Corporate Social Responsibility Final
Social Responsibility
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Institution
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Most companies’ major aim is to maximize their profits; they work towards making sure that their shareholders wealth is maximized. Companies however have now realized that they should make sure that all the wealth of the company should not belong to shareholders. This is why companies now aim at maximizing the stakeholder’s welfare. The stakeholders are the employees, the shareholders, the customers and the society in general. This is why most companies now engage in corporate social responsibilities. This is recognizing that you owe the society you operate in, they have given the company a place to exist and welcomed them hence an obligation to cater their needs (Purdy, 2008). Corporate social responsibilities involve ensuring that businesses comply with the law, ethical standards and also the international norms.
Thomas Cook group is one successful leisure travel groups company. This can be seen by the fact that they make sales of up to 9.5 billion pounds according to their financial statements in 2012. Their customers are around 23 million that is in their economic year. The company has branches in 21 countries hence increasing their sales. The company was founded in the year 2007 and has June, and its main consumer brands consist of Thomas Cook, My Sunquest, Aitours, Direct holidays, Neckermann, Condor airlines and also Ving (Thomas Cook Group, 2010).The company has continued to invest in many countries with their aim being to provide inspiring soul searching journeys and they have continued to emphasize that the fact that they get more customers because of their ability to personalize their services and the fact that they can be trusted.
Thomas Cook group services include selling package holidays; this includes the flight and also the hotel. They offer their services through making calls but with the development of technology now they can easily do that by using online websites. Good governance has also led to the growth of this company; their board of directors has certain responsibilities to ensure that there is good governance. They have a close look at all the projects that the company can invest in and choose the most viable one; this also includes approving business plans. Board of directors also approves both the yearly and half yearly financial statements and looks for any loopholes just in case there are any. The shares of Thomas Cook group are actually listed in London Stock Exchange and the board of directors approves recommendation of final shares (Thomas Cook Group, 2010).
Thomas Cook group take corporate social responsibilities very seriously, this is because they know that their clients destinations should be places where they can enjoy. Their corporate social responsibilities are not only for the society and consumers but also the employees. The company has a large number of employees whom their associate with their success. They come up with ways to motivate them and the company sues the behavior modification approach to motivate them (Purdy, 2008) whereby the human resource manager ensures employees have positive attitude towards their job. They also ensure that their employees have good salaries and allowances; they also give them benefits like health insurance, vacation and time off. It has always been said that happy employees offer the best services and hence by being socially responsible to employees it increases their sales. It will also reduce employee turnover.
The company defines CSR as a way to enhance positive environment and they have board that’s actually involved with CSR especially in terms of taking care of the environment. They have the health; safety and environmental committee so as to evaluate if their activities harm the environment and if they do how to minimize them and them also come up with ways to make the environment better (Karp, & Thomas, 2010). They also have a hazard prevention program whose aim is to safeguard the society from harmful substances and they do this by educating the society. The company is involved in charitable activities and fundraising in the community where they also involve their employees. Thomas Cook group plc should ensure that they involve in more environment friendly activities like planting trees and also cleaning the environment. This way they will be able to improve their brand image and reputation hence gaining competitive advantage.
Ethical leadership can lead to the growth of a company; this is leadership where the leader is expected to load in a way that they respect the rights and also dignity of others. They have integrity (Cohen 2011) which makes the others trust them and follow their example. Thomas Cook Group plc leaders aim is to put the interests of others first and this is why they have established websites to listen to their customers and act effectively.
The leaders in Thomas Cook Group also ensure that the employees follow their example of good ethics. They work towards ensuring services provided are fair to all consumers and that the company is a corruption free zone. Ethical leadership in the company has helped in molding the employee’s attitudes and values leading to offering good service to their customers (Duggar, 2009).
Thomas Cook group trains their employees before hiring them and they should take this opportunity to educate them on business ethics to enhance ethical leadership. They should have a code of ethics that should be clear to all employees on what the company identifies as ethical behavior. They should be consequence to those who do not adhere but at the same time there should be rewards to those who adhere. The leaders should also come up with ways to socialize with society as their obligations are not only to motivate their employees but to ensure their customers are happy with their existence (Duggar, 2009). Ethical leadership increases employee morale and productivity.
Organizational viability is the ability of a company to survive for a long term. There is more that is needed to ensure a company’s viability. Thomas Cook has recognized that for the organization to have long term survival they need to check on their economic viability, their ethic viability and also the manageability system viability. The company’s spirit of innovation has helped in their growth and they believe it will come in handy to ensure their future existence. Thomas Cook Group plc has embraced technology and used it wisely, they have websites where customers get their services online and also where they can communicate with them by answering their questions about their products (Karp, & Thomas, 2010). This reduces costs and gains more customers for such strategies.
Thomas Cook should actually invest fully in online advertising and get more employees to work on that sector so that customers can feel like they have a one communication with them. The company should also be aware that they will have competitors who have better ways of getting customers and shareholders hence taking care of their future include having strategies to keep their stakeholders (Purdy, 2008). The company needs to have strategic plans and also get strategic leadership that is based on ethical conducts.
Legal considerations are something that all business is aware of. The government can control businesses both directly and also indirectly. They can control what businesses produces so as to safeguard interest of the consumers. There is also protection for employees to ensure that there is no discrimination in the work areas and also to ensure fair pay. There are also the legislations for health and safety working environment to protect the employees as they work and ensure no harm comes to the environment (Kish-Gephart, Harrison, & Trevino, 2010). The most common is the consumer protection legislation to protect them from fake products and also to ensure the prices are fair.
Thomas Cook Group is not an exemption and hence has to operate within the law since there is a penalty for those who do not adhere. Adhering to these laws also ensures company’s reputation is protected (Whitley, 2000). Thomas Cook group being in the tourism sector have to comply with all the environmental standards required. They have someone responsible of ensuring that they adhere to all legal requirements.
Thomas Cook Group plc ensures that they are aware of the disparities in cultures and institutional environments in most countries they operate in. This gives them competitive advantage over those companies that have no knowledge of where they are operating in. The headquarters of Thomas Cook Group is the United States and they enjoy the fact that the political scene there is very much stable (Duggar, 2009). One of the benefits they have enjoyed is being able to conduct their business in other foreign countries because the US government has enacted trade agreements with foreign countries.
The company should ensure that in all their activities they comply with government and legislations. This will enable them work peacefully without incurring costs of penalties actually having a committee that works to ensure no government or environment legislations are not adhered to. Engaging in social responsibility has led to increase in sales of Thomas Cook Group plc. People want to be associated with a company that is not selfish; one that looks at the society’s needs and provides quality products (Karp, & Thomas, 2010). Corporate social responsibility leads to a better brand image and reputation for the company hence increasing their profits.
References
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Duggar, J (2009). ‘The role of integrity in individual and effective corporate leadership’, Journal Of Academic & Business Ethics, 3, p. 1-7.
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Karp, T, and Thomas I. H. (2009). “Leadership as Identity Construction: The Act of Leading People in Organisations.” The Journal of Management Development 28.10: 880-96.
Kish-Gephart, J. J., Harrison, D. A., & Trevino, K. L. (2010). Bad Apples, Bad Cases, and Bad Barrels: Meta-Analytic Evidence About Sources of Unethical Decisions at Work. Journal of Applied Psychology, Vol. 95, No. 1, 1–31.
Purdy, J. (2008). Job Satisfaction Within a Nonprofit Organization: An Application of Hertzberg’s Motivation-hygiene Theory. Michigan: ProQuest Publishers. Print.
Thomas Cook Group. (2010).Corporate governance retrieved on 6th January 2013 from < HYPERLINK “http://www.thomascookgroup.com/” http://www.thomascookgroup.com/>
Whitley, R., (2000). The institutional structuring of innovation strategies: business systems, firm types and patterns of technical change in different market economies. Organization Studies 21/5, 855 – 886.
