Uber incorporation was founded in the year 2009, since its formation, it has realized significant growth in the scope of its operations. The company in the recent past has expanded both internally and externally and currently it is operating in over 600 cities across the world. Externally, uber has realized strategic development in the company name as well as obtaining additional funds to be used in the management and operation of the company. Recently, Uber has entered into a collaboration with Toyota that is a top global automobile company, this shows the growth in business dynamics for uber incorporation as well as having a prospective future for is a clear evidence of growth (Angrist, Caldwell & Hall, 2017).
The thesis will mainly focus on the evaluation of the organizational experience of the uber-company and the various scandals the company has faced since it was founded in 2009. Also, the thesis will analyze the various strategies the company has implemented to help the overcoming the challenges and finally recommend appropriate strategies that the company should implement to accelerate its growth and expansion across the word.
The scope of the Business
The core business of uber is providing ride services that are usually being supported by the use of point to point software’s technology and mobile application to help in connecting the passengers to the available driver in their locality. Uber usually uses functionalities for ensuring good qualities and trustworthiness of their rides, however, the current existing taxi regulations are not sufficient enough to do such functions efficiently. The use of ICT platform by the uber-company usually makes the company make use of big data, in many occasions, yield management is normally being employed that normally adapts various prices based on the supply and the demands as well as doing the specifications of places and the times.
Organizational scandals
Since its foundation in the year 2009, uber has faced numerous scandals that ranges from the reports of being involved in sexual harassment to the implementation of aggressive strategies to help them take down competition from other companies. In many occasion uber has been featured in news mainly for wrong reasons such as loss of executive, cyber attacks and incidence of sexual harassment (Angrist, Caldwell & Hall, 2017). In October 2016, uber was involved in cover-up sandal that was viewed as a major breach of the security. In this scandal, uber deliberately paid hackers $100,000 so that they can cover up a cyber attack that led to exposing 57 million people data across the world.
In the year 2013 September, Uber driver was accused by a passenger for choking her in the city of Washington DC. The passenger tweeted in her twitter account that uber grabbed her forcefully out of the car mainly because they were kissing with her husband. The accused driver responds to this allegation claiming that the lady was extremely drunk and pulled her out of the car because the lady started fighting him (Tzur, 2017). The CEO of Uber Travis Kalanick also had to send an email to the company press team at the particular time, the CEO blamed the media for trying to implicate uber with this incidence that to him they appeared as if they are not really in the first place.
The major scandal faced by uber was in December 2014 in Delhi India where uber was banned due to accusations of rape. The ban was imposed to uber after a passenger reported that she was abducted and taken to a secluded space where she then raped by the driver of the uber. Besides this scandal, uber also has been accused of sexism that came after "hot chicks" Promotion. The company branch located in Lyon, France uses a promotion that attempts to pair the various clients of uber with "hot Chicks" Drivers. As a result of the numerous complaints from the public, the promotion was killed quickly and scrubbed from the internet as fast as possible.
Recommendation for change
For uber to be able to avoid the repeated scandals in their operations, they should consider reformulating their cultural values. Uber should consider changing their written cultural values, mainly because it’s important for the culture to reflect inclusivity and positive behaviors towards the clients. The company should also implement mandatory training on leadership for the company’s senior managers. The company should engage a respected consultant to train the managers on inclusive leadership. Also, they should allocate sufficient resources for that training so that the company can regain their lost reputation due to numerous scandals (Angrist, Caldwell & Hall, 2017).
Uber should also establish various protocols with respect to escalating complaints that normally require proper investigations. The company should have a clear guideline for the managers that outline how to investigate complaints from the public. The protocols should also outline the condition under which various legal organizations should be consulted. Legal organizations are crucial since they ensure consistency of the treatment of the various clients across the world (Tzur, 2017). Complaints that involve harassment or violations of fundamental human rights and dignity should not be brought to the attention of the consulted legal organization mainly to protect the company reputation.
The other crucial strategy uber should implement is adopting and promoting the sponsorship programs to the staffs. The strategy will help uber to promote the success of the junior staffs. Sponsorship program to staff members has positive effects on the career advancement, payment, and retention of an employee in an organization. career advancement has crucial impacts on the improvement of the quality services that the company offer to the customers. Sponsorship will ensure that uber engages top managers in running the various operations in the company hence reduces
Stages of Moral Development
The stages of moral development according to Kohlberg’s include egoism, cultural relativism, social group relativism, Utilitarianism, virtue ethics and finally deontology. Ethical egoism being the first stage of moral development is basically a view that each and everyone should pursue his or her own self-interest and no one has any obligation of promoting other people interest (Schwartz, 2001). This normative theory is mainly concerned with how people are supposed to behave. Cultural relativism, on the other hand, is defined as an idea of individual’s beliefs, values, and practices that can be based defined based on his/ her own culture of origin but through being judged based on the criteria of another person perspective (Brandenberger, 2015). The view of cultural relativism normally varies because of the cultural variation of people living in societies.
Social group relativism is another important philosophy that explains moral development, the philosophy is based on a common belief that morality or moral development is basically a matter of adherence to norms or following norms of an individual’s peer group (Brandenberger, 2015). The other stage of moral development is virtue ethics that is basically identified as on that on important virtues for the moral character of an individual or a group of people living in a given society. Currently, virtue ethics is among the three major approaches that are being applied in the field or normative ethics.
Utilitarianism philosophy is also crucial in explaining the stages of moral development. The philosophy states that the best action to be taken is normally the one that maximizes utility. Where utility basically means well-being of the various sentient entities. The last stage of moral development is deontology that mainly focuses on wrongness or rightness of the various actions themselves and the various consequences of the actions taken (HEIDER, 2016). The philosophy is sometimes being described as duty or obligation that is primarily based on ethics. The philosophy strongly believes that various ethical rules normally binds people to their respective duty hence it becomes an obligation (Schwartz, 2001).
Conclusion
Uber can fix the various scandals they are facing such as rape accusation, abduction cases, and other internal fissures, through adopting various strategies geared at improving the reputation of the company that has grown to at least $28 Billion worth through having a good business plan. To get solutions for the internal cultural problem that affects uber it requires similar sort of implementations and finesse. For example, uber should first create a more diverse and inclusive working environment. Lack of diversity in a workplace usually results in discrimination and biases. The company should close all forms of biases that are likely to affect the efficient operation of the Company.
The moral development is important any given society mainly because they promote coherence among people, understanding of various cultures within any society as well as cooperation among the societal members. Upholding good moral standards in society or a workplace usually results in peaceful co-existence of people hence promoting development activities.
References
Angrist, J., Caldwell, S., & Hall, J. (2017). Uber vs. Taxi. Cambridge, Mass: National Bureau of Economic Research.
Brandenberger, J. (2015). Moral development: Theory and applications. Journal Of Moral Education, 44(3), 387-389. doi: 10.1080/03057240.2015.1053317
HEIDER, B. (2016). UBER VERSUS TAXI. GENERATION YS PERCEPTION OF TAXI AND UBER SERVICES IN LISBON. [S.l.]: GRIN PUBLISHING.
Schwartz, E. (2001). Three Stages of a School'S Moral Development. Religious Education, 96(1), 106-118. doi: 10.1080/00344080119265
Tzur, A. (2017). Uber Über regulation? Regulatory change following the emergence of new technologies in the taxi market. Regulation & Governance. doi: 10.1111/rego.12170
