Thursday, January 13, 2011

Business Ethics And Stakeholders

Business ethics is the behavior that a business sticks to its daily habit. The ethics of a particular business can be different. The business interaction applies to the world as a whole to dealing with a single customer. Many business no doubt would gain bad reputation. Some entrepreneurs are just interested in earning profits, which is called capitalism. This automatically brings up the question of ethical behavior. If a business does not stick to the business ethics and breaks the laws, normally end up being fined.
Positive ethics are built on personal ethics. There is no division between what is right for the business, playing fair, telling the truth, and being ethical in life. Business ethics require a business plan. A business’ ethics are expanded by its image and its future and role in the community. The clearer the plan for growth, stability, profits, and service, the strong the business is committed.
Stakeholder is a person, group, organization, or system who influences or can be influenced by a business's accomplishments. You can use a stakeholder analysis to identify people and groups, which will influence you positively or negatively. It can also develop strategies to gain more support for your initiative and deduct any situations to successful achievement of your plan.

Wednesday, January 12, 2011

Sustainability

Sustainability is the capability of having minimal long-term effect on the environment. Therefore, I agree that businesses should be more sustainable. Businesses should provide what is best for people and the environment.
The Body Shop, the second largest cosmetic franchise in the world, is a top brand for skin and hair care products. The Body Shop is trying to reduce impact in our environment. They are fighting against climate change. In order to for this to happen, they try to reduce emission and waste by recycling.
To reduce their carbon footprint, they have installed new lightings to reduce their energy use. Also, they have introduced energy-awareness training for their staffs, reduce the amount of travel trips, and switch their car fleet to lower-emission models. In the UK, 65% of the stores are on the renewable energy contracts. Their current goal is to make all their polyethylene terephthalate bottles from this plastic. By using these recycled bottles, they save about 9 million plastic bottles every year. Back in 2008, carrier bags had been replaced with 100% recycled and recyclable paper bags. Also, their gift packagings are made by recycled content. They intend to use minimal amount of packaging materials possible. Many people are aiming to go green, to protect our planet. Customers won’t have to worry about what materials they use and whether their cosmetics are organic because The Body Shop is the first cosmetic retailers to use 100% recycled material.
The effort they show affects me as a customer because recycling is one way to reduce the amount of waste. The whole purpose of recycling is to reduce pollution and protect natural resources.