OGL 481 Pro-Seminar I:

PCA-Ethical Communities Worksheet

Worksheet Objectives:

1. Describe the four ethical communities

2. Apply the ethical communities to your personal case situation

Complete the following making sure to support your ideas and cite from the textbook and other
course materials per APA guidelines. After the peer review, you have a chance to update this and
format for your Electronic Portfolio due in Module 6.

1) Briefly restate your situation from Module 1 and your role.

My analysis will be focused on the 2022 historic event in Staten Island where
Amazon workers voted in favour of having a labour union. This event was led by former
Amazon worker, Chris Smalls, and was the first of its kind to win against the retail giant
(Caturano & Sandoval, 2022). While Amazon’s success is evident in its figures, its
organizational culture, structure, internal politics and symbolic frames all have gray areas
that stifles the full potential of organizational growth. The union serves as a medium for
employees to speak out against poor work conditions, being underpaid, human resource
issues and high turnover rates. Rather than addressing concerns openly, the company
adopts an avoidance approach by releasing employees of their duties. My role in the
organization will be as an external consulting agent seeking to find the underlying causes
of Amazon’s high turnovers and other issues. Having identified the issue, I will undergo a
process of evaluation and subsequently elimination. Because of the disconnect that the
company faces due to their organizational structure, I will aim to bridge the gap and
provide a sense of connectivity between managers and employees. The overall aim is to
find ways to both address and resolve the issues thereby improving Amazon’s situation.

2) Describe how the ethics of the organization influenced the situation.

Organizational ethics refer to the core principles, values and standards that guide
the behaviours and operation of the organization. It is embedded in the soul and spirit of
an organization which Bolman & Deal (2021), defines as the organization’s commitment

 to deeply rooted identity, beliefs and values. In addition to Amazon’s commitment to

satisfying their customer needs, the company also has ethical obligations to commit to
operational excellence and to be Earth’s best employer (Amazon, n.d.). These are some of
the principles on which Amazon claims their identity is hinged. However, the situation
reveals that this is merely written identity and far from a fair representation of the
company’s true identity. The unionization of the company in Staten Island was a direct
effort to rebuke the the company’s treatment of its workers (Weise & Scheiber, 2022). If
an organization is not able to uphold its commitments then it can be deemed as a failure
to fulfil their ethical obligations.

The work environment was also a major driving factor of this situation. In ethics,
an organization’s environment and identity are closely related and have a direct impact on
the company’s reputation and culture. If a work environment is not conducive,
productivity would likely be negatively affected. It has a direct impact on employee
morale. In the case of Amazon, workers were gravely concerned about the unsafe work
environments that they were forced to work in (Weise & Scheiber, 2022). This also
countered the values that the company claimed to uphold; that of being Earth’s best
employer. As a result of Amazon’s refusal to address the ethical issues raised by their
staff, many employees lost trust and confidence in the company causing them to vote in
favour of the unionization.

3) Recommend how you would apply one of the ethical communities for an alternative
course of action regarding your case.

In this scenario, I would apply the ethical community of family by being caring
and showing love to the workers. This community embraces the qualities of care, love,
compassion and vulnerability (Bolman & Deal, 2021). In this type of community focus is
placed on satisfying the needs of the employees. To accomplish this, servant-type leaders
would be most suitable. It adopts the core concept of a community and togetherness. The
situation happened during the pandemic and one of the concerns of the employees was
work safety during this period (Weise & Scheiber, 2022). Since the pandemic was a
difficult period for all, in this frame, I would firstly recommend that Amazon have
implemented training sessions for their management team to properly address the issues
raised by their employees. This would have made them equipped to embody the
characteristics of servant-like leaders. Operating as normal under far from ideal
circumstances would not have been helpful. Normally, Amazon is focused on speed and
customer satisfaction. While the company would not have want to sacrifice their core
values, during this period, greater attention should have been paid to the wellness, safety
and health of their employees in order to ensure sustainability of their company.
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 This community strongly endorses showing compassion and concern for others.
During this period, I would have also recommended that Amazon considered extending
their shift systems that would allow smaller groups to be working in the warehouse at the
same time. According to workers, the warehouses were packed (Weise & Scheiber, 2022).
By breaking down shifts into smaller groups, it would have allowed much room for social
distancing at work. Additionally, I would have recommended that the company clamp
down on its policy of not allowing sick persons to come in to work. During the pandemic,
especially during the earlier stages, Amazon insisted that everyone report to work unless
they received a negative test result (Wise & Scheiber, 2022). This meant that even if a
person was unwell or showing signs of a flu but did not have a negative result, they
would still have to report to work. By exercising greater caution for their employees’
safety, Amazon would have embraced the ethical community of family by showing that
the company is concerned for the health of its employees.

4) Reflect on what you would do or not do differently given what you have learned
about ethics.

In this particular situation, I would not have done what Amazon did and practiced
what the jungle community promotes. In this community, justice and power are the focal
qualities. Accordding to Bolman & Deal (2021), it is a politically charged environment of
conflict and the pursuit of self interest. Amazon clearly practiced this by forcing their
authority on their workers. By ignoring the concerns of the employees, particularly as it
relates to workplace safety and mistreatment, and prioritizing customer interests, the
company showed that their interests were self-serving. The result of this was clearly
conflict since workers went to great lengths for their voices to be heard. Unionizing is
usually a last resort, after all other attempts have failed. The fact too that this was the first
in Amazon’s history of worker votes to win majority in favour of the union also spoke
volume. It was a direct outcry that the employees were desperate for change and action.

As previously discussed, I would have enforced change by essentially practicing

what the company preached. Their written values clearly opposed what was actually
being practiced. I would have taken the steps to fulfil their ethical obligations by
factoring in and paying closer attention to the their values of being Earth’s best employer
and operational excellence. To do this, they would have had to take into account the
concerns that were aired by their employees by showing compassion and concern for
others as is the focal point of the family community. This would also be achieved through
proper leadership as previously discussed.

 References

Amazon. (n.d.). Who we are. https://www.aboutamazon.com/about-us

Bolman, L. G., & Deal, T. E. (2021). Reframing organizations: Artistry, choice, and leadership
(7th ed.). San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass. Perusall Version.

Caturano, S., & Sandoval, A. (2022). Here's how Chris Smalls, who was fired from an Amazon
warehouse, beat the retail giant. ABC News. Retrieved 01/22/23, from https://
abcnews.go.com/Live/chris-smalls-fired-amazon-warehouse-beat-retail-giant/story?
id=83892275

Weise, K. & Scheiber, N. (2022). Amazon workers on Staten Island vote to unionize in
landmark win for labor. The New York Times. https://www.nytimes.com/2022/04/01/
technology/amazon-union-staten-island.html