不知不觉来了爱尔兰已经两个多月了. 我不得不感慨光阴如梭. 两个月前登机前的情景依然历历在目. 记得那天下午五点多, 表哥帮我拉着大大的行李箱到达蛇口码头和深大其他同学会合. 当时看到其他在深圳居住的同学有父母亲人为他们送行, 我不由得感到一阵落寞, 因为我的家人不在我身旁. 本来有几个同学以及一些师弟师妹说要来送我的, 我只是临走前和他们吃了个饭, 没有要他们送, 因为我明白到时可能会行走匆匆, 没有空顾及他们, 而且当天他们也要上班和上课的, 所以我也不想给他们添麻烦. 然而我还是感到很庆幸, 因为至少有表哥做我的 “苦力”, 在前往蛇口码头的路上对我千叮万嘱, 叫我在外面要小心啊, 晚上不要太晚回, 不要和别人吵架(真可惜前两天我违反了这个规定), 冷了要穿衣服……我当时就一直 “嗯嗯嗯”地应着, 最后忍不住笑了出来: “怎么你这么像我妈? 我不是三岁小孩子了, 这些东西我早就知道了!” 所以现在想想, 没有父母送行也没什么大不了的, 我起码还有一个表哥嘘寒问暖呢, 呵呵.
当天六点以后, 大家坐船到香港国际机场登机, 先飞往土耳其, 再从土耳其转机到爱尔兰. 登机前, 大家在机场聊天, 逛免税店, 玩三国杀, 玩扑克…… 一切都在我脑子里如此鲜明, 仿如昨日. 在飞往土耳其的飞机上, 坐在我身旁的是一个在澳大利亚新南威尔士大学毕业的来自比利时的硕士生. 他准备回国工作. 我和他在飞机上聊了好几个小时, 聊了好多好多东西, 直到大家都累得睡着了. 直到现在我们还用facebook联系着; 后来在飞往爱尔兰的飞机上, 又遇到一个恰好和我到同一个学校读研的印度学生, 大家又聊了起来. 现在还可以经常在校园里和他碰面, 一聊就是半个多小时. 当第二天飞机即将降落到爱尔兰都柏林国际机场时, 大家都忍不住从飞机窗口往下看. 当大家看到成片成片的草地和一栋栋精致的房子时, 都忍不住欢呼起来. 下了飞机, 我呼吸到了生平最清新的空气. 直到现在, 爱尔兰让我最深刻的东西, 就是这里的空气, 清新得可以闻到草叶的味道. 跑在路上的车后面看不到尾气, 公交车也是如此, 不像深圳, 到处是灰尘和公交的尾气. 可能空气好了, 我感觉人也特别精神, 不容易犯困, 而且暗疮也少了. 有时真想把这里的空气移植到深圳, 呵呵!
怀着好奇与追寻梦想的决心, 我开始了自己的学习. 当时选课时, 项目主任说我这个专业只要选三门课, 其中两门必修, 一门选修. 我当时还暗自庆幸: “才三门课, 一周才三次课, 好轻松啊! 以后可以更多时间做自己想做的东西!” 当时还想叫深圳的朋友帮我报一下中华会计网校的课程, 我在这边认真再学一下中国的会计, 回去考CPA. 然而事实证明我真的太天真了, 那三门课把我累得半死, 只差没要了我的命. 从第一周上课起, 我就开始感到压抑了. 无穷无尽的文章, 让你从早读到晚也读不完. 开始的前六周, 每周要打印上百张的期刊论文来读, 后面虽然少了一点, 每周也有三十来张. 这些文章可不比单纯的雅思托福里的那些阅读, 是相当专业的, 我经常读着读着就晕了, 又要重头读起. 有些句子得读好几遍才大概明白它要讲什么. 另外还要读厚厚的课本, 心力交瘁. 单词是一个大难关, 本以为自己的词汇量够大了, 可是来了这里才发现原来自己也是井底之蛙. 没办法, 只能一边读一边对着电脑来查, 读完了就不停地背单词, 把单词从百度词典粘贴到一个文档里, 标上序号, 每天坚持抄啊读啊. 不知不觉, 到今天为止, 我已经新积累了3800个单词. 两个月积累了3800个单词, 连我自己也觉得不可思议. 这就是环境的力量!
除了读文章, 无穷无尽的作业也让人筋疲力尽. 我不清楚别的专业是否也是这么多作业, 但是我的专业真的快让我崩溃. 为了检验我们有没有读文章, 老师要求我们要写journal article review. 本来文章就读得不是很懂, 还要写分析评论, 真的是雪上加霜. 万般无奈之下, 我只能把文章重复读几次再下笔; 另外每周还要写两篇learning journal, 一篇要写三页文档接近1200个词, 一篇要写五页文档接近2000个词. 最后每个小组要写四篇case review, 先是花上几个小时讨论, 讨论完以后全部组员就不约而同地望着我, 意思是问我: 你可以完成最后的文章吗? 当然我很乐意这样做, 因为大家都觉得我写作好, 很相信我, 所以到最后我都会说一句: “Ok, I will finish the article and send it to you for revision before I send it to the teacher!” 所以最后四篇case review, 大概 7000多个词的写作量都是我完成的. 这周二我们小组做完presentation, 要写一份五页的报告, 主要任务又落在我身上. 除此之外, 还有商务研究课上的那两个research project 弄得我想死, 前天刚和桂花做完presentation, 报告还没写完, 另一个project又来了, 而且更难, 要用到统计学的线性回归的, 我听到这个名词头都大了…… 总之天天不是读就是写, 永远也停不了.
所以我除了每周拖着一个行李箱到超市买足一个星期的东西, 我就基本没有出去过, 除非去市中心理发和买一些猪骨或者鸡爪煲汤. 有些朋友叫我周末出去玩我都没有去, 只能乖乖呆在宿舍看书写东西. 比如说劲文之前叫了我两次出去了, 我都婉言谢绝了, 想起来真的很惭愧. 前几天文涵问我们要不要在11月27号去玩彩蛋球, 当时网上订票只要4欧, 过后要20欧元. 我本来也想和大家一起去的, 可是一看时间太后了, 到时都准备期末了, 我肯定没时间的, 所以就没订了. 在大家的眼里, 我就是一个不停用功读书的人. 其实谁不想玩呢? 我也想玩, 只是我真的觉得我玩不起. 老觉得花了这么多钱来这里读书, 我不读出个名堂来真的对不起自己和家人.
今天打电话问回家, 母亲开玩笑似的问我: “你是不是读得很辛苦啊? 是不是后悔出国啦?” “当然没有!” 我立即说到, “我从来不会为自己的选择后悔.” 她又笑着问: “要是到时你毕业回国了找不到好工作, 你就不怕别人笑话你出国了和没出国差不多?” 我当时也笑着说: “只要你们不要笑我就够了. 哈哈. 其实出国了并不代表以后就可以找到好工作, 但是对我来讲, 有一点是最重要的, 那就是学会了怎样在困境中破茧重生!” 是的, 我坚信,明年回到深圳的我, 将会是一个全新的赖小琪!
爱尔兰都柏林大学 赖小琪
Case Review and Analysis
Introduction:
The trend of globalization, while bringing myriads of opportunities to multinational enterprises, also presents numerous challenges to them, such as the need to define appropriate ethical standards and to operate in a socially responsible manner in all the markets and countries where the firm does business. Ethics standards vary from country to country can be very complicated and controversial to firms doing international business. The case to be analyzed discusses the unethical practices in Nike Inc.’s subcontracted factories around the world, Nike Inc.’s counteractive measures adopted to eliminate these unethical practices and its viability.
Analysis:
Ethics is defined as an individual’s personal beliefs about whether a decision, behavior, or action is right or wrong. Ethical behavior usually refers to behavior that conforms to generally accepted social norms while unethical behavior is the behavior that does not. Why is it important to understand the ethics prevailing in other countries before subcontracting or setting up factories in those countries? By taking into account the ethics in the host country and formulating relevant operative policies accordingly, the company can present a decent image to the public and earn a great reputation, which can tremendously facilitate its production activities and promote its sales volume. Otherwise, like Nike Inc.’, the company may be severely criticized by the public with its brand and fame being terribly ruined.
Considering the great significance of ethics in host countries, how can we guarantee the company and its subcontracted factories’ activities conform strictly to these ethics? First of all, Ethical research should be done before entering certain places, because the cost of completing this research could be a lot lower than the cost of what happened to Nike. Then the company should formulate and implement ethical policies effectively regarding various issues like working condition, wages, welfare, etc. Also, Companies like Nike should have one of their own management teams in place supervising the sub-contractors on a regular basis to monitor the work practices. They need to research the backgrounds of all possible sub-contractors with regards to ethical issues and the regulations that these firms have in place.
Another issue related to the case is: Does a company’s profitability go against social responsibility? Social responsibility is the set of obligations an organization undertakes to protect and enhance the society in which it functions. Many companies do not practice social responsibility in their operation because they deem the more responsibility means the more cost they have to pay accordingly. These companies may tend to take obstructionist stance whereby they do as little as possible to address social or environmental problems, or defensive stance whereby they will do everything that is legally required but nothing more. Actually, in the short run, the company does sacrifice a portion of its benefits to realize its social responsibility. However, in the long run, by realizing sufficient social responsibility, such as protecting environment by purchasing the latest pollutant-dealing equipments, donating to charities or philanthropic organization, etc, the company can present a positive image to the public, which will in turn attract greater patronization and increase market shares and profits.
But once the company’s image has been damaged due to unethical practices, is it possible to repair it? The answer is positive, though it may take pains. The company should reflect on its unethical practices and eradicate them by working out explicit policies and regulations and strictly exercising them. On top of that, the company can offer its employees training in how to cope with ethical issues or dilemmas they may encounter during their work. Moreover, Like Nike, the company can also invite a third party to regularly investigate its daily operations and make public the result so as to better monitor the implantation of its ethical policies. It does take a lot of time and efforts, but as long as the company truly put its determination in place, it will work and the company’s image and brand can be restored eventually.
Conclusion:
This review brings together a summary and analysis of the case “Nike Inc.: Developing an Effective Public Relations Strategy”. Ethics is a sensitive and important issue in many countries. It is especially sophisticated in the context of international business because different countries may have different criteria for ethics. The company should pay special attention to the local ethics and its conceivable social responsibilities when doing international business. Only by taking into consideration the ethics in the host country and setting up reasonable and viable policies and regulations can the company run its business smoothly. |
