Problem Analysis
In the construction industry, safety has been one of the top five problems faced the industry. Over the past few years, the number of reported safety related cases have been on the rise and this has significantly affected the industry. Safety of the workers has become a major topic of concern, the causes of the safety issues within the construction industry have been associated with most of the companies lack of a well laid out human resource management body and lack of ethical practice to ensure the workers safety at their workplace is upheld. There have been a number of possible reasons that have resulted to these incidences which include, poor safety training for the employees, as the industry grows the companies fail to take all the required safety measures so as to maximise on their profits which is completely unethical. Several incidences have also shown the companies cutting down on the cost of ensuring safety for the workers which in return leaves the worker in a risky position (Shi, Y., Xue, X. and Li, C., 2015). These are some of the issues that will be addressed in the report as well as more on how companies need to utilize ethical theories and a CSR model so as to establish a responsible human resource. This will help control the safety issue of the company in the industry.
Greenleaf Consultant is a consultant company which addresses such issues and provides recommendations to clients on how to handle such cases. Acting as an ethics/CSR consultant in the company, the application of both ethical theories and CSR strategies will help clearly luminate the issue and provide the best approach for Redrow Plc. Safety of the employees as identified earlier will be closely examined and resolved by the end of the report. CSR is the abbreviation for corporate social responsibility. This is a corporate’s initiative to assess and take responsibility for the company’s effects on the environment and social wellbeing (Shi, Y., Xue, X. and Li, C., 2015). In this case we are handing the social well being with the safety of the employees being the major concern. The employees play the major role in any company, it is the responsibility of the company to ensure that their wellbeing is greatly taken care of. In the construction industry, the employee’s safe has received much attention due to increasing safety issues relating to the employees in the construction sites. Ethics on the other hand can be simply defined as the moral principles that govern the behaviours of a person but in the corporate field this ca be defined as the moral principles that govern the decisions made in a business or an organization (Ball, M., 2014). It is the responsibility of the Human resource to apply ethical decision-making theories so as to ensure a safety for the employees at their work stations.
It is important to first address safety problem in the Redrow Plc in the construction industry. Just like any other company in the construction industry, the safety of the workers is of major concern. Among many other risks in the construction industry workers are faced many safety risks such as being struck by objects while working, accidents involving forklifts, demolition and excavation machinery as well as equipment (Biswas, G., Bhattacharya, A. and Bhattacharya, R., 2017). Other risks associated with working on the high building includes, burns from fires, electrical mishaps, explosions, all these risk among others make the workers occupation quite risky (Finkel, G., 2015). Research carried out by the company also shows that cases of death for the workers in the construction industry are also on the rise with the four main causes of death being falls from high points of construction on the site, struck by objects, caught In between these objects and electrocution. These fatal four have been termed as the 58% cause of deaths for the construction workers in the construction industry (Ball, M., 2014). As observed in the construction industries, the well being of the workers keeps being prone to more risks, there has been a rise on the risks on the lives of the workers which led to the need of conducting a study to help one understand the reason behind the worrying pattern (Finkel, G., 2015).
Responsible Management and Corporate Social Responsibility
For Redrow Plc stakeholders, it’s important for them to understand the main reason that have led to the increase in dangers faced by their employees. One of the leading causes is the boom in the construction project. This has significantly led to the rise of the workers safety challenge. Over the past few years the number of construction projects have greatly increased hence the workers tend to be overwhelmed with work, other main causes of the pattern include the few inspections that are carried out on the construction sites. Most researches have identified this as one of the primary causes of these accidents (Ball, M., 2014). With few inspections the workers end up not meeting the required safety regulations and the companies also fail to observe all these requirements hence exposing the workers to more risks. Over the past few years, there has been a drop in the number of construction site inspections which can be seen to have such a huge impact on the safety of the workers. The other leading cause of safety risk for the employees in the construction industry is that some of the companies in the industry are taking shortcuts so as to reduce on the expenses they are to incur if they were to adhere to the set construction policies (Finkel, G., 2015).
This has made construction work one of the most hazardous occupations currently. Redrow Plc being one of the main leading companies in the construction industry, it is important to address the social well being of its workers. Addressing the safety of its employees should receive the highest priority level so as to help reduce and the safety challenges in the industry. Application of CSR is one of the best approaches the company’s human resource can apply. As defined in the introduction, CSR (corporate social responsibility) is an initiative that is extremely beneficial to the social well being of the employees. The term generally implies that the company is willing to go the extra mile so as to ensure the wellbeing of the employees as well as the environment (Biswas, G., Bhattacharya, A. and Bhattacharya, R., 2017). As specified earlier, he report will specifically cover the social wellbeing sector of the CSR.
Exploring the Issue
This is a term that is used to describe a company’s effort to improve the society. The efforts can be categories in different ways and in return they help both the company, and the employees of the company. In the construction industry this is one of the most important sectors of the company that should be integrate. As identified earlier, in relation to the challenges and the dangers the employees undergo while working it is the responsibility if the company to go the extra mile so as to positively impact the lives of its employees. With the right application of a CSR in the company there are multiple advantages that the company is entitled to once the CSR is implemented accurately.
It is the role of the HR to ensure the safety of its employees. As dictated by the CSR decisions made by the managements needs to be in favour of its employees. The human resource has this responsibility all tasked to them. With the fast-growing construction industry, it is the responsibility of the HR to ensure that the company keeps hiring more employees but this has proven to be one of the main dangers to the workers safety. With the increase in demand of the workers, the companies end up hiring more works and tend to loosen the vetting process of who are the qualified people to hire. With this being the case, the unqualified employed workers end up risking the safety of the qualified employees already hire (Randy Evans, W. and Davis, W.D., 2011). This increases the number of safety related Case in the company. The human resource needs to approach this matter in a both ethical related approach as well as a CSR effective strategy. With the rapid growth in the industry, it is ethically right for the HR to carry out an effective vetting of the employees. This means that the HR should up hold the company polices and the standard requirement of who is qualified to be employed.
Exploring the Issue
The industry fails to adapt to these policies so as to reduce on the wages paid to the construction workers. Ethically this is wrong, the cost of hiring cheap labour has led to the rise in the number safety associated cases in the industry. As seen with the application of CSR it is the responsibility of the company to provide a better social well-being of its workers. This means the company main responsibility should be ensuring that its employees wellbeing is safe guarded. With this being mention, the human resource and the management should take serious action in formulating a way to vet its employees and ensure that these procedures are met before any employee is hired. This ends up helping secure the well-being of the other employees. This is because the safety risks that may be as a result of incompetence will be eliminated by the start of the working process. This falls under the category of ethical business practice which is a branch under CSR. The category implies the ethical application of business practices, the following of the laid-out procedures for hiring employees is one of the most important part of the business. Redrow falls under the construction company which clearly puts it at the centre of the whole employee qualification program. This has multiple advantage to the company not only the employees. With the application of such a CSR approach the company ends up reducing the employee safety related cases, this means the company manages to cut down on expenses that may incur in case of accidents. Also due to the qualified employees the company will end up increase its productivity. For the construction industry, this means the company will end up coming up with standard structural building as well as improving its work relations. This will also improve the company image significantly. Most of the construction companies have tainted their brand due to the increases safety incidences, this has resulted to the reduced number of employees since most of the employees end up quitting due to the fear of their life. Looking at this in a larger perspective, the company ends up being branded as a company with little concern to the wellbeing of its employees. Such incidences get the company into extra expenses trying to settle legal charges among other expenses which could have been avoided.
CSR in connection with the management can also significantly impact the well being of its workers by conducting safety training from time to time or in case there are new technologies set in place for the workers to utilize. It is the responsibility of the human resource to address these matters and always priorities the workers wellbeing. In the construction industry, hazardous nature of the work the employees are subjected to needs constant education. The company needs to come up with educative programs which help the employees learn more on how to remain safe. In most cases, employees receive close too no training where the employers assume the employees are conversant with their duties. The CSR stipulates that going the extra mile to safe guide the well-being of the employees (Rangan, K., Chase, L.A. and Karim, S., (2012). With this being said the business needs to be ready to higher professional safety companies to come and educate the workers on different safety measures. This gives the workers a greater exposure on how to ensure their well-being is observed a secure. The management needs to keep its workers up today with the current safety measures in the industry. With the advancement in construction architectures, the workers are exposed to more safety threats. Most of the companies do not address these matters. Ethically, it is the responsibility of the management to updates its employees on the changes in the industry and in case these changes have an impact on their wellbeing, then the management needs to address the issues and provide risk prevention measures. This is a major challenge in the construction industry. Over the past few years, the construction industry has received great revolution. The construction work is booming and as seen earlier the complexity of the constructions keeps rising. From the risks analysis in the introduction, it is evident that, most of these risks are directly associated with the above changes in the industry. The risks seem to be affecting the workers since most of the companies have not embraced the changes in he industry and the impact this has on the workers wellbeing. The management has the responsibility to factor in all these changes and provide educative knowledge to the worker on how to cope with the changes. As seen in the corporate social responsibility pyramid there are there important sections which are: economic responsibilities, legal responsibilities, the ethical responsibilities and finally the philanthropic responsibilities.
Recommendations for Redrow Plc
Most of the companies are more concerned of the economic responsibilities which entails making profits then followed by the legal responsibilities lastly the other two come in respectively which should not be the case. The company should factor in under what expense does it cost the company to make these profits. With this being factored in the wellbeing of the employees then becomes a priority. Educating the employees for instance on the use of new technologies among other new advancements in the industry can extremely save the lives of the workers. Safety and the well being of the employees has been greatly challenged by this advancement in use of machines among other new equipment in the industry. The death counts of workers on the hands of these machines keeps rising. Research shows that most of these deaths is as a result of lack of knowledge by the workers (Khan, M.T., Khan, N.A., Ahmed, S. and Ali, M., 2012). The company should take this as a challenge and educate the workers for there own safety while using the new equipment.
With the decrease in the site inspections it implies that the workers are less supervised. This means that some of the construction safety rules end up being neglected. This ends up affecting the workers well-being. The human resource of the company should also thing of an effective way of ensuring the works adhere to all these rules for their own wellbeing. CSR advocates for legal responsibility of the company. It is the legal responsibility of the company to ensure that the employees adhere to the construction laws in the industry (Rahman, S., 2011). These rules are set in place t ensure the well-being of the employees. The company is ethically responsible to meet these duties and reequipment just as it is specified in the deontologism theory where one performs the act that is appropriate for everyone. It is responsibility of the management to ensure the employees follow the construction safety rules hence the application of the theory implies that the management should not neglect this responsibility.
Benefits of applying CSR for Redrow Plc
In the construction industry, there are multiple advantages in applying CSR. As seen from the covered sections CSR is very connected with the well being of the employees, this has a magnitude impact on the company. It is important to go through most of these benefits so as to help solidify the integration of CSR and Redrow Plc. One of the main reasons for CRS is improving on the company’s brand recognition. With the constant care the management offers to its workers, it reflects on the brand of the business (Carroll, A.B., 1999). This makes it possible for the company to acquire more business opportunities since most of the other businesses always want to associate with such a brand. This directly impacts the economic responsibility under CSR of the company. This will also improve the business reputation of the company. The less the safety cases related to the workers the better the business reputation. This means that the business will improve on its employee retaining ability (Sherekar, V., Tatikonda, M. and Student, M., 2016). These the wellbeing of the employees will be safe guarded there will be no need for the employees to quite the company since the company will give them no reason to quit. This in returns improves the productivity of the employees (Xie, S., 2015). With improved productivity, the company will be able to build customer loyalty since the customers will be assure that the company will always deliver. The implementation of the CSR also has a financial impact to the company. Due the efforts and measure taken to ensure the well being of the employees, the company will reduce on the expenses that could have been utilized handling law suits and other medical charges that may be incurred in case the safety of the workers was not observed. This will also impact the growth rate of the company (Moratis, L., 2016). With the company making more profits and its retaining ability of its workers, it becomes easy for the company to grow since it’s a team made up of competent and certified employees.
Advising Redrow Plc
From the conducted research in the construction industry in relation to the safety of the employees it is evident the impact associated with the implementation of a CSR approach by the management to see the well-being of the workers covered by the company. There has been different measure covered within the report on some of the measure the company needs to take up. These measures are listed below since they were explained into details before:
The HR and management need to adapt a well organised hiring system so as to avoid the employment of unqualified workers. The dangers associated with the employment of unqualified workers has also been highlighted in the previous sections. Redrow also needs to offer safety training to its workers as the technology advances in the industry. With the construction industry growing and becoming more complex as a company, Redrow Plc needs to invest in its employees so as to ensure the employees are conversant with the new changes in the industry. This directly secures their well-being. Application of ethics and CSR in the company management is the core conclusion of the report as the best approach to secure Redrow Plc workers well-being.
References
Ball, M., (2014). Rebuilding Construction (Routledge Revivals): Economic Change in the British Construction Industry. Routledge.
Biswas, G., Bhattacharya, A. and Bhattacharya, R., (2017). Occupational health status of construction workers: A review. International Journal of Medical Science and Public Health, 6(4), pp.669-675.
Carroll, A.B., 1999. Corporate social responsibility: Evolution of a definitional construct. Business & society, 38(3), pp.268-295.
Finkel, G., (2015). The economics of the construction industry. Routledge.
Khan, M.T., Khan, N.A., Ahmed, S. and Ali, M., (2012). Corporate social responsibility (CSR)–definition, concepts and scope. Universal Journal of Management and Social Sciences, 2(7), pp.41-52.
Moratis, L., (2016). Out of the ordinary? Appraising ISO 26000’s CSR definition. International Journal of Law and Management, 58(1), pp.26-47.
Rahman, S.,(2011). Evaluation of definitions: ten dimensions of corporate social responsibility. World Review of Business Research, 1(1), pp.166-176.
Randy Evans, W. and Davis, W.D., (2011). An examination of perceived corporate citizenship, job applicant attraction, and CSR work role definition. Business & Society, 50(3), pp.456- 480.
Rangan, K., Chase, L.A. and Karim, S., (2012). Why every company needs a CSR strategy and how to build it.
Sherekar, V., Tatikonda, M. and Student, M., (2016). Impact of factor affecting on labour productivity in construction projects by AHP method. Int. J. Eng. Sci. Comput, 6(6).
Shi, Y., Xue, X. and Li, C., (2015) Measuring the CSR of Construction Enterprises: A Literature Review. In ICCREM (pp. 961-966).
Xie, S., (2015). Corporate Social Responsibility and Firm Performance: OLS and Granger Causality Analysis.
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