OPINION
The Corporation — An Individual’s Point of View
COVID, PUSH, AND PULL Effects
Corporations are going Digital, requiring fewer workers, “What is the Obligation of the Corporation” to Society when it comes to this change?
To explain this, we need to back up a bit and try to first understand what are the obligations of a “Corporation.” Meaning, what is a “Corporation” from the “working people's point of view.”
If we keep in mind the fact that “the most valuable and least replaceable resource is time,” and today, hourly employees get paid to get the product to market “on time.” What is a Corporation to do? Today, the answer seems simple — “Go Digital.”
Let’s First Do a “Look Back”
Many erudite debate whether “Corporations” are part of Society. The fact that there is a debate alone tells us the warped ways people think about it.
Wikipedia says — “A Corporation is an organization.” Whoever wrote the piece on the subject is wrong. People are an organization too — An organization of “organs,” i.e., ‘An organ is a self-contained group of tissues that performs a specific function in the body.” That is one of the ways people avoid explaining the complexity of a corporation and, thus, its obligations to society.
Corporations are a “legal body” that is “created” for a specific purpose. If we live in the United States, ruled by a Moral Law called the “Declaration of Independence” and a “Law of the Land” called the “Constitution.” Would it not be logical that a “Corporation” be held responsible for its duties to society just like we are?
Our Duties to “Society” Are
- To pull our own weight — past childhood, we need to find a way to minimally feed and house ourselves within the framework of our laws.
- To get an education — commensurable with our capacity to learn.
- To be Socially Responsible — Maintain a set of principles that include helping those in need.
If that is a minimum set of our duties as individuals and corporations are “legally created individuals,” why are Corporations not held to the same set of duties? Or, are they?
Duty of Corporations Today
The ONLY duty corporation's exercise is number 2. Number 1., and 2., are “electives,” ninety-nine percent of the time they are self-involved.
Why? Because their entire focus is on Wall Street. If they don’t deliver as “promised,” their stock gets sold, and their profits go down. This is bad for all executives (stock options and bonuses suffer). The “workers” suffer the indignity of getting “laid-off,” minimally not to get a raise that year.
Corporations today still believe that they have to maximize the efficiency of their scale. It even has a name, “Command and Control (C&C).”
- It is a “soft” style of the Military structure where orders from above are followed (or people die).
- The “Command” in corporations is done by whomever “hires and fires.”
- The control part is done with “schedules” made by the same, based on “the marketing people’s prognostications required for delivery.” This style of “getting to the market” is called “push.” One of the “organs” in the corporation studies the “market” and prognosticates how much product the “market will need (for a predetermined period of time).” Schedules are made to “push” that much product out the door in that time. On the other hand, given the “fixed” number of line workers, the schedules for delivery get “longer.” This is where “skilled” workers are required. Lots of assumptions are made, and the “Corporation” pushes the product to the market as quickly as it can before the “competition takes over.”
Why does everybody believe this to be the “Best” way to approach the market? Because those with the cheapest product price and delivery time “owns” the market.
How do they achieve the cheapest price? They look for “efficiency” at every step in production.
Who works “production?” The hourly employee.
The Transition to PULL
Some corporations that were “pushing” products to the market lived in a hit-or-miss delivery world. The effect of this was either losing clients to competitors or creating large inventories of products when there was no demand. Maintaining inventory is expensive.
In order to create “Just-In-Time” deliveries (no inventory), a new way of “production” was needed — produce for the demand by allowing the market to “pull” the product through the production line. This elicited “knowing” where the “bottleneck” of production was (where the product spent the most time) in order to allow variability in production.
These areas today are prime areas for robots. You can use as many as needed to satisfy demand and get the product to the market on time or take them offline if not needed.
However, for large products like airplanes, for example, the “pull line” is more complex. first, the lead time delivery for all the parts is needed; then, determine the order for production, including all the pre-assembled parts. in final assembly, determine the crews needed for assembly of the various large parts and the time it takes from start to finish of each. Make changes in assembly to minimize each step and maintain quality; then, literally “pull” the plane through the runway needed to start and finish the job of each step. ALL skills are “experienced skills.” Each line of “sub-assembly” production has to do the same in order to achieve success in the end.
All that to say what?
The search for “on-time delivery of product” with the certainty of “Price” is never-ending for ALL corporations. All of it continues to be driven by “Wall Street.” All of it by the threat — “We will sell your stock.” This can create panic of an all-out selling of stocks, and it is worse during bad times (like now). the American market learned this at the Wall Street Crash of 1929.
This has driven even the most sophisticated corporations, for example, Boeing, to be internally run by “accountants.” This is one of the reasons many corporations today have “technical” issues. the drive of PULL has taken over. “Accountants” only talk “money” and those who threaten the Corporation’s “purse.”
“For a one-tool owner of a hammer, everything looks like a nail.” What do the accountants do? They talk to Wall Street all the time to take “the temperature.” Inside “the house” they drive the schedule that overrides everybody all the way down the “command and control” line of executives, managers, and skilled workers.
THE RESULT — Even “Quality” takes a hit — U.S. corporate liability claims as of Sep. 2023, to name a few, Altria Group (formerly Philip Morris), General Motors, Dow Corning, and Owens Corning. Complex products like airplanes have had such “market-driven problems” as well, (Oct. 2021) “Boeing Deals With New Dreamliner Defect Amid Production Problems.”
Going Digital
The software required to run sophisticated lines of production has increased exponentially since the turn of the century. Even machinists today have to learn to program their machines in order to work the parts they are in charge of.
How is the Corporation Socially Responsible?
The Financial Times wrote “The role of corporations in society,” July 2020.
“The coronavirus pandemic has forced companies to adapt, affecting everything from the minutiae of daily tasks to the fundamental way they view their businesses and make money. The pact between the corporation and society has also changed…
…The handing out of taxpayers’ money has put business practices and their broader effect under intense scrutiny. The accompanying requirement is that companies behave with greater responsibility.”
How does any of the above translate corporations into the Duties an individual has (1., 2., 3. above)?
Examples of what the carmakers have done and the excesses of Pharma, not only the one unethical corporation but the prices they are all charging these days (even the government is no help), tell a story of greed of their own. Maybe there are a few exceptions, for example, Mark Cuban who set up a minimum-cost internet company to sell drugs at a minimum cost.
The Corporation Social Responsibility
Every Corporation has a set of ethics. in the post “Seven Principles of Business Integrity,” Mike Esterday writes:
“Business ethics are the code of morals adopted by an organization, representing the values the company runs on.”
This really boils down to three words that apply to everybody, not only in the Corporation, the employees, or any audience that is witness to the products, the body of or those working for the Corporation:
“Performance with Integrity.”
The best way I found to explain what this means is very simple:
“When you are at work and think you are all by yourself and nobody is watching, work as if tomorrow’s front page of the newspaper has an article and a picture of what you did during that time.”
Corporations have the same obligation to society when it comes to a change in business practices, from planning to execution. Why? every employee has the potential to be affected, and this, in turn, will affect the social area where they live. The Corporation, as a “Legal Body,” has an obligation to Society. In their article “Citizenship and Social Impact: Society Holds the Mirror” 2018, Deloitte specified:
“Stakeholders today are taking an intense look at organizations’ impact on society, and their expectations for good corporate citizenship are rising. In an effort to meet these expectations, leading organizations are making citizenship a core part of their strategy and identity.”
As long as “Stakeholders,” no matter how “intense” they look at this problem, the “problem” will not be solved. Paying the “time” workers more money requires a total philosophical change
“Pay for Knowledge and Influence vs. Pay for Time”
Both have to deliver “quality,” and both spend “time.” One (knowledge) makes decisions that affect the “time” workers in the “how” of the product; the worker “executes” the operations needed to deliver on time with skill.
However, in the larger picture, both are members of society, and both have “families” and obligations outside of work.
From a “Societal” point of view, Wall Street needs to shut up and live with what they get.
As rich as those “BANKS” are, they go bankrupt for their greed, too. Look at the list of bankrupt banks during the 2008 recession. Among them are “Lehman Brothers (investment bank-greed), Merrill Lynch (NY, investment bank-greed), Fannie Mae, and Freddie Mac (Secondary Mortgage, housing the seed of the problem).
WHO PICKED THE BAG? — Society did.
Who created and, thus, is responsible for “the corporation as an individual?” The Government.
Our “dear” government is an accomplice to this crime by NOT safeguarding the ILL PRACTICES OF GREEDY BANKS. Who Pays for all of it? WE, THE PEOPLE, DO (look at our debt).
Who in our “dear government” did this (2008)? It was one of the administrative, 4th Branch entities we pay so much money for.
The balance scale is not “equivalent” down to the individual. Where did we Start?
- People came here because of religious persecution in Europe. ->
- The “Indians” helped feed us at first. ->
- We grew out of farming the land, a one-man show. ->
- We declared independence with all our dreams as the “Moral Law (Declaration of Independence)” and the “People Law (The Constitution).” ->
- We continue to work on this “Dream set of Principles” (we are not perfect but try). -> We have to continue to try, or we, as a Nation, will die. -> Another set of Principles will take its place.
- Over time, we have suffered from the “Paradox of the boiling frog” and succumbed to the “Process of Incremental Seduction (slow boil)” and allowed the Government to run astray.
To what extent that is true? It remains to be seen; what will we do about it when we vote?
P.S.: October 5, 2023
From The 1440 News Digest: “Healthcare Strike
Roughly 75,000 Kaiser Permanente workers walked off the job early yesterday in the largest healthcare strike in US history. The walkout, which does not include doctors, is slated to last until Saturday, with executives claiming the system would remain open as thousands of temporary workers filled in.”
