Managing People and Organization Author Note: Sustainability in Business

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Managing People and Organization
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Introduction
Sustainability has become an indisputable part of business. Most organizations that
are now growing and expanding depend upon sustainability in order to maintain their
competitive advantage (Benn, Edwards & Williams, 2014). A sustainable business, also
called a green business is an enterprise that leaves minimal impact and footprint on their local
as well as global environment, society, community and economy (Zhou, Chen, & Li, 2018).
Alibaba is one the largest e-commerce chain in China. Founded in the year 1999 by Jack Ma
and seventeen other co-founders, it has established extensive supply and distribution chain all
over China. The main target customers of the organization are the middle class people in
China. The middle class people in china alone cover 55% of online sale consumption
(Alibaba Group, 2019). Their mission has been to be able to make it easy to do business
anywhere. They integrate hundreds of sellers and manufacturers with the customers thus
maintaining and B2B and B2C business strategy. Being a company of significant impact,
Alibaba is committed to sustainable growth and business strategies in order to maintain their
competitive advantage (Alibaba Group, 2019). In this report, the sustainability aspects of the
Alibaba Group and how those aspects have been upheld has been analyzed. In light of that,
the enterprise has been evaluated in order to decide whether Alibaba Group can be considered
a sustainable organization.
Discussion
There are four criteria that a business needs to meet before it can be called a
sustainable business. These are: incorporation of principles of sustainability into each of the
business decisions that they take, supplying products or services that are environment
friendly and are able to replace the non-sustainable products or services, the product or

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services that they offer are better in sustainability issue than what their competitors offer and
their business operations are committed to environmental principles (Kiron et al., 2013).
Thus, a sustainable business engages in activities so that all of their processes, manufacturing
and products are able to address the present and emerging concerns related to environment
while earning a profit (SDG1. No Poverty | Global Compact Network Australia, 2019).
Company Overview
The business strategy of Alibaba has always been customer satisfaction (Choi, 2015).
They operate mostly in a collective culture and thus, this value is easier to uphold. In case of
individualistic cultures, the main importance is given on the stakeholders. The organization
aims to be able to do business at least for 102 years. The reason behind this aim is that the
company was established in 1999 and by doing business for 102 years they will be able to
touch all three centuries which cannot be claimed by most companies. The vision that they
have set for 2036 is to serve 2 billion global consumers, support 10 million businesses and to
create 100 million jobs (Alibaba Group, 2019).
Sustainability
When it comes to sustainability, Alibaba has created a sustainability policy and goals
in order to be able to impact positive change in the environment that they operate. In order to
learn the aspects that they need to maintain for sustainability, they gather input from their
shareholders, customers and employees. The shareholders and customers are able to share the
global environmental concerns that they need to focus on while the employees, as they are
locals are able to address the local sustainability issues and concerns that they need to look
after (Good, 2014). There are seven key areas of sustainability that Alibaba maintains. These
are:

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Corporate Governance
The corporate governance is the heart of Alibaba Group’s business. This strategy
helps them to ensure that their business remains sustainable. Alibaba has seen rapid growth in
the last 20 years and it was necessary to create a sustainable decision making system in order
to be able to retain their profit in an ever-changing market (Kim, Zhang & Zhang, 2016). The
Alibaba board of directors have 36 senior managers and partners that are involved in the
decision making process. The partners are dedicated to monitor the ethical conduct of the
employees of Alibaba, make personal contributions in order to solve investment requirements
and set the tone at the top. This is how the people on top maintain their social responsibility.
Due to the collective decision making process of the Alibaba Group, it is ensured every time
a decision is taken that the decision has been debated thoroughly and deliberated for a long
time. It is also ensured that in the decision making process, any single individual does not
hold the key decision making power. Thus choosing the correct leaders is extremely
important for the success of the business. While choosing the individuals that will direct the
company to its future, some key traits are always given importance. These are: Integrity,
Intellect, Emotional Intelligence, Ethical Conduct, Energy, Ability to Influence, Strategic
Mindset, Open-mindedness, resilience, self-awareness and Humility (Wang et al., 2018).
Intellectual Property Rights Protection
The very center of a healthy marketplace practice lies the rights to intellectual
property. Alibaba Group continuously tries to ensure that the products that they sell are
authentic and branded. They discourage the sale of unauthorized or fake goods, which is
detrimental to the good will that they have created and intend to maintain. The vendors that
they work with falls under the protections of copyright infringement (Alibaba Group, 2019).
Alibaba has even files law suits and won them when it comes to authenticity of a product.
The well-known brands like Adidas and Apple are their vendors and thus maintaining and