Business & Society in Challenging Times
The most obvious thing that I discovered from the lecture’s reading is that the society is composed of different groups of stakeholders, including employees, investors, customers, and suppliers. These stakeholders affect and are affected by the actions of businesses. However, I discovered that company must have some form of permission from the government for their operations to be modified or to affect stakeholders. For example, I identified that the government had enacted policies to close nonessential businesses intending to minimize the coronavirus spread. As a result, a lot of people have lost their jobs, which implies that the relationship between business and society has been disrupted.
I was intrigued to find that pandemics harm the corporate sustainability relation. My position as a student studying management makes this an essential because it enabled me to learn how corporate sustainability has changed since the Covid 19 pandemic. I realized that businesses have a social purpose for about how much they care for the society. Still, they have not made right on that commitment since companies have laid off employees without making cash payments to them. Consequently, I observed that the relationship between business and societies had been damaged. The reason is that most employees who have lost their income feel that companies have decided to maximize profitability at the expense of corporate social values.
I learned that pandemics change the structure of business ethics, complicating the relationship between business and society. I was startled to discover that during challenging times, the rules that guide moral behavior in managerial decisions might not always be followed. During pandemics, businesses make decisions while balancing stakeholder interests, such as safety and health. Thus, I noticed that most companies have an ethical dilemma as to whether they should open, expose their workers to the risk of catching the virus, or close and suffer losses.