ABC Bank: Ethical Challenges, CSR, and Marketing Strategies Report

This report examines the ethical challenges faced by ABC Bank following a public inquiry, focusing on the need for ethical reform and improved public perception. It analyzes the bank's shortcomings related to ethical standards, including breaches of anti-money laundering laws and customer service issues. The report explores measures for addressing these challenges, such as setting business goals, establishing ethical guidelines, implementing motivational approaches, and conducting training programs. It also highlights the importance of risk management and the role of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) in rebuilding the bank's reputation. The study further discusses the use of social media marketing for advertising CSR activities and potential negative public backlash. Recommendations include internal and management changes, aligning the bank's structure with government policies, and focusing on regaining the trust of the community and customers through CSR initiatives and transparent communication. The report concludes with a call to action for ABC Bank to implement these changes to regain its market value and improve its brand image.

MANAGEMENT
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Executive Summary
The study highlights the importance and effective of management in business firms. The study
also discusses about the problems that the business firm has to face due to poor ethical standard
and structure. The study has highlighted the effectiveness of corporate social responsibility. The
study focuses on social media as a medium for advertisement. Recommendation for ABC Bank
has also been included in the study.
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Table of Contents
Introduction......................................................................................................................................3
Challenges of ABC Bank.................................................................................................................3
Measures for the challenges.............................................................................................................4
Corporate Social Responsibility......................................................................................................5
Advertisement through social media...............................................................................................6
Potential negative backlash from the public against the marketing campaign................................6
Reason for the backlash...................................................................................................................7
Proposals that could help the campaign and the bank.....................................................................8
Recommendations............................................................................................................................8
Conclusion.......................................................................................................................................9
Reference List................................................................................................................................10
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Introduction
Every business organisation or firm needs to have some ethical standards for attaining
transparency in the business operation and function. Ethical standards allow the firm to avoid
any kind of law or policy breach and maintain the business operation. The study shed light on the
approaches and measures to region the brand image and reputation in the society. ABC Bank has
lost its image and reputation in the society and among the customers mainly because of their
poor ethical culture. Unreasonable rate was charged from the clients that eventually led to public
injury. ABC Banks was to regain its reputation through the corporate social responsibility
activities. The CSR activities are very effective in gaining customers and community’s sympathy
and also help in building a good brand image in the market. ABC wants to advertise its CSR
activity through social media as it is one of the most effective marketing approaches.
Challenges of ABC Bank
Some of the activities of ABC Bank have caused public injury and these activities created a
negative impact of the clients and society. ABC Bank has breached several anti-money
laundering laws as well as the bank has charged the customers for the services that they have not
provided. ABC Bank was also criticized for lack of diversity among its board members and
executives. ABC Bank possessed poor ethical culture and this has led to take inadequate
decisions. The clients are unhappy with the service and banks attitude. ABC Bank lack
management and leadership and this are the main reason for the problems. The leaders and
managers of any business firm are accountable to guide the employees and ensure that the
employees are following the organisations structure, values and ethics. The banks culture is not
aligned with the government policies and this allowed the employees to take appropriate
decision. ABC Bank needs to make major changes in their structure, culture, ethics and policies
in order to regain the market value. The public injury has de-motivated the employees of ABC
Bank and they answer client’s queries. The employees are feeling embarrassed and ashamed of
the banks management and this might increase the employee turnover rate.
Lack of business structure is also a major challenge for ABC Bank and they need to come up
with new business strategies and goals in order to maintain the business growth and provide
standard and transparent service to the clients. Apart from all of the challenges, ABC Bank needs
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to focus on regaining the brand image and reputation in the community and among the clients.
ABC has to retain its clients so that they could continue their business. ABC Bank is in desperate
need of internal and management change that could overcome the challenges.
Measures for the challenges
ABC Bank has to make major changes in their structure, ethics standards, values and culture.
The firm also needs to align the structure with the government laws and legislation so that bank’s
service does not breach any law or legislation. The leaders and managers of ABC Bank need to
adopt managerial and leadership approaches or theories so that they could take adequate
decisions and guide the employees in their work. As suggested by Wilson et al. (2018), the
Bank’s policy also needs to go through changes so that the policy could become transparent and
understandable to the clients and employees.
Setting Business Goals
ABC Bank needs a well structured plan, ethical guidelines and strategies that could support the
business goals. It is obvious that every business organisation has some desired goals and
objectives. As suggested by Johnson (2017), the leaders and managers of business firms are
accountable to achieve those goals and objectives through their approaches and strategies. ABC
Bank’s current goal is to regain the lost the image and reputation among the clients and society.
The managing bodies of ABC Bank are accountable to come up with management plans and
strategies.
Ethical Guidelines
The managing bodies have to focus on the ethical standards because this is the reason bank lost
its image and provided inappropriate service to the clients. The leaders of ABC Bank also need
to play a major role for achieving the business goal. As suggested by Herrera et al. (2016), the
leaders need to make sure that the employees are following the ethical guidelines and their
actions are not breaching and laws or legislations.
Motivational Approaches
The leaders also have to adopt any motivational strategy in order to boost the employee’s morale.
Employees of ABC Bank are de-motivated and their morale has fallen down due to lack of
guidance and inappropriate organisational structure. The leaders make to encourage and motivate
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the employees so that they could perform their role efficiently. Employee’s performance and
productivity is completely depended upon their morale (Karl, 2015).
Training and Development Programs
ABC Bank needs to carry out training and development programs for the employees so that they
could enhance their knowledge, skills and abilities. The training and development program could
ensure that the employee does not repeat the same mistakes (Ehrich et al. 2015). The employees
could prevent the issues from reoccurring. Training and development programs are also very
effective in motivating the employees and gaining trust and loyalty of the employees. ABC Bank
has to focus on retaining the employees anyhow so that they could implement internal changes in
the structure.
Risk Management
Risk management is considered to be one of the most important aspects of business operation
because risk management allows the business firms to avoid future risks and issues. As
suggested by Moffic et al. (2015), the managing bodies have to analyse the business functions in
order to identify any kind of issues or future risks. The managing bodies also have to develop
risk management strategies for minimizing the impact of future risks and issues. Risk
management is very essential for banking firms as they have to deal with sensitive data.
Corporate Social Responsibility
The managing bodies of ABC Bank are going to carry out CSR activities for regaining the
reputation and brand image in the society and among the clients. The CSR activities of ABC
Bank are going to create a positive impact on the community. CSR has become a marketing
trend in the business environment because the activities not only improve the community and
environment but it also helps in building brand image in the community. As suggested by
Rangan et al. (2015), the CSR activities are very effective in attaining community’s attention as
well as customers. The CSR activities provided various benefits to the business firms and this is
the reason most of the successful business organizations focuses on carry out CSR activities and
disclosing the activities to the public.
ABC Bank has decided to donate some amount of money to the not for profit organisation. The
Bank is focusing on not for profit organizations that are involved in reducing violence against
women. The bank has allocated a budget for this initiative and they have a strong hope that the
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CSR activity is going to help in regaining the lost reputation in the community. The Bank has
chosen the correct approach for advertisement because social media is the most effective and
efficient approach for advertisement and brand endorsement. Social media helps in getting
attention of the community and the activities could be appraised by the people. Social media
increases brand exposure (Lunenberg et al. 2016).
Providing support to the not for profit organisation is going to be an effective initiative but this
needs to adequately advertise so that the community could know about the initiative. It has been
witnessed that the customers are often to the organisations that are involved in CSR activities. So
basically this initiative is going to regain the reputation in the community as well as attract new
clients.
Advertisement through social media
Social media is considered to the efficient marketing approach and it is the best possible way to
advertise any activity, product or service. As suggested by Lim and Greenwood (2017), social
media is the biggest platform that connects billions of people and the business organisation
focuses on utilizing this as an opportunity for brand exposure and attaining attention the
community. ABC Bank needs to carry out their campaign advertisement through social media for
gaining communities attention and regaining the brand image. ABC Bank needs to develop a
page on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram that is going to cover up the CSR activities and
initiatives. The social media pages have to be maintained by an expert and every post must be
attractive enough to gain communities attention (Aksak et al. 2016). The post must be able to
depict the intention of the bank in order to gain communities sympathy. There might be some
negative backlash that could hinder the campaign advertisement and initiatives (Fatma et al.
2015).
It is very important for ABC Bank to make the community aware of the CSR activity and apart
from social media, the bank could provide send a notification to the existing clients. The bank
could retain its clients through this initiative. The initiative is also a part of the business goal and
if the initiative turns out to be a success then the bank is going to regain its lost reputation as well
as the bank is going to attain new customers.
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Potential negative backlash from the public against the marketing campaign
The campaign is expected to succeed in creating a positive impact on the public through its CSR
initiative. There will be some shortcomings that would be presented by the campaigns and a
backlash would be created in the public. The potential negative backlash that is expected from
the public is a potential outburst of anger regarding charge of extra fees by the organisation and
using it in a way to improve the brand image. As suggested by Plewa et al. (2015), the decision
making of the organisation that led to losses to the organisation would be highly condemned by
the public. This can create a turmoil regarding the campaign that the organisation would be
carrying. The public outrage may lead to disruption of the whole CSR campaign as the
organisation has been seen to take excess charges from the public due to their management
faults.
The public may see the act of CSR and community service as an act that is made to stain off the
negative image that the brand has created. The employee morale can also be decreased if an
outburst or a backlash regarding the campaign occurs. A potential backlash can be the confusion
or dilemma that is created in the consumers of the brand (Pomering, 2017). The consumers
would be confused whether it is for community service or it is just removing negative stains and
building its image. The social campaign can also be seen as a false image by the public that is
being created by the organisation. The public may view the campaign as an unrealistic
expectation that is set by the organisation just to lure the public and increase the profits of the
organisation. The negative backlash may also be that the public would not support this campaign
at all and also discourage others to take part in the campaign.
Reason for the backlash
The negative backlashes that would be created regarding the campaign would be a result of the
inefficient leadership and management skills that is shown by ABC organisation at several times
before. The ethical structure that was not maintained by the organisation which led to increasing
and collecting irrational charges would raise an outburst in the public regarding their money.
This behaviour was repeated by the organisation at several times which would create anger in the
public regarding the issue. The social campaign would be disrupted and discouraged by the
public as they would see that the organisation is using falsely created and accumulated money to
provide social services. The public would think that it is trying to stain off the negative brand
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image by these activities but it is still continuing the activities. The social activities may seem
like a cloak to the public to shed the mistakes that the organisation is doing (Tuten and Solomon,
2017). The poor organisational culture would also be a reason for the backlash as the lack of
leadership and poor behaviour of the staff is due to poor organisational culture. The charges for
deceased customers would also create anger among the people and would increase the anger
against the organisation.
Proposals that could help the campaign and the bank
The Bank needs to overcome the internal challenges so that they could represent themselves as
changed organizations to their clients in order to regain their trust and loyalty. The Bank needs to
make workplace diverse and also need to hire board members and executive from different
culture and religion. The Bank has also been criticized for lack of diversity and it could be
overcome by recruiting new board members.
The advertisement campaign must only focus on the CSR activity and the bank has to show the
community that their actions are improving the environment. It is obvious the campaign is going
to be criticized by some people and the bank has to change those people's perception. ABC Bank
has to any how change the community’s perception through their advertisement campaign and
the CSR initiative. The advertisement could involve the people linked with the non for profit
organisation. The advertisement could also involve their feedback (Felix et al. 2017). The bank
could ask the not for profit organisation to post about their activities on their social media pages.
Recommendations
The bank is in a great need of an internal change in order to overcome the challenges. The issue
is caused due to the negligence and management of the firm. The bank could recruit skilled and
experienced managers and leaders that could assist in regaining the image as well as overcome
the internal flaws. The business structure has to be changed and made more transparent so that
the future problems could be avoided. ABC Bank must try to align the ethical guidelines with the
policies so that the employees could follow the rules and regulations as well as their action
cannot breach any law. The advertisement campaign needs to successfully executed otherwise
the bank cannot regain its reputation in the community.
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Conclusion
The study concludes that the business operation is completely depended upon the management,
culture, ethics, structure, values and policies. The business structure needs to be transparent so
that the business could sustain for long term. The manager and leaders of business firms are
responsible to guide the employees and make sure they follow the organisation policies and
ethics. ABC bank had to face serious consequences due to the negligence of the leaders and
managers. ABC had a poor structure and this led to public injury. CSR activity is very effective
for brand exposure and building a brand image in the community. The donation initiative is
going to help the business firm to regain its lost image in the community. The initiative has to be
advertised appropriated so that the community could know about the bank’s activities.
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Reference List
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fit as predictors of corporate reputation: A global perspective. Public Relations Review, 42(1),
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leadership. Journal of Educational Administration, 53(2), pp.197-214.
Fatma, M., Rahman, Z. and Khan, I., (2015). Building company reputation and brand equity
through CSR: the mediating role of trust. International Journal of Bank Marketing, 33(6),
pp.840-856.
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marketing: A holistic framework. Journal of Business Research, 70, pp.118-126.
Herrera, J.J.D., López, M.J.G., Palacios, C.A. and Amat, O., (2016). Is there a difference in
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Karl, M.A., (2015). Are ethical and social banks less risky? Evidence from a new dataset.
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Lunenberg, K., Gosselt, J.F. and De Jong, M.D., (2016). Framing CSR fit: How corporate social
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Moffic, H.S., Saeed, S.A., Silver, S. and Koh, S., (2015). Ethical challenges in psychiatric
administration and leadership. Psychiatric Quarterly, 86(3), pp.343-354.
Plewa, C., Conduit, J., Quester, P.G. and Johnson, C., (2015). The impact of corporate
volunteering on CSR image: A consumer perspective. Journal of Business Ethics, 127(3),
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Pomering, A., (2017). Communicating CSR through corporate image advertising. In Handbook
of Integrated CSR Communication (pp. 171-190). NY: Springer, Cham.
Rangan, K., Chase, L. and Karim, S., (2015). The truth about CSR. Harvard Business Review,
93(1/2), pp.40-49.
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Tuten, T.L. and Solomon, M.R., (2017). Social media marketing. Sage.
Wilson, E., Kenny, A. and Dickson-Swift, V., (2018). Ethical challenges in community-based
participatory research: a scoping review. Qualitative health research, 28(2), pp.189-199.
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