The Employees do the everyday jobs that ensure that the business keeps running smoothly. They want a fair day’s pay for a fair day’s work as well as job security to ensure financial safety for the foreseeable future. They may need training and they are entitled to a safe and comfortable working area. The employees have the least important say in the business despite arguably the biggest jobs in the business keeping everything in working order. The responsibility of the employees is to ensure that the output is a good enough quality for the customers to stay satisfied. If employers keep employees happy and motivated then they will get a better quality work from them. Many businesses try to influence employees by offering:
- Training opportunities
- Promotion opportunities
- Profit sharing schemes and bonuses
- ‘perks’ like discounts
- Social activities like trips
The Customers these stakeholders are vital to a businesses success because if they have no customers then they will have no money coming in and therefore the business would fail. The customers would by the products that the business make but if the products are cheaper elsewhere or better elsewhere then the customer may leave because another business does the job better. They want value for their money as well as quality products at reasonable prices. Businesses have to conduct market research to see whether the customers that they are aiming for will buy their products or the products won’t sell. If the business can successfully predict what the customers will do then it contributes hugely to success.
The Suppliers sells the business raw materials, components or services. All businesses need suppliers so that they can produce their products, without supplies the business can’t make any money leaving the business in free-fall. The suppliers want regular orders because that means that they are themselves succeeding in what they are doing. The suppliers are an influential part of the business because the costs of the business are mainly the raw materials; if the quality of the raw materials is bad then the end product will be bad thus losing customers. Business will buy the raw materials in bulk to get a bigger discount on them.
The Government expect businesses to provide the right products and services that the economy needs to stay stable. The government also want the business to provide jobs for the public so that the economy stays stable again. Also if the business provides goods it allows the government to trade with the rest of the world thus boosting the economy. The government affect the overall profit because they collect taxes from every business after all the costs have been taken away from the businesses income. They fund all businesses as well so they are entitled to tax profits (although nobody like tax).
Conflicts of Stakeholders:
There will be lots of conflicts of interest with the stakeholders. These are the main conflicts of interest:
Between employer and employee- there are conflicts of interest between these two parties quite regularly because the employee wants more pay for less work and the employer wants more work for less pay to maximise profits. Because conflicts are quite common in this instance groups like the Advisory, Conciliation and Arbitration Service (ACAS) are put in place to help to solve them. These conflicts can be easily resolved in a meeting between the two parties or it could need the ACAS because the problem couldn’t be solved in a simple meeting.
Between shareholder and worker- there are conflicts of interest between these two stakeholders because the shareholder wants as much profit as possible but workers don’t want to work harder or more efficiently unless their pay or rewards reflect the hard work. These conflicts are harder to resolve than those between employer and employee because their views are harder to change however many of these conflicts are still solved by meetings.
Between Owners and Managers- there are conflicts between these two parties because both have different objectives to the other e.g. the owner may be so close to the business that they can’t see what the business needs to do to go forward whereas the manager can. These types of conflicts are easy to resolve as both are concerned with taking the business forward so it only takes a meeting to resolve this conflict.
Marks and Spencer’s conflicts- Marks and Spencer’s like any business will have conflicts of interest. M and S have measure to try and restrict these conflicts. The main way they try to do this is the Business Involvement Group (BIG), this is a group of people that are all employees voted for by fellow employees and this group tries to restrict the gap in communications between the owners and the employees via meetings. They have these groups for every store. Once the owners tried to change the breaks that the employees have form one 15min break in the morning, one 30min lunch and another 15min break in the afternoon to one 45min lunch and a 15min break in the afternoon. Every store except form the Peterborough store agreed with this proposal. So the Peterborough BIG had a meeting with the owners and they managed to keep the original break. There was also a time when the business wanted to change the Christmas bonuses but again the Peterborough employees didn’t agree with the idea and once again the BIG managed to keep the old bonuses. Marks and Spencer’s manage to manage their conflicts of interest quite well because of the Business Involvement Group.
