become a long term effect in their families' ways when it comes to their money and how they would budget it. As simple as this they could give an end to their poverty. With this, we prepared a seminar based from the knowledge and research we have acquired from reliable sources and speakers. We made a script and program flow that we think would be fit for the family. I like the idea that this time, we didn't have to teach about parenting especially because parenting is something that they are experiencing and we aren't, with the case of poverty, it's something we COB students are very familiar of that's why we were able to prepare a seminar that's insightful for the families.
This particular journal, I would like to talk about how effective the decision making model is. Whenever we answer a case, the step by step procedure makes it easier for us to arrive at a decision and also lessen the possible mistakes we might commit along the decision making process. This model does not only guide us but also makes the process more clear. Whenever we discuss a certain case, our discussions are improved by using the model because everyone gets to contribute per stage and not only share their solutions right away. The decision making model is very flexible since we can also apply it to every situation in our life because at all times, it requires taking into consideration stakeholders or most of the time the people involved in our lives. This is a fair way of decision making, while it is systematic, the benefits of doing so or following the models helps me, particularly, apply my virtues well and never forget about the people being affected by my decision. Overall it helps me show more of myself in every decision I make and the model helps a lot with it.
The cases we are analyzing every week has been an avenue for me and my group to discuss and talk about our thoughts regarding the topic ethics. With CSR, ethics is a very important factor because it has a lot of contribution to how a person reacts to certain situations. With every case, there are different things we consider and this is also when all of us applies what we learn in class. As for me, given that there are lots of factors to consider such as it being utilitarianism, virtue ethics, justice and fairness and etc, what I usually fight for in our discussions is to choose which is morally right. I believe that as humans, we have moral obligations to each other, and I also think that we should be selfless and just offer selfless service to one another (because this is how I was brought up during my gradeschool and high school years and also by my parents) I know that we are all subject to our own actions and opinions and it is based on what we believe in.
I have always been aware of Corporate Social Responsibility and what it is, but given the depth of discussion we have had in the subject, I got to understand more of how it works and the things to consider and at stake with doing so. In our first few weeks, learning more about CSR only made me want to get involved more, because as an entrepreneur, I want my business to have this kind of good effect to our community. The CSR activities we see every good news monday gives me more ideas in how I can make one for my own. At the same time, in depth discussion on CSR such as the types of CSR activities we can do, the type of intentions behind it and most of all how it can be implemented or how it is already being implemented are the topics that cover the first step to doing my own CSR activity. I know I can make a more unique version to it and I can't wait to actually implement it in the future. The CSRGOVE outreach activity is where I currently believe that I can already start exercising a csr activity and I am aware of how much I really do want to do it in the future.
In our visitation, my group and I focused on the things that we could help improve on for our chosen organization. The two main things that we would like to address for the org is that their facilities, particularly their study area is already lacking the needed materials for children to learn better. Also, the problem raised to us by the organization is that they needed the parents to participate in the activities of their children.
My group came into conclusion that we could do two things, it is to donate certain materials (out of fundraising and donation drives) such as flash cards for learning, pillows for comfortable learning, pencils, crayons, coloring and academic books that the children could use in their study time. For the second problem, we would conduct a seminar for the parents that could help them understand more of their responsibilities to their children even if they make them stay at the orphanage, we would make a program flow and we will also make this an interactive event.
As of now, we have started collecting things we can donate to the place such as crayons, pencils and other study books. We're not only collecting from within the group because we also extend the effort and good intentions to other people who might also want to donate since it is for a good cause. Also for the seminar, we have already made a program for the parents but it is not finalized yet. So far we will be having one of the parents to speak up to their co parents. We think that we are 70% done with the preparation and within three weeks, we can already implement this to the community.
Last September 15, my group and I visited Assocacion De Damas De Filipinas, our chosen community for our CSRGOVE outreach project. This non-profit organization aims to house children (ages 6 and below) to help the children grow as holistic persons and develop their personalities while also being God-fearing, all done with love, nurture and care.
I personally thought that in order to maintain the mission and vision of the orphanage (as stated in their website) There should be improvements in their facilities. We saw that the place is getting old and that it isn't anymore as suitable as it should be for children to be comfortable in. At the same time, when we asked the head of the place what were their main concerns, they said they needed the parents to be more participative in their children's activities. Later on, we were able to give solutions to these problems after we have discussed the current situation in our group.
This visitation made me feel blessed because I never had to experience how it was like to be in an orphanage because my parents took care of me fully. All these made me realize that my parents have always worked hard in order to sustain a good lifestyle for us, their children. Lastly, it made me also think that this CSR activity will improve me as a person because I really do want to be able to help people in my life, it's one of the things that I look forward to doing when I'm already working and the best part is, with this CSR activity, I understand that I can already start doing it now.
