ETHICAL ISSUES IN AN ORGANIZATION

QUESTION

1.  ETHICAL BEHAVIOUR

1. a.   Discuss ethical issues that impact on Cirque du Soleil as an organisation. Your discussion must consider at least TWO conflicting viewpoints on ethical behaviour.

2.  SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY

a. Expand on the explanation of the three major perspectives on     corporate   social responsibility as outlined in the text book pp. 73-74.

b. Discuss which (if any) of the three major perspectives is most aligned to Cirque du Soleil. Justify your answer.

3.  ORGANISATIONAL SUSTAINABILITY

A vanguard company is one that scores highly on both social responsibility and success. O’Toole (1985) says that vanguard organisations have four common characteristics – they all:

1. try to satisfy all their stakeholders

2. are committed to a higher purpose

3. value continuous learning

4. aim high

a. For each of the four common characteristics explain whether Cirque du Soleil demonstrates the characteristic or not. Your explanation must be supported by an example.

4.  STRATEGY, PLANNING AND CONTROL

Cirque du Soleil is described as an organisation that created a ‘blue ocean’ strategy rather than joining other circuses in the ‘red ocean’.

a. Define the term ‘blue ocean’ and discuss why Cirque du Soleil is used as an example to explain this term.

b. Explain the process in developing a strategic plan using ‘blue ocean’ techniques.

c. Explain a process used to operationalise or execute a strategic plan. Use Cirque du Soleil to illustrate your explanation.

d. Explain how feed forward, feedback and concurrent control can be applied to ensure the health and safety of the Cirque du Soleil performers. Provide an example for type of control.

5. CHANGE MANAGEMENT FRAMEWORKS

Cirque du Soleil has made a commitment to make changes in terms of its impact on the air quality and climate change see: http://www.cirquedusoleil.com/en/about/global-citizenship/environment/climate.aspx

One of the cornerstone models for understanding organisational change was developed by Kurt Lewin back in the 1950s, and still holds true today. His model is known as Unfreeze – Change – Refreeze, refers to the three-stage process of change he describes. See: http://www.mindtools.com/pages/article/newPPM_94.htm

a. Briefly explain how Cirque du Soleil could apply Lewins three step model to the issue of change within their organisation in terms of air quality and climate change.

SOLUTION

1.a  The ethical issues that impact Cirque DU Soleil as an organization are conflicting and have redefined the traditions in art and entertainment industry. The biggest conflict on ethics of the firm was to maintain high value with low production cost and low ticket prices for the viewers.  It is very obvious that high value delivery was ethical bounding for the firm and on the same time, managing with the limited resources created hurdles in the path. Cirque DU Soleil had two options on ethical conflict, one that it should come up with spectacular ideas and secondly it can continue to find, recruit and train competent people. Both were tough and challenging for the firm, the market for Cirque DU Soleil was a maturing market, it was seen in some data report survey that more than 90 million people of the country had already seen the programme of Cirque DU Soleil. It can be said that performers have short career than corporate professionals, it is a different business, and people tend to retire early or simply fall for retirement due to injuries or permanent disablements. Though the firm could try for strategic recruitment i.e. by creating a pool of people or manpower which would be required to fill the immediate gaps and people already into this business could be kept in pool or surplus for spontaneous recruitments. The ethical conflict could be resolved by this means to some extent because Cirque DU Soleil is a firm which focuses on public entertainment and continuity of the show even in worst of internal conditions as well and this could only be achieved by superb show creations which are spectacular and by means of competent workforce who could be involved for circus or singing or dancing spontaneously with crash course of training. The ethical behavior of the firm says that it should manage with the performance standards even in adverse financial conditions and deliver value to the customers and simultaneously on the other hand, they are resistant to change in their firm and they must opt for development and continuous transformations. Development is possible with the help of change being adopted on right time in the firm as it was entertainment industry and entertainment industry is highly volatile and subject to new ideas and innovations. Their ethics made them conflicting among themselves but if they renewed their ethical thoughts and worked towards development, their success even in financial terms would have been easily possible. [Financial Times, 2012]

2. A. The major perspectives of corporate social responsibilities are applied business ethics, social awareness and education and fair trade. Out of these, Cirque DU Soleil has major impact of applied business ethics as ethical behavior is their focus although they have a fighting ethical norm and in order to accomplish their ethical rules, they have to sacrifice and struggle a lot but their corporate social responsibility is following ethics and codes relating to entertainment even in times of tough financial crisis.

2. B.  Cirque DU Soleil had philosophy of entertaining the public and making shows even when their financial conditions were very weak, they had a strong commitment towards their shows and believed on the principles of always continuing the shows. Their ethical approach was their closest corporate social responsibility and for attainment of the same, they struggled and got support from many institutions, government aid and some philanthropy who strongly believed in continuing the show even in adverse conditions through their aid. Behind the stage, every employee represents Cirque DU Soleil; they are morally connected with the firm and truly consider the firm to be reflective index of their personal and professional integrity. Cirque DU Soleil adopted a special behavior of code of conduct which reflects in their values and personal stability and the employees are intended to perform with high dignity and zeal even in adverse situations and difficult times. Cirque DU Soleil had established three principle areas in which they want themselves and their employees to excel i.e. wherever they are and whatever position they hold, do they truly deserve for that. These areas cover the employer/employee relations inside the firm and make them healthy and pleasant, behaviors in dealing with partners, spectators, loyal customers, performers and suppliers, and Cirque’s actions from a social responsibility perspective. It was analyzed and found that ethical behavior and employee employer unity and integrity was their biggest corporate social responsibility and they worked truly in directions towards attainment of the same. Although fair trade and business practices is also a CSR properly fulfilled by the firm in terms of clearly stated vision, mission, goals and its code of ethics. [Cirque DU soleil]

3. A. A vanguard company is the one that has attained perfection on both the sides of business forte i.e. corporate social responsibility and business growth and development. The four common characteristics are try to satisfy their stakeholders, are committed to higher purpose, value continuous learning and aim high. Out of all these statement, considering the first one in context of Cirque DU Soleil, it can be said that trying to satisfy stakeholders is a vague and conflicting statement in terms of Cirque DU Soleil as the firm was going in deep financial crisis and achievement of level of satisfaction in terms of stakeholders was certainly not there. It can be said because the funding of the show, percentage of new visitors all these were at stake since very initial times only. Although performers were motivated and loyal towards the firm, the visitors were millions of people across the globe but yet the satisfaction level of stakeholders was dicy and little vague.  Second point that the firm must be committed to higher purpose and it seemed to take place and get fulfilled to some extent because their mission statement and company’s vision has described repeatedly that they are focused towards creative vision and uniqueness which means that the firm and its performance team is dedicated towards achieving higher purposes. Third point is that value should be there for continuous learning and aiming high but this is contradictory to Cirque DU Soleil because they had limited developments and managers lacked vision of future perspective to long extent. They couldn’t see growth and development for long time and lacked far sighted vision which can be said because there was lack of innovations, ideas, strategic recruitment for worst situations and other strategic management loopholes as well.  Forth pillar of aiming high is also incomplete and unachievable for the firm to some extent because it was lacking financial stability which should not be there as the performing team had regular visitors and great crowd in support but they lacked management and systematic advertising and innovations in such a way that aiming high and achievement of the same could be attained. Although the firm mentions that they focus on leveraging their productivity and innovations but it is vague statement as per the records of financial stability which could have been there if the firm was high aiming firm with high level of management practices. Out of all four pillars of great wholesome organization, Cirque DU Soleil could be primarily be compared to aiming at higher purposes as they really focused on high purpose i.e. customer satisfaction, performance standards being high, motivating the employees for following code of ethics of the firm but other three were lacking to certain extent due to financial instability, inability of the firm to justify high prices of the tickets and problems of the firm in having high performers in time of attrition in the firm due to injury or accident of the performer. [Cirque DU soleil]

4. A. Cirque DU Soleil is known for being a firm which created blue ocean strategy rather than competing and fighting in red ocean market trends which was very common and still is commonly used in knowing any market space. Cirque DU Soleil believed that performance should be motivating and spectacular enough to create market for itself; it has no significance for competitors, chain of market trends and most popular shows or practices in present times. Blue ocean strategy is very vast concept and is far ahead of normal market trends whereas red ocean strategy is typical already known market which is thoroughly studied and researched before entering the market place. As per the red ocean concept, Cirque DU Soleil is not an expert as they did not researched much about their competitors or latest trends about the performances they would be delivering. They created new concept, blue ocean concept, according to blue oceans concept, competition is yet not set as standards are still to be discovered and they can only be discovered when success of the present functioning unit is judged. The difference between these two strategies is the same as between definite and indefinite dimensions, Cirque DU Soleil followed the principle of indefinite dimension and they worked towards achievement of standards as per their own creativity and not with definite style which is already known for being successful or unsuccessful. [Cirque DU soleil]

4. B. Strategic plan for using blue ocean strategy is that in this the long term vision should be made so that vision does not become short sighted afterwards, secondly, preparing for the worst must be done as blue ocean strategy means no planning about the current market trend so there should at least be planning for various alternatives which could be utilized if in case the present performance or method of performance fails to attract customers or viewer’s attention. [Mensueto, 2010]

4. C. In order to execute strategic plan for blue ocean market approach, one needs to follow strategic recruitment primarily with help of which preparing for manpower shortage can be done, secondly believing in making the customers known for the performance they are delivering, thirdly preparing alternatives by means of keeping different troupes in hand so that if one plan is able to attract people, the other could be instantly applied and fourthly development and innovations on continuous basis so that those innovations could attract people irrespective of the market trends and there should not be performances of repetitive nature so that people of all type even those who have watched show once could be entertained again and again. [Mc Graw Hill, 2010]

4. D. Feedback and forwarding control techniques are excellent ideas for the management of Cirque DU Soleil as safety of employees or performers could be easily attained by means of it. Health, safety, welfare standards should be controlled by regular monitoring by means of professionals, external audits should be entertained so that evaluation of safety standards could be guaranteed, monitoring of plays, gadgets, technology in use and safety standards being practiced by the performers should be made subject to regular check and punishable offense if found guilty for. Management should become more ware, alert, active and systematic on those prerogatives. [Cirque DU soleil]

5. A.  Cirque DU Soleil has taken steps to change the policies and frameworks relating to its corporate social responsibility on environment protection and climate preservation and for attainment of the same, change are required in the firm. The change can only be introduced if appropriate planning is done. [Cirque DU soleil] That can be done by means of applying change models already made by HR professional in the past. One of such models taken by us will be lewin’s model where the process of change is defined in three steps i.e.

• unfreezing,
• changing and
• Again refreezing.

This can be attained if initially we know the process of unfreezing the already established norms which can be done by knowing the need for change, ensuring support from external and internal factors for bringing change and creating the change required. It can be further carried into changing ht system by applying the change needed, executing it for few days with proper training and ideas and finally refreezing that stage so that change is easily accepted by people and they encounter no strangeness in applying it. In terms of Cirque DU Soleil, it can be attained by initially knowing the need by having a separate team of HR and technical professionals who will monitor and find out need and intensity of change required, secondly the team of senior officials and top management will ensure that the communicated change is taking place or not by means of trainings, counseling, surveys, evaluations and employee feedback and  finally refreezing can take place when employees get acquainted with the newly introduced principles and training ends on positive note. With application of all such principles in context with Cirque DU Soleil, Cirque DU Soleil can be made better workplace with higher corporate social responsibility and environment friendliness. [Mind tools, 2012]

References:

1. Financial times (2012), case study: Cirque du soliel, retrieved 4^th may, 2012 from < http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/4191c332-500a-11e0-9ad1-00144feab49a.html#axzz1ts5UQnI1>
2. Cirque DU soleil, creative approach, retrieved 4^th may, 2012 from http://www.cirquedusoleil.com/en/home.aspx#/en/home/about/details/creative-approach.aspx
3. Cirque DU soleil, global citizenship, retrieved 4^th may, 2012 from http://www.cirquedusoleil.com/en/about/global-citizenship/review/2011/company-news/ethics.aspx
4. Cirque DU soleil, social responsibility, retrieved 4^th may, 2012 from http://www.cirquedusoleil.com/en/about/global-citizenship/social-circus.aspx
5. Mensueto ventures llc, 2012, navigate blue oceans to undiscovered business opportunities, retrieved 4^th may, 2012 from http://www.fastcompany.com/1769079/blue-ocean-strategy-w-chan-kim-renee-mauborgne
6. Mc Graw Hill (2010), principles of management, management foundations, a Pacific Rim focus, 3e.
7. Cirque DU soleil, CSR, retrieved 4^th may, 2012 from http://www.cirquedusoleil.com/en/jobs/recruitment/careers/corporate/social-responsibility-social-circus.aspx
8. Cirque DU soleil, sustainable development, retrieved 4^th may, 2012 from http://www.cirquedusoleil.com/en/about/global-citizenship/sustainable-development/environment.aspx
9. Mind tools (2012), Lewin’s change management model, retrieved 4^th may, 2012 from http://www.mindtools.com/pages/article/newPPM_94.htm

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