Case Study Analysis: Leading Ethical Business with Dilmah Tea

This case study examines Dilmah Tea's approach to organizational change through the lens of ethical leadership and corporate values. It highlights the importance of integrating integrity, ethics, tradition, quality, customer focus, responsibility, and sustainability into the organization's vision and mission. The study emphasizes that a friendly and collaborative environment is crucial for successful change implementation, where employees and stakeholders work together. Sustainability is presented as a key consideration, linking business practices to human well-being and poverty reduction. Ethical leadership, centered on social responsibility, is vital for managing change and creating a competitive advantage. The case suggests that businesses should tie their success to social responsibility, considering the ethical expectations of consumers in their sales and production processes. Ultimately, the study advocates for embracing ethical leadership, principles, and social responsibility to foster a supportive and energetic change environment.

LEADING AN ETHICAL BUSINESS: DILMAH TEA 1
Leading an Ethical Business: Dilmah Tea
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Leading An Ethical Business: Dilmah Tea 2
Leading an Ethical Business: Dilmah Tea
This case study presents key issues that the management needs to embrace as they pursue
change. Organizational change requires a strategy for it to happen and it is the role of the
management to lead employees to achieve the required change.1 For an organization strategy to
work, people should work as a team led by a good manager. The case study of Dilmah Tea
informs that organizational change is something that can be achieved, through good leadership.
Good leadership can be achieved through team work that is led by the best leader. It takes the
efforts of an effective and transformational leader-manager to realize organizational change.
Therefore, this case study presents some key issues for managing organizational change.2
One key issues presented here is corporate values. For organizational change to be
achieved the organization must have corporate values to its vision and mission. The vision and
mission act as a framework where the organization should operate within. Based on the case
study, Dilmah Tea has some key pillars, which are a reflection of the values of its organizational
culture. The six pillar model of Dilmah Tea, include integrity, ethics, tradition, quality, customer,
responsibility and sustainability. The examination of Waddell, et al, on organizational change:
Development and transformation puts emphasis on environment of change. According to the
author the environment could sometimes be chaotic, but if managers and change agents build a
coalition they can realize their goals. Due to that, Dilmah Tea appears to use corporate values
that support its change environment. When employees observe or exercise these corporate values
like integrity, ethics, responsibilities and sustainability, the change environment looks friendly.
1 Bennett, Elena M., et al. "Linking biodiversity, ecosystem services, and human well-being: three challenges for
designing research for sustainability." 76-85.
2 Hansen, S. Duane, et al. "Corporate social responsibility, ethical leadership, and trust propensity: A multi-
experience model of perceived ethical climate." 649-662.

Leading An Ethical Business: Dilmah Tea 3
Thus, Dilmah Tea case appears to inform that the managers and change agents need to ensure
that the environment in which change should be implemented needs to be friendly and coalition-
like. Coalition-like means that employees and all stakeholders need should collaborate for the
realization of change.3
The corporate value like sustainability can still be looked into separately. Dilmah Tea
case presents sustainability as an important global issue that any business seeking change must
observe. According to the case study, sustainability is linked to human well-being and poverty
reduction outcomes.4 To managing change, this case study argues that the change should be able
to solve the problems like poverty in the society. Research shows that when implementing
sustainability the human well-being should be incorporated. Therefore, this case study educates
that when change agents pursue organizational change, they need to assess how positively it shall
impact people. The person in this case is not only the consumers, but also the employees. The
employee interests must be taken into account when pursuing change.
Also, the case study underscores the relevance of leadership when managing
organizational change. For an organizational change to be implemented, leadership must be
effective. Dilmah Tea case suggests that ethical leadership should be the one to be considered to
manage change. The ethical leadership is centered on social responsibility. Ethical leadership can
be used to form employee ethical climate perceptions that subsequently impact the production.
Change is generally not easy, and resistance is likely to occur from employees opposed to the
change. However, this case presents a different angle in which organizational change can be
3 Waddell, Dianne, et al. Organisational change, n.p.
4 Falkenberg, Helena, et al. "Short- and Long-term Effects of Major Organisational Change on Minor Psychiatric
Disorder and Self-rated Health: Results from the Whitehall II Study." 688-96.

Leading An Ethical Business: Dilmah Tea 4
managed.5 It suggests that exercising ethical leadership enables the organization to integrate its
corporate social responsibility into the change. Social responsibility as a concept believes that the
organizations have a responsibility to other stakeholders like employees, and customers apart
from shareholders. Hence, this case informs that when an organization considers ethical
leadership it will look at ways of integrates it into social responsibility, which gives it a
competitive advantage.
The Dilmah Tea case also wants organizations to manage organizational change by
business success and social responsibility.6 In the case, it is clear that when businesses use social
responsibility to manage and implement their organizational change, they have to commit to it.
Committing to social responsibility is one a business strategy, and if properly implemented a
business stands to be profitable and success both in the short-term and long-term. Social
responsibility in essence gives a business a competitive advantage. Hence, going forward
businesses need to manage their organizational strategy by tying business success to social
responsibility.
All in all, to manage change the organizations should embrace ethical leadership in sales
and production. In this case, the change agents should ask themselves, if their production as well
as sales meet the desires of ethical consumers. The consumers of today are keen on ethical
practices of the businesses, and therefore when implementing changes the organization need to
consider the ethical expectations of its customers. Notably, a business that engages in unethical
practices is not likely to get the support of stakeholders. But, those businesses that conduct
5 Baldini, Nicola, et al. "Organisational Change and the Institutionalisation of University Patenting Activity in Italy."
27-53.
6 Vahtera, Jussi, and Marianna Virtanen. "The Health Effects of Major Organisational Changes." 677-78.

Leading An Ethical Business: Dilmah Tea 5
themselves ethically are easily embraced as well as supported by the consumers.7 Ideally, the
case study presents organizational change as a simple concept, in the event the change agents
realize that the importance of embracing ethical leadership, ethical principles as well as social
responsibility. These three aspects are the ones that make the change environment friendly,
supported and energetic enough to carry out the change.8 Thus, any other organization that
considers organizational change needs to first assess its corporate values, social responsibility,
ethical leadership as well as ethical principles as a basis for creating a favorable change
environment.
Bibliography
7 Kokkinen, Lauri, et al. "Does Transfer of Work from a Public Sector Organisation to a Commercial Enterprise
without Staff Reductions Increase Risk of Long-term Sickness Absence among the Staff? 585-87.
8 Frølich, Nicoline, et al. "A Reinterpretation of Institutional Transformations in European Higher Education:
Strategising Pluralistic Organisations in Multiplex Environments." 79-93.

Leading An Ethical Business: Dilmah Tea 6
Baldini, Nicola, Riccardo Fini, Rosa Grimaldi, and Maurizio Sobrero. "Organisational Change
and the Institutionalisation of University Patenting Activity in Italy." Minerva 52, no. 1
(2014): 27-53.
Bennett, Elena M., Wolfgang Cramer, Alpina Begossi, Georgina Cundill, Sandra Díaz, Benis N.
Egoh, Ilse R. Geijzendorffer et al. "Linking biodiversity, ecosystem services, and human
well-being: three challenges for designing research for sustainability." Current Opinion
in Environmental Sustainability 14 (2015): 76-85.
Falkenberg, Helena, Eleonor I Fransson, Hugo Westerlund, and Jenny A Head. "Short- and
Long-term Effects of Major Organisational Change on Minor Psychiatric Disorder and
Self-rated Health: Results from the Whitehall II Study." Occupational and Environmental
Medicine 70, no. 10 (2013): 688-96.
Frølich, Nicoline, Jeroen Huisman, Stig Slipersæter, Bjørn Stensaker, and Paulo Charles
Pimentel Bótas. "A Reinterpretation of Institutional Transformations in European Higher
Education: Strategising Pluralistic Organisations in Multiplex Environments." Higher
Education 65, no. 1 (2013): 79-93.
Hansen, S. Duane, Benjamin B. Dunford, Bradley J. Alge, and Christine L. Jackson. "Corporate
social responsibility, ethical leadership, and trust propensity: A multi-experience model
of perceived ethical climate." Journal of Business Ethics 137, no. 4 (2016): 649-662.

Leading An Ethical Business: Dilmah Tea 7
Waddell, Dianne, Andrew Creed, Thomas Cummings, and Christopher Worley. Organisational
change: Development and transformation. Cengage AU, 2016.
Kokkinen, Lauri, Marianna Virtanen, Jaana Pentti, Jussi Vahtera, and Mika Kivimäki. "Does
Transfer of Work from a Public Sector Organisation to a Commercial Enterprise without
Staff Reductions Increase Risk of Long-term Sickness Absence among the Staff? A
Cohort Study of Laboratory and Radiology Employees." Occupational and
Environmental Medicine 70, no. 8 (2013): 585-87.
Vahtera, Jussi, and Marianna Virtanen. "The Health Effects of Major Organisational Changes."
Occupational and Environmental Medicine 70, no. 10 (2013): 677-78.