In: Economics
Review the following scenarios and for each indicate:
1. If you believe the behavior is normal, aggressive, unethical, or illegal.
2. Also indicate what you should be done, supporting your reasoning and/or decision indicating which of the three models of social responsibility(profit responsibility/stakeholder responsibility/societal responsibility) you are using.
Scenario One
Attending a trade show a colleague removes their identity badge and approaches a competitor’s booth and tells the competitor’s representative they have an interest in the product and asks for information.
Scenario Two
A sales representative from a competitor’s firm asks you to hire him/her promising to provide information about the customers he/she handled while with the competitor.
Scenario Three
Your firm conducts market research to find which butter substitute doctors most recommend for patients with high cholesterol. The survey results indicate 80 % of doctors make no recommendation, 5% recommend your product (brand A), 4 % recommend your chief competitor (brand B), & no other brand received more that 2%. Your advertising agency suggests the following advertising themes:
-More Doctors Recommend Brand A than Any Other Leading Brand
-Doctors Recommend Brand A 25 % More Than the Next Leading Brand
For scenario three evaluate the behavior using both the profit model and the stakeholder model, indicating differences in behavior according to each model.
Scenario one
It talks about an illegal action. Here, it is said that the colleague removed the identity badge and approached a competitors booth. With the notion that they have an interest in their product at a trade show, it is being done to collect information about the product. The act is considered to be illegal. The identity badge represents a firm in the trade show and improper use of the same is considered to be an illegal and unethical action considering the show. Here, there should be stakeholder responsibility to educate the representatives not to resort to such processes and there should be societal responsibility from the side of the representative not to resort to such actions.
Scenario two
The given scenario represents an unethical behaviour from the part of the representative. Here, the representative is asking about hiring him/her promising the fact that he/she is ready to give the customer records of the rival firm. Here, the representative should have the societal responsibility not to resort to such actions to find things done for him/her.
Scenario three
The given scenario represents an aggressive approach which is not unethical. Here, the firm conducts a market research about which brand does the doctor recommend for butter. It was found that 80% of the doctors never made any recommendations and 5% recommended the firm’s brand A, 4% represented the rival brand B and no other brand received more than 2% recommendation. The advertisement of the firm stated that more doctors recommended brand A more than any other band which is a true statement as 80% have made no recommendations in this regard. In the other statement, the firm states that doctors represent brand A 25% more than the next brand which is also true considering the statistics available. Here, the profit responsibility of the firm is seen as the firm would try to increase the profitability of it through advertisements and other approaches.