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DARK SIDE CASE: Amazon.com, Inc. and the Human Cost of Fast Shipping
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Author: Debapratim Purkayastha, ICFAI Business School, IFHE, Hyderabad
Author: Vijay Kumar Tangirala, Freelancer, Hyderabad
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The case discusses the grueling working conditions in the warehouses of the online retail giant, Amazon.com, Inc. To support the fast and free shipping to its customers, Amazon had put systems in place to ensure that the workers at its warehouses and logistics operations worked with a high level of efficiency. The targets set for the workers were allegedly so stringent that some of them urinated in bottles to save time by avoiding going to the toilet. Those who picked goods to be delivered to customers were known to walk around 10 miles on a daily basis. The case discusses the stringent delivery targets given to the delivery drivers which resulted in several of them not taking toilet breaks – they instead urinated in bottles and exceeded speed limits on the road. The case goes on to discuss the alleged low level of wages paid to the company’s workers. The wages in some cases were so low that some of the workers in the UK were forced to live in tents near the warehouses to avoid paying private transporters for conveyance. In the US, the inadequacy of Amazon’s wages could be gauged from the several number of its workers who were dependent on state assistance. The case details the pressure brought on Amazon by, among others, Senator Bernie Sanders to increase its wages. The company seemed to have budged when it raised the hourly wage rates of its workers in the US and the UK. Observers, however, were disappointed with Amazon doing away with stock option grants and variable compensation pay. The case raises the question of how Amazon, which was one of the world’s most valuable companies in terms of market capitalization, could be forced to improve the working conditions of its workers and whether consumers had a role to play in bringing about a positive change. This case is critical as it throws light on how the relentless focus on efficiency results in the exploitation of labor. Amazon seems to do very well for some stakeholders (e.g., owners, customers) at great expense to other stakeholders (e.g., workers in its warehouses and logistics). The case also raises issues about the difficulties that workers encounter in organizing unions and otherwise expressing voice at work.
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Paper is No Longer Available Online: Please contact the author(s).
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DARK SIDE CASE: Nestlé and Modern Slavery
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Author: Debapratim Purkayastha, ICFAI Business School, IFHE, Hyderabad
Author: Syeda Maseeha Qumer, ICFAI Business School, Hyderabad
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In November 2015, Nestlé reported that it had uncovered forced labor in its seafood supply chain in Thailand. This was a rare admission by a multinational company about the prevalence of modern slavery in their global supply chain. Nestlé’s had been facing allegations of using child labor in its cocoa supply chain in Ivory Coast and was also accused of failing to disclose this to customers at the point of sale. Some critics argued that Nestlé was not doing enough and was not being transparent enough in its efforts to eliminate child labor within its global cocoa supply chain. So when Nestlé self-reported about forced labor in its seafood supply chain in Thailand it received a lot of media attention. While some industry observers applauded Nestlé, others wondered whether Nestlé’s admission of slavery was honest or was just an attempt to fend off child labor allegations in other parts of its business.
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Paper is No Longer Available Online: Please contact the author(s).
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Dark Side Case: Rogue One: The Canadian Space Agency and “Understanding the [Non] Inclusive Organization”
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Author: Stefanie Ruel, John Molson School of Business, Concordia U.
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Dark Side Case Award
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Samaa, a woman/Muslim/lesbian/engineer/expatriate, is the protagonist that the students follow throughout this Dark Side Case. She is a highly technically-trained individual, who is in her early career at the Canadian Space Agency (CSA). She faces, on a day-to- day basis, mostly all White, heterosexual men who are technically- trained and who reflect the organization’s approach to inclusivety, or lack thereof, with respect to her complexity as an individual. She also sees evidence that some of her women colleagues, mostly White, who self-identify as being part of the non-dominant class and who have been in the industry longer than she has, are facing their own challenges within the CSA. Samaa is exploring how to confront the twin challenges of her day-to-day experiences while also aknowledging that the organization needs to evolve from merely complying with Canadian Employment Equity (EE) legislation into valuing the complex individual and inclusivity.
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Paper is No Longer Available Online: Please contact the author(s).
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DARK SIDE CASE: A South-South Postcolonial Perspective in Human Relations at Petrobras Bolivia
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Author: Ana Christina Celano, IBMEC, Rio de Janeiro
Author: Fernanda Filgueiras Sauerbronn, U. Federal do Rio de Janeiro
Author: Ana Beatriz Gomes De Gomes De Mello Moraes, IBMEC, Rio de Janeiro
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José is an executive, HR manager of a Brazilian state-owned oil and gas company in Bolivia. José has a personal critical humanistic position and thinks about doing his work in the best way. However, when he arrives in this country, he gets scared as soon as he has access to the result of a cultural diagnosis carried out a year earlier. In it, the employees showed a negative view of Brazil and the company, related to a history of domination. Looking at a drawing made by a Bolivian engineer during the interviews, José could see this representation, in which the participant designed the Bolivian employee like a boy imprisoned by chains to an adult of hard features that represented Brazil and the Brazilians managers. What to think before a drawing with such a clear expression? For the first time, José saw himself in the place of those whom he criticized so much. As a Brazilian he was used to feeling what it is to be in the position of the subordinate, of the still colonized and oppressed. Finally, he would have to face the challenge of creating a plan of action facing a headstrong boss, perhaps quite like the adult's depiction of the drawing. He wondered how to get out of this situation, how to make a difference for everyone involved, and how to reduce this asymmetry.
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Paper is No Longer Available Online: Please contact the author(s).
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