Business Ethics and Contemporary Issues

This assignment delves into the multifaceted realm of contemporary business ethics. It examines various theoretical frameworks, including Ayn Rand's influence on business ethics and the application of practice theory to business relationships. The document also explores themes such as corporate social responsibility, the impact of globalization on ethical practices, and the role of Confucian values in shaping ethical business conduct. Lastly, it considers the significance of engaged scholarship in advancing our understanding of entrepreneurship and small business ethics.

CONTEMPORARY
DEVELOPMENTS IN
BUSINESS AND
MANAGEMENT

TABLE OF CONTENTS
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................1
TASK 1............................................................................................................................................1
Overview of the primary external influences to Toyota.............................................................1
TASK 2............................................................................................................................................4
1. Analyse cultural change of Toyota and its influence on policies and decision making. ........4
2. Critically evaluate the effectiveness of the organization’s response.......................................7
3. Areas for improvement in Toyota...........................................................................................7
CONCLUSION................................................................................................................................8
REFERENCES..............................................................................................................................10

INTRODUCTION
Business development refers to potential improvements in various functions and
employees working in an organisation. Along with advancement in technology or business
operation it is very important to develop each and every individual within a company. In this
present report Toyota has been chosen for assessment. Toyota is a Japanese Multinational auto
mobile company whose headquarter is situated in Toyota, Aichi, Japan. Organisation has more
than 600 subsidiaries. Establishment is involved in manufacturing of vehicles and is world's sixth
largest company in terms of revenue. This present report will focus on External factors which
influence the establishment. It has high contribution in every sector like political, legal,
economic, social and environmental. In addition to this, it will also cover recommendations for
improvements in Organisational culture of Toyota. Furthermore, cultural change of Toyota and
its influence on policies and decision making will be described in brief. Critical evaluation on the
effectiveness of the organization’s response will also be done.
TASK 1
Overview of the primary external influences to Toyota
PESTLE Analysis
Toyota is the third largest car manufacturer in this entire world. It plays a major role in
automotive industry. PESTLE analysis of Toyota will be done to know the impact of external
environment factors on the company. PESTLE analysis is a concept in marketing principles. This
analysis is made to know the effect on new product launch or current operations.
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Political
While dealing in cars and vehicles, Political factors has significant role in
knowing the factors that affect Company's in a particular nation or market. Toyota operates in
many nations, so it has to deal with many political environment of different countries. Toyota
analyses all such majors in order to earn profits and stability of the company. Market should be
studied by the company before entering in any market (Bansal, Shrivastava and Nguyen, 2018).
Political stability in a country helps in determining the working environment that organisation
needs to follow for running business in that nation. Stability in political environment of a country
means calm culture that is favourable to run a business. Frequent changes in government policies
has a great impact on profits of the business. To earn growth and higher income in a business,
policies of country related to taxes and imports exports should be friendly. It helps the
organisation in earning more easily.
Toyota deals in cars so it needs support from government for eco-friendly products. It
will help the establishment in grabbing opportunity and improving its product in a way that it can
satisfy expectations of environment. In the year 1992, Toyota has planned to set up its operations
in United Kingdom because all tariffs related to domestic cars manufactures has been abolished.
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Illustration 1: PESTLE Analysis
(Source: PESTLE Analysis, 2017)

European market was giving opportunity to Toyota to deal alone in a single large activity and
become the European car manufacturer. Toyota got many benefits from the same by operating in
UK it has excluded the tariffs. It used intelligent, dedicated talents and an infrastructure was
developed which helped Toyota in earning and enjoying many advantages. European union has
given the most suitable political conditions in which all the countries got merged in terms of their
economies so that a large market can be developed. It resulted in easy trade in goods and services
and labour was easily available without any hassle.
Economic
This factor of PESTLE analysis helps in knowing the effects of economic situations on
any organisation. Toyota has major business with US as dollar is more powerful than yen.
Company has always grabbed the opportunity of growth in the world's largest economies.
Growth in any sector of business will result in growth of Toyota. As, better economic condition
will increase the purchasing power of a country (Amankwah-Amoah, Osabutey and Egbetokun,
2018). This will increase business of companies like Toyota. Inflation rate is also a major factor
which affects organisation in great way. Higher inflation rate will decline sales of company.
GDP is also a factor which affects the success of the Toyota. Better GDP of any nation will
result in improvement in living standard of people. Thus, it will help the company like Toyota in
growing their business by selling small cars to people who are buying cars for the first time.
Social
Auto mobile companies Concerns most about all the environmental factors that implies
on driving vehicles. Toyota is focusing on manufacturing electric cars or hybrid cars so that it
cannot cause harm to the environment. Toyota Prius is one of the example from Toyota of such
cars (PESTLE analysis, 2017). Toyota is planning to divert its business by 2020 towards
production of electric vehicles. Hybrid cars has opened many opportunities for Toyota, people
has started showing interest in Electronic cars. Change in attitude of consumer and family
priorities has also a great impact on company. Many a time, family changes their priority of
buying things which affects business in great way. Decision of company to establish
administration in United Kingdom was one of the best decision of organisation. It helped
company in enjoying benefits of talented employees and a well-developed infrastructure
(Bendell, 2017). It also resulted in entry of entity in one of the biggest market of the world. Due
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to workers and their thought company has got so many ideas of manufacturing as per the taste
and preference of consumer. European customers have also got benefits from the same.
Technological
Technological factors affect the most to companies like Toyota because they itself are
technological organisations. In 21st century IT sector has grown rapidly. Every company uses IT
sector for growth and development in their business. Toyota is an auto mobile industry which is
majorly based on technology. To increase sales in an auto mobile industry, company needs to
improve its technological system. Popularity of a company's brand depend upon the kind of
services they provide (Sosik and Jung, 2018). Like here Toyota company's brand image is
depended upon how safe cars they manufacture. To do the same Toyota needs to invest highly in
technology (Bentley and Gibney, 2017).
Every customer pays for the best quality products so they too like to buy from those
companies who are innovative and which makes them different from other brands. Cars which
consume low fuel and gives a good average are considered to be the best. So technology is most
important factor in growth and profits of the company. In the year 1993, UK has given chance to
Toyota to make investments in manufacturing operations. Technology was very easily available
that time and highly educated employees has given more advantage to the company in
technological terms. This has helped Toyota in achieving higher growth and great opportunities
to expand its business. Rising growth in e-commerce has helped the organisation in promotion of
its products through social media or any other electronic medium.
Environmental
Every company is focusing on keeping the environment clean and manufacturing
environmental free products. It helps the organisation in building a good brand image.
Government also support such environmental friendly products and ideas of company. Every
other company including Toyota invests in sustainability. In the field of environment, Toyota has
achieved many breakthroughs. It has also contributed for the protection of environment by way
of making efforts towards the same (Bianchi, 2017). Decline in Oil reserve is also an opportunity
for Toyota as it promotes the company for innovative development on motors. Toyota has
adopted technology by but it always implies environmental policies of the nation in their work
Toyota has got so many opportunities in order to provide more environmental free
products like electronic cars, cars with higher average of fuel consumption. Along with this,
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company should also focus on all the laws related to environmental pollution of the nation in
which organisation is operating. Toyota deals in cars so it needs support from government for
ozone-friendly products. It will help the establishment in grabbing opportunity and improving its
product in a way that it can satisfy expectations of environment
Legal
Legal policies of all nation is different and they vary in every market. Company suffers
many losses in terms of legal issues in many areas. Major areas are passenger safety for the auto
mobile company. Toyota has the opportunity for higher growth because government is daily
improving intellectual property rights. So by this way company can manufacture high quality
products which are more safe and fulfils the satisfaction of employees. Toyota should also follow
consumer laws and work according to the needs of customers. Organisation should make sure
that it has fulfilled all those requirements that is ensured by it in their products. Else it will be an
exploitation of consumers.
External environment gives so many opportunities to the company (Boyd and et.al.,
2017). It helps the company in improving its manufacturing process and operations by implying
all the external factors. PESTLE analysis has concluded that Toyota has so many opportunities
which can help the company in attaining higher success and growth in the future.
TASK 2
1. Analyse cultural change of Toyota and its influence on policies and decision making.
Organizational culture means that belief and action that contributes to the social and
physiological environment of the company. Toyota has a culture of adopting innovations and
supporting continuous environment. Toyota believes in team working and manufacturing of
quality products. Corporate culture is always based on goals and objectives of the company. It is
designed in such a way that aim of organisation can be achieved.
Charles Handy Model of Organisation Culture
In an organisation people works together to achieve a common goal. To achieve the same
workers, learn the work and maintain close coordination with other colleagues. Charles Handy
has defined organisation culture in four types.
Power: In many companies' power remains with the top level management and whereas,
in some organisations middle and lower level employees also has the power to make major
decisions related to their work. Toyota has that culture where decision power lies in the hand of
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top level management. Subordinates have to follow strictly what is assigned to them. In such
organisational culture employees cannot share their ideas and views to their superiors. Toyota
has made strict policies regarding decision making and their implementation (Brodie, 2017).
Employees just need to follow all what is assigned to them for the goal and objectives of the
company. This culture is good as well as bad in some aspects. When in an organisation all the
decisions are taken by higher authorities, it demotivate all employees. There is no authority in
hands to workers, for every small tasks they need approach their superiors. It decreases their
morale and they feel less job satisfaction.
Task culture: Different teams are formed by the company to achieve a specific target.
Employees come together for the assigned task. In this culture, like four to five members in each
team are taken and some specific work is provided to them. A team leader is also appointed so
that all employees under the leader can check work provided to team members. All employees
who share common interest are grouped together in a single team. Company uses teamwork
policy of working in its business. Organisation believes in team working because it feels that it
gives more productivity. Employees get more dedicated and feel competitive while working in a
team. Toyota's culture is highly active towards forming teams and groups for every task they
wish to accomplish (Handy's model of organisational culture, 2018). Every worker of company
goes with a training program which is specially designed for Team building. Here in this training
program Toyota train employees in such a way that they get enough understanding of working
with a team. It helps them in knowing everything one should know while working with a group
of people.
Person Culture: As per the culture model given by Charles Handy, many people have
the feeling that they are more important than the place where they work. Such companies follow
the society of person. In this culture, people are more concerned about themselves and they work
just for money. They do not get attached with the company in any way. Toyota does not follow
person culture. They are just loyal towards their work and learn from their work. In this culture,
major focus of work man is to earn money and learn for self-growth. But every employee should
know that company comes first than any other thing. Being selfish and working for own are not
the ethics that an employee should follow.
Role culture: As per the specialisation and knowledge of a person works are being
assigned to them. Toyota follows role culture given by Charles Handy and company assigns
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work to its employees by understanding their educational qualification. In this culture,
employees of Toyota take the work assigned to them and accept all the challenges given to them.
Amount of responsibility a person handles gives them a sense of power (Butler, 2017). Workers
in this organisational culture are responsible for all the work given to them.
Additional Features of Toyota's Organisational Culture
Teamwork: Company uses teamwork policy of working in its business. Organisation
believes in team working because it feels that it gives more productivity. Employees get more
dedicated and feel competitive while working in a team. Toyota's culture is highly active towards
forming teams and groups for every task they wish to accomplish. Every worker of company
goes with a training program which is specially designed for Team building. Here in this training
program Toyota train employees in such a way that they get enough understanding of working
with a team. It helps them in knowing everything one should know while working with a group
of people. Team working helps in giving social satisfaction to employees because everyone
communicates with each other. By this social groups are being formed and it relaxes people from
work and stress.
Continuous improvement through learning: Such organisational culture is adopted by
Toyota that employees feel as if it is a learning organisation. It believes in adopting every
innovative technology in its working system so that company can achieve growth. Technological
learning by way of continuous improvement in the system of company (Grayson and Hodges,
2017). This is the culture of Toyota which supports continuous improvement of manufacturing
process. This will result in attaining higher growth of the establishment. They are just loyal
towards their work and learn from the same. In this culture, Employees just come to learn and
earn from the company.
Quality: Quality is that feature which is heart of Toyota's organisational culture.
Company has always focused on giving quality products to its customers. High quality is the
major attribute of company because automotive industry has to keep safety of people in mind
while manufacturing any vehicle. Toyota has always kept safety and best quality services as the
first priority of their company culture (Hicks, 2018). Quality product increases the sales of the
company and attracts maximum number of customers. If quality aspect is followed by company,
then it increases its chances to earn more growth. Toyota’s organisational culture believes on
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quality work. Every product of Toyota is made with all dedication and hard work of engineers
and expert staff.
Secrecy: It is always believed by company to maintain a degree of secrecy. Auto-mobile
industries have to maintain a privacy for their manufacturing process. Technology adopted by the
company should be kept as secret. In the plants of Toyota operated in US many problems are
faced related to technological system. So company has adopted the culture of maintaining
secrecy. This will result in maintaining a dignity of the products. No other establishment can use
their formula of manufacturing products. Hence, this is the main reason behind maintaining the
secrecy in their technological system.
Influence of above factors on decision making of Toyota.
Decisions are the biggest part of a company which is required to be taken by company daily on
every small thing. It affects the system of company as a whole. A single wrong decision can
result in big loss to the establishment. So before taking any decision company should analyse all
the factors and its consequences in the future.
Team working is adopted in work culture of Toyota. It helps in fast decision making
because group of people who works together have common goals and objectives. So it will be
easy for managers and leaders to take decision in one direction. An effective team where
employees are intelligent helps the organisation in decision making. They give their ideas and
suggestions which helps the management system in forming decisions.
Toyota follows the culture of continuous improvement which helps in knowing to
management that decisions should be taken in the direction of improvement. Managers know that
every innovation should be bought in to operations of company. Establishment believes in
bringing as many innovations in its operations as much as it can. It helps the establishment to
know the direction of working and it makes easy for managers to know that in what direction
they have to make decision. It will help the firm in a positive way and it will make their decision
making power fast and easy (La Rocca, Hoholm and Mørk, 2017).
Toyota's organisational culture believes on quality work. Every product of Toyota is
made with all dedication and hard work of engineers and expert staff. Quality product can only
help a person in competing in this competitive market.
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2. Critically evaluate the effectiveness of the organization’s response.
As per Masalimova and Shaidullina (2017), Toyota has adopted culture of providing
training to its new joinees. It will help them in learning about the work that they have to perform
in the company. Training is given by experts in Toyota. It is very effective for organisation
because this makes easy for employees to learn about organisational culture. Different
development programs are launched by Toyota in order to make workers know about the new
technology and innovations. It helps in learning in a better way from experts rather than knowing
things on their own. Toyota falls under auto mobile industry in which adaptation of new
technology is necessary for growth of the company. Toyota responds to such things by
implementing the same in its new product launch. Effectiveness in work can be achieved by this
training and development programs. Whereas Pred (2017), says that if training is not provided in
an effective manner to its employees then they will not be able to learn about new technology
that has been adopted by Toyota. It will result in high losses to the organisation. As, a proper
trained employee can contribute more to the establishment. So effectiveness in working of
company will come by providing a proper training to their employees by experts. As per Mosse
(2018). Toyota has adopted the culture of continuous improvement which is necessary in an auto
mobile industry. Frequent technological changes make it compulsory for company to adopt
continuous learning. Employees can give more output if they learn every technological
transformation. Continuous improvement will increase the sales of the company and helps it in
achieving its goals and objectives. As, improvement on daily basis brings positive outcomes and
aims of the organisation can be achieved easily. But as per Roy, Paul and Mukhopadhyay (2018),
Continuous improvement is given in theoretical format to employees which increase their
knowledge but employees do not get positive practical knowledge from the same. Which may
give less productivity to the company. So for a positive outcome an establishment should give
practical knowledge rather than giving theoretical guidelines. It will result in overall growth if
employees as well as of organisation.
3. Areas for improvement in Toyota
Toyota should hire experts who can give training to employees about every innovation
company is adopting. Training helps workers in learning about the new process or new joinees
about the existing process that organisation is following. It helps in learning in a better way from
experts rather than knowing things on their own. This will make the procedure fast and easy,
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which will result in improvement in growth and success of establishment. Training is the only
way by which a new joinees can learn the work of company (Rutland, 2018).
Toyota should operate its system in developing countries. As it will give an opportunity to
the company to increase its sales and revenues. Developing countries has large market for
automotive sector because they are not developed completely and are adopting innovative
products. This will give growth at worldwide level to the company. It also helps in increasing
living standard of people of developing countries. It is a kind of great motivation for such
nations and people who resides there in such countries.
Toyota's governance should be active in terms of following the latest technological
system in this competitive environment. Change in attitude of consumer and family priorities has
also a great impact on company (Trehan, Higgins and Jones, 2018). Many a time, family changes
their priority of buying things which affects business in great way. Decision of company to
establish administration in United Kingdom was one of the best decision of organisation. It
helped company in enjoying benefits of talented employees and a well-developed infrastructure.
It also resulted in entry of entity in one of the biggest market of the world. Due to workers and
their thought company has got so many ideas of manufacturing as per the taste and preference of
consumer. European customers have also got benefits from the same.
Company should also focus on manufacturing more electronic vehicles which are
environment friendly. Toyota deals in cars so it needs support from government for ozone-
friendly products (Sautman and Dreyer, 2017). It will help the establishment in grabbing
opportunity and improving its product in a way that it can satisfy expectations of environment.
Toyota is planning to divert its business by 2020 towards production of electric vehicles. Hybrid
cars has opened many opportunities for Toyota, people has started showing interest in Electronic
cars.
Toyota's management system should review the performance of the employees and their
overall efficiency. It will improve the productivity of company. Workers will be assigned task as
per their efficiency. If any employee has less working capabilities, then manager should make
notes on his performance and take necessary steps for improvement. It will result in employee
satisfaction as well as growth of the organisation.
Toyota should be more active towards corporate social responsibility. As every company
needs to take make environmental friendly products. This will be beneficial for public as well as
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for the company (Schaltegger and Burritt, 2017). Toyota should follow Corporate social
responsibility so that establishment will not face problems like other companies. For example,
Volkswagen has faced emission scandal which resulted in huge loss to the organisation as well
as to the environment. So in order to avoid such scandals Company should be more focus
towards its polices made for Social responsibilities. Organisation should make donations and
charity. A separate department should be made to for the same, this will result in benefits to the
society as well as increase goodwill of the establishment. It will increase social image of the
company which will result in more investments by public. Indirectly this will help the
establishment in raising more funds from investors.
CONCLUSION
From the above report it has been summarized that every Organization has different
culture which means that they follow some or all other policies. Model of Handy culture has
been used by company so that team working can be adopted. In addition to this, PESTLE
analysis has been made to know the impact of external environment factors on the company.
Furthermore, it has been concluded that continuous learning helps to adopt every innovative
technology in its working system so that company can achieve growth and objectives. By
reviewing the performance of the employees and their overall efficiency will result in improving
the productivity of company. Along with this, change in attitude of consumer and family
priorities has also a great impact on company.
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REFERENCES
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opportunities of doing business in Africa: The emerging roles and effects of
technologies. Technological Forecasting and Social Change, 131, pp.171-174.
Bansal, H., Shrivastava, G., Nguyen, G.N. and Stanciu, L.M., 2018. Social Network Analytics
for Contemporary Business Organizations.
Bendell, J., 2017. Terms for endearment: Business, NGOs and sustainable development.
Routledge.
Bentley, G. and Gibney, J., 2017. Regional development agencies and business change.
In Regional Development Agencies and Business Change (pp. 23-30). Routledge.
Bianchi, M.T., 2017. Discovering the role of innovation in contemporary business systems: an
assessment technique from the literature analysis. International Journal of Digital
Culture and Electronic Tourism, 2(1), pp.1-15.
Boyd, B. and et.al., 2017. Hybrid organizations: New business models for environmental
leadership. Routledge.
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Butler, A., 2017. Contemporary South Africa. Macmillan International Higher Education.
Grayson, D. and Hodges, A., 2017. Corporate social opportunity: Seven steps to make corporate
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Hicks, S.R., 2018. Ayn Rand and contemporary business ethics. Perspectives on Ayn Rand's
Contributions to Economic and Business Thought, p.239.
La Rocca, A., Hoholm, T. and Mørk, B.E., 2017. Practice theory and the study of interaction in
business relationships: Some methodological implications. Industrial Marketing
Management, 60, pp.187-195.
Masalimova, A.R. and Shaidullina, A.R., 2017. Diversification of professional on-the-job
training models and forms in contemporary business conditions. Modern Journal of
Language Teaching Methods, 7(3), p.554.
Mosse, D., 2018. Caste and development: Contemporary perspectives on a structure of
discrimination and advantage. World Development, 110, pp.422-436.
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Pred, A., 2017. City-systems in advanced economies: past growth, present processes and future
development options. Routledge.
Roy, A., Paul, P., Roy, M. and Mukhopadhyay, K., 2018. Mapping Confucian Values in the
Context of Ethical Dimensions: Implications for Contemporary Business
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Rutland, P., 2018. Business and state in contemporary Russia. Routledge.
Sautman, B. and Dreyer, J.T., 2017. Contemporary Tibet: politics, development and society in a
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Sosik, J.J. and Jung, D., 2018. Full range leadership development: Pathways for people, profit,
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Trehan, K., Higgins, D. and Jones, O., 2018. Engaged scholarship: Questioning relevance and
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Online:
PESTLE analysis. 2017. [Online]. Accessed through:
<http://panmore.com/toyota-pestel-pestle-analysis-recommendations>.
Handy's model of organisational culture. 2018. [Online]. Accessed through:
<https://www.tutor2u.net/business/reference/models-of-organisational-culture-handy>.
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