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Introduction: How Stakeholders Shape Responsible Business Objectives
Stakeholders refer to various individuals that are directly or indirectly intrested in operation of particular company. These individuals are interested in knowing financial and overall position of the company. This report is based on critical evaluation of the stakeholder of the company and their role in deciding effective business goals. It will also discuss on the extent to which stakeholder of company can influence the goals of organization. To improve the understanding regarding stakeholder's various real life examples will be quoted in this report.
Stakeholders And Their Role
There are various individuals and groups that are interested in the profitability and stability of the organization. For ensuing effective working of the firm, main focus has been provided towards forming adequate goals and objective for company. Stakeholder of the company impacted the decision making process at the great extent. Responsible business goals refer to sustainable activities that organization need to initiated for satisfying stakeholders. The role of stakeholder in forming responsible business goals are as follows:
- Investors: These are the individual that are responsible for fulfilling the financial needs for the company. Investors are concentrate towards investing their funds in companies which are having high growth potential. They are interested in knowing the financial and solvency position of firm as this will assist in determining their overall profits. In the current times, customers are interested to buy from the company that are indulging in sustainable activities and pay more focuses towards protecting environment. Increase in number of customer will result into high sales and eventually results in enhnacing overall position of the firm (Adjei-Bamfo, Maloreh-Nyamekye and Ahenkan, 2019). To keep investors satisfied towards the firm's operations, company used to form responsible business goals that assist in attracting more customer and eventually results in improving profitability of investors. However, investors did not promote sustainable activities to the large extent as for carrying out such activities company need to incur huge amount which left company with less amount to focus on their core activities.
- Customers: These are most important stakeholder of company as this decides on overall working and profitability of the firm. Customers are mainly interested towards identifying innovation and creativity that has been carry out by firm. Consumers are more interested towards the purchasing form firms that are indulging towards protecting environment and society. This creates pressure for company to concentrate toward forming strategies that will help in achieving sustainable goals. For attracting more customer firm are investing on carrying out sustainable activities within their firm that will enable company in enhancing their sales. However , company do not invest more towards responsible business goals as this will increase cost for company and eventually results in the making the product expensive for customer. It has been identified that company which are highly indulging towards producing organic product provide goods at more prices than other company. This results in reducing the interest of some of customer and eventually results in reducing sales and profitability of firm. It is necessary for companies to maintain balance between the cost of goods and sustainable activities.
- Employees: It has been identified in the current situation that people are interested to work in company that are more focused towards carrying out sustainable activities. These choices of employers towards cultural, social and environmental protection are creating pressure for organization to create responsible business goals (Alam, 2022). This will include protecting cultural and social right of employees and focuses on creating policies for their wellbeing. On the other hand, employees are more interested towards fulfillment of their financial needs and requirement and their working is highly dependent on this factors.
- Supplier: These are the individual that are interested in knowing the profitability position of the company. They are interested in knowing profitability position of firm as it will decide on their payment and future contract with particular company. As the quality of air and water are reducing due to operations of organization, supplier are focusing on working with company that are indulging in carrying out sustainable activities. This pressurizes business entity to focuses on bringing changes in their goals and objective and carry out process that will have less impact on the environment and society. However, suppliers do not create much pressure for company to involve in sustainable activities as they are more interested in timely payment and regular business with them.
- Government: Authority of country focuses on reducing the negative impact on environment and focuses more on promoting sustainable development in country. Governments of country are interested in knowing financial and ethical position of organization which assists in ensuring fair operation within the firm. Government has prepared various policies and regulation for business entity that will help in reducing the negative impact on environment. (Štrukelj and Gajšt, 2019). Government focuses on bringing changes in their policy that will target the protection towards the natural resources. These government policies and regulations are having huge impact on forming responsible business goals as each firm needs to follow governmental guidelines for the effective completion of objectives. For example: in UK, government has formed polices that are targeting towards the reducing use of plastic in country and lowering the carbon emission to zero level. In support of the guideline, Tesco has changed their strategy that focuses on using renewable material for packaging and limit use of plastics (Impact of government policies on Tesco goals, 2021). For fulfilling the guidelines of zero carbon emission, companies in UK has uinvested towards Electric vehicle for delivering goods and procuring raw material this will helps in achieving goal of company and having good reputation in front of government. In context of interest and power matrix, government are the stakeholder that are having less interest in the prodigality of firm but have full power towards controlling operation of company. This creates compulsion for company to form policies and strategy that enable firm in fulfilling the requirement of government.
- Competitors: These are the firm or organization that involve in same type of operation and work. Competitors are interested in knowing profitability position of firm as it assists in comparing their growth with others. They are having interested in knowing the innovation and strategies of firm and focuses on evaluating strategy on the basis of profits. Evaluating strategies and policies of others will assist in determining the changes that particular firm need to bring in their operation. Competitors enforcing other firm to formulated goals that will help in attaining sustainability (ElAlfy et al, 2020). If one firm is indulging towards protecting environment and safeguarding society's rights then it can create competitive edge in the market. So to unable competitors in forming such competitive edge others firm also concentrates towards forming strategies that assist in attaining sustainability. In the power matrix, competitors are having interests in the company but do not have any power in influencing decision of the organization. They are indirectly impacting decision making process as managers evaluates others' polices before taking any decisions.
- Communities: These are group of people that come together for fulfillment of particular objectives. These group and association are having huge impacted on firm while forming responsible business goals. These groups include Business organization, environmental organization, cultural groups and non-profit organization that focus on protecting society and natural resources. In power and interest matrix these stakeholders are least interested in the working of company and do not have huge power to changes any business decision. Firm need to evaluate and analysis the requirement of each association and decide on policies that can be helpful in fulfilling needs of all communities (Hepburn et al, 2021). Cultural associations are targeted towards identifing company's operation that assists in fulfiling cultural and social needs of employees and customer. Environment groups are interested in knowing the operational process of company that can helpful in reducing negative impact on environment and promote sustainability. These exert pressure on company to form strategies that can satisfy goals of both organization and communities. Dissatisfaction among communities may result in negative publicity of the firm and eventually results in reducing overall profitability of company.
- Trade association: when various business that are having same goals and objective come together for conducting public relation activities that includes, advertisement, donations, publishing and education, they together refer as trade associations. Standardization among the industry is the main motive towards forming such association or groups. Companies want to become part of such groups as it helps in enhancing their knowledge, networks and enhnaced reached to various resources (Rezapouraghdam, Alipour and Arasli, 2019). This stakeholder are having huge power and interest in working of firm as they are intent in knowing operation of firm which helps them in determine upon whether particular business should be made part of the association or not. Trade association has power to remove certain company from their groups which results in reducing reputation of firm in the market. So to maintain the reputation and goodwill in industry, company focuses on forming policies that can be beneficial in achieving goals of trade associations. As these groups are targeted towards improving public relation activities, it made it necessary for company to form strategy that will assist in fulfilling responsible business goals.
- Media: These are organizations that are concentrating towards creating awareness regarding actual working of company. These stakeholders are having huge impact on the working of firm as if any unethical or unfair activities undertaken will be widely spread through media which will impact on overall position of company. Firm's decisions are highly impacts by this stakeholder as all company are focusing on creating positive image in the industry. This will eventually results in increases in sales and overall profitability position of firm (Kong et al, 2021). Company like Unilever, Sainsbury, Lloyds is indulging towards providing donation for the education of children. This information has been used while promoting their company as it helps in attracting more costumers. Firm are highly pressurize by media to invest in the sustainable activities as less interest towards such activities may results in negative marketing of company and impact on profitability and stability position of company.
- Shareholders: These are individual or organizations that have invested certain amount in exchange for shares of company. Shareholders are having high interest and power in the operations of organization. They are interested in knowing the financial position of company which will help in determining their return form investment and have power in decision making process. Shareholders have rights to vote and are able to forces companies to formulate sustainable goals. From the research it has been identified that 80% of the shareholder decision are dependent based on the company that are undertaking environmental, governance and social factors in their operations (Impact of shareholder on responsible business goals, 2023). This exerts pressure on firm to formulate policies towards sustainability that will help in attracting more shareholders.
Demand Conflict Among Shareholders
There are various type of shareholder and each focuses on different type of needs and requirement. It is important for company to evaluate demand and needs of each type of shareholder and formed polices accordingly (Kölbel et al, 2020). There is difference in the goals and objective of each stakeholder as investors and shareholders are interested towards improving profitability position of company. Communities groups are concentrated towards protecting environmental and cultural needs of the country where as government are least interested in the financial position and more focus is paid towards fulfilling guideline of authority in protecting natural resources. Company faces issue in balancing between needs and requirements of each stakeholder and organization's goals.
Conclusion
It has been concluded from report that stakeholders have huge impact on forming responsible business goals. It has been determined that government, investors, shareholder, employees and communities have great impact on sustainable activities of firm. It has been identified that communities and trade association are influencing companies to invest towards protecting environment, social and cultural aspect of country. investors and shareholders are interested towards investing in activities by which return on investment could be increased. This creates challenge for company in forming strategies that can helpful in fulfilling needs and requirement of all stakeholders.
References
Books And Journals
- Adjei-Bamfo, P., Maloreh-Nyamekye, T. and Ahenkan, A., 2019. The role of e-government in sustainable public procurement in developing countries: A systematic literature review. Resources, Conservation and Recycling, 142, pp.189-203.
- Alam, A., 2022. Investigating sustainable education and positive psychology interventions in schools towards achievement of sustainable happiness and wellbeing for 21st century pedagogy and curriculum. ECS Transactions, 107(1), p.19481.
- ElAlfy, A., Palaschuk, N., El-Bassiouny, D., Wilson, J. and Weber, O., 2020. Scoping the evolution of corporate social responsibility (CSR) research in the sustainable development goals (SDGs) era. Sustainability, 12(14), p.5544.
- Hepburn, C., Qi, Y., Stern, N., Ward, B., Xie, C. and Zenghelis, D., 2021. Towards carbon neutrality and China's 14th Five-Year Plan: Clean energy transition, sustainable urban development, and investment priorities. Environmental Science and Ecotechnology, 8, p.100130.
- Kölbel, J.F., Heeb, F., Paetzold, F. and Busch, T., 2020. Can sustainable investing save the world? Reviewing the mechanisms of investor impact. Organization & Environment, 33(4), pp.554-574.
- Kong, L., Sial, M.S., Ahmad, N., Sehleanu, M., Li, Z., Zia-Ud-Din, M. and Badulescu, D., 2021. CSR as a potential motivator to shape employees' view towards nature for a sustainable workplace environment. Sustainability, 13(3), p.1499.
- Rezapouraghdam, H., Alipour, H. and Arasli, H., 2019. Workplace spirituality and organization sustainability: a theoretical perspective on hospitality employees' sustainable behavior. Environment, Development and Sustainability, 21, pp.1583-1601.
- Štrukelj, T. and Gajšt, N., 2019. Indispensability of socially responsible business policy. Corporate social responsibility in the manufacturing and services sectors, pp.93-125.
Online
- Impact of government policies on Tesco goals. 2021. Online Available through :< https://www.ukessays.com/essays/social-policy/effect-government-policies-tesco.php>
- Impact of shareholder on responsible business goals. 2023. Online Available through: https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/engaging-shareholders-role-companies-social-change-1e?trk=pulse-article_more-articles_related-content-card#:~:text=It%20involves%20actively%20involving%20shareholders,practices%20and%20enhanced%20social%20impact..