Assignment
Read the following article and answer the questions listed in order to analyse it. You should adopt a critical thinking approach in viewing the case from sensemaking, CSR, evidencebased management and ethical considerations.
Do we care enough about COVID?
The COVID-19 pandemic has already generated its own mythology. In Australia, our COVID19 myth is about a cohesive and caring society that patiently endured lockdowns, border closures and other ordeals. Like many myths, ours has some foundation in reality. You might ignore the empty toilet paper shelves in the local supermarket, but it still has its own force. It might be especially potent in Melbourne, where the restrictions were most severe and prolonged.
The COVID-19 myth is now presenting its puzzles to true believers. If you imagined we all pulled together for the common good, and because we have the good sense to look after our own health, you are likely to find it strange that we are now apparently prepared to tolerate dozens of deaths in a day. The total COVID death toll is now above 11,000.
More than tolerate: there has been a preparedness to pretend nothing out of the ordinary is happening.
All of this seems a far cry from those days when we experienced horror as the number of new infections rose above a few dozen a day, a few hundred, and then a thousand or so. Have our senses been blunted, our consciences tamed?
Public discourse is never neutral. It is always a product of power. Some people are good at making their voices heard and ensuring their interests are looked after. Others are in a weak position to frame the terms of debate or to have media or government take their concerns seriously.
The elderly - especially the elderly in aged-care facilities - have carried a much larger burden of sacrifice than most of us during 2020 and 2021. They often endured isolation, loneliness and anxiety. They were the most vulnerable to losing their lives - because of the nature of the virus itself, but also due to regulatory failure and, in a few places, gross mismanagement.
Casual and gig economy workers, too, struggle to have their voices heard. Yet the conditions of those in poorly paid and insecure work have been repeatedly identified as a problem for them as well as for the wider community, because they are unable easily to isolate.
Up to this point, however, our democracy has spoken: we want our pizzas delivered and we want to be able to head for the pub and the restaurant. And we are prepared to accept several casualties along the way to have lives that bear some resemblance to those of the pre-COVID era.
The "we" in this statement is doing a lot of heavy lifting. There is a fierce debate going on about whether governments - and by extension, the rest of us - are doing enough to counter the spread of the virus. Political leadership matters enormously in these things.
In the years following the second world war, Australia's roads became places of carnage, as car ownership increased and provision for road safety was exposed as inadequate. It peaked around 1970, with almost 3,800 deaths - more than 30 for every 100,000 people. Road fatalities touched the lives of many Australians.
In the 1960s and 1970s, the coming of mandatory seatbelt wearing and random breath testing helped bring the numbers down. Manufacturers made their cars safer. Public campaigns urged drivers to slow down and stay sober. These were decisions aimed at avoiding avoidable deaths, despite the curtailment of freedom involved.
These decisions were also in the Australian utilitarian tradition of government, "whose duty it is to provide the greatest happiness for the greatest number" - as the historian W.K. Hancock famously explained in 1930. The citizen claimed not "natural rights", but rights received "from the State and through the State". Governments made decisions about how their authority could be deployed to preserve the common good and protect individuals - from themselves as well as from others.
Governments have during the present surge so far been willing to take what they regard as a pragmatic position that the number of infections and fatalities is acceptable to "the greatest number", so long as "the greatest number" can continue to go about something like their normal lives.
But this utilitarian political culture also has its dark side. It has been revealed persistently throughout the history of this country - and long before anyone had heard of COVID-19 - as poorly equipped to look after the most vulnerable. The casualties of the current policy are those who have consistently had their voices muted and their interests set aside during this pandemic - and often before it, as well.
These are difficult matters for governments that would much prefer to get on with something other than boring old pandemic management. The issue is entangled in electoral politics - we have just had a federal contest in which major party leaders studiously ignored the issue, and the nation's two most populous states are to hold elections in the next few months. Governments also realise that restrictions and mandates will meet civil disobedience.
But COVID cannot be wished away. At a minimum, governments need to show they are serious about it to the extent of spending serious money on a campaign of public information and advice on issues like mask-wearing and staying home when ill. They usually manage to find a sufficient stash of public money ahead of each election when they want to tell us what a great job they've been doing. They might now consider whether something similar might help to save lives.
Frank Bongiorno
26th July 2022
From the Conversation (Abridged)
Task
I. Considering and discussing three of Clegg's characteristics of sensemaking, what is your interpretation of this article?
II. Align the leaders of the government of Australia to the justifications of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) in their response to this situation described in the article. How would you advise them? Discus two justifications.
III.
i. Using the steps of EBM (Evidence Based Management) discuss how the leaders of the government of Australia might approach the statement `we need to do more to counter the spread of COVID. Note; you need to examine the current level of decision making and strategy in this article and potential improvements to this strategy.
ii. Using and applying two ethical frameworks (other than Utilitarianism), discuss how the leaders of the government of Australia might justify their decision-making on the issue described in the article.
Case study analysis
Read the following case and answer the questions listed in order to analyse it. You should adopt a critical thinking approach in viewing the case from multiple perspectives and ethical considerations.
Sue is a senior manager at a small market research company. One of her team members, Jason, is responsible for conducting social media trend analyses. His job involves analysing what people are talking about on social media, particularly in relation to the companies they serve as clients. Their clients see this service as invaluable, as it enables them to gain rapid customer feedback about their products and services.
Previously, the trend analysis was a long and laborious process, involving reading thousands of online posts and summarising the key themes. Realising this was an inefficient method, Jason began developing a new approach in his spare time. As he had considerable expertise in programming, he began to work on a hobby project to streamline his work. He wrote a program that would automatically trawl social media for relevant content and show which words and phrases were occurring most frequently. While he would still have to write some commentary about the trends his program detected, this new program made his job considerably easier.
One day, Sue received a visit from Jason. Having grown considerably in experience and credibility, Jason informed her that he was going to resign to start up his own analytics consultancy. Sue was very pleased for Jason, since she had grown to like and respect him over the years they had worked together.
Sue realised that she would have to manage the transition carefully. She knew that Jason would not be able to take any of their clients, as his contract specifically prohibited him from walking away with their business. However, whether Jason should be allowed to walk away with the software he developed was very controversial.
She approached her colleagues and received conflicting advice about what to do. Some managers strongly opposed allowing Jason to keep his software. They argued that he had developed it on company time and using their equipment, and in the service of his job. The loss of the software would also make the job of Sue's team a lot more difficult. Replacement of the software would be costly and require new training of their remaining team members.
On the other hand, other managers suggested that Jason should be allowed to walk away with it. They observed that the intellectual property clauses of Jason's contract were vague. And while Jason developed the program to make his job easier, he did not produce it under Sue's directive (or even her knowledge, until Jason showed it to her one day).
Sue knew that she had a dilemma on her hands. How should she resolve it?
Task
I. What is the main issue being presented in this case study?
II. Who are the key stakeholders in this case, and what impact could the issue have on them?
III. What approaches could the main character take to resolving this issue? Describe at least two approaches.
IV. Which approach do you believe that the main character should adopt? In answering this question, you should draw on information provided in this case study, as well as the ethical frameworks discussed in this course.