Author Archives: Dilson Abreu

RETENTION (Dilson Abreu)

  • What do you think is the most demotivating part of Harper’s job?

   I believe the most demotivating aspect of Harper’s job is her constant workload and her perception of not being a valuable member of the team. According to Professor Buckler’s article “A Case of Disengagement,” it states, “David seems less aware of the workload and stress Harper is dealing with and doesn’t seem to be available to help if Harper needs advice.” Since Harper’s prior boss, Jose, left the firm a few months ago, she has had to cover some of his responsibilities, and it has really been taking a toll on her. Before the new boss (David), Jose was very upfront and clear on communication and was always easy to reach out to since he was managing Harper and another co-worker, But now David manages the whole team, so it has become more difficult for Harper to ask for aid and for her work to be recognized.

  • If you were an HR manager meeting with Harper’s supervisor, David, what advice would you give to help David re-engage Harper?

If I was an HR manager meeting up with Harper’s supervisor, David, some advice I would give him is to not overwork your employees. As we have seen in Harper’s situation, the major reason she is planning to leave the firm is that her work has doubled and she gets no help when asked for. After reading the article, “8 EFFECTIVE EMPLOYEE RETENTION STRATEGIES” by Dan Scalo, it states “While you might fear a productivity dip if your team members scale back their workloads, research suggests that working less (which typically equates to stressing less) can actually result in even greater productivity.” This demonstrates that quantity is preferable to quality; a supervisor would not want to review a large number of papers because they contained numerous errors. Because David is new, he does not understand the importance of what employees bring to the company. According to the article, workplace morale improves when employees feel valued. While a “Thank you” note is nice at first, managers can provide greater rewards such as promotions, bonuses, raises, or paid time off. I’m sure if Harper had gotten a promotion or a pay raise, she would have stayed with the company because she knows her work is valued.

Another piece of advice would be to establish clear-cut expectations and invest in employees’ professional development. Another reason Harper was so stressed out was that she felt like David was not investing in her professional development and was not clear with her assigned duties. A way that this can be fixed is to use the same gameplan as her former boss Jose had, be crystal clear on what needs to be done, and give regularly update feedback so they know they are being evaluated as stated in the article. Regarding her professional development, a resolution that can be done is to provide your employees with opportunities to better these skills. For example, promote workshops, information sessions, programs, etc. 

  • What would be the downside of losing Harper as an employee?

  The downside of losing Harper as an employee would be the contribution she has brought to the company. Harper has been in the company for about 4 years, and im pretty sure she knows everything about the company. If Harper leaves David would have to hire an external recruiter or get an internal recruiter from their firm to begin the hiring process. This would triple the workload the company has to do because now they have to review dozens of resumes, process phone calls, in person, or virtual interviews, and then train the chosen candidate. This could take months in order to be done. This is why it its important to cherish your employees.

The Founder (Dilson Abreu)

  1. What makes Ray Kroc and the brothers different from each other?

    What made Ray Kroc different from the brothers was that he was able to make a franchise out of the McDonald’s restaurant. What the brothers lacked was having a real-world view of what business is like. The brothers were very smart about designing a restaurant but did not know how to expand since they had tried before but failed due to the fact that they did not know how to manage more than one restaurant. In the film, we see that the brothers established 5 restaurants, 3 in Southern California, 1 in Sacramento, and 1 in Phoenix, and did not plan to expand anymore due to quality control. They saw that these restaurants were not sanitized and had an inconsistent menu. Furthermore, after this realization, the brothers saw that having 1 great restaurant was better than 50 not great ones. 

         But this is where Ray Kroc separates himself from the brothers, Ray knew having 1 great restaurant would not be enough to make an empire. Ray knew what steps had to be put in place in order for this to happen. Ray went out to the banks and asked for loans to lease land and build restaurants. He found the right people to manage the restaurants, made the restaurants open 7 days a week instead of only on Sunday, and went out to recruit people to hire. The brothers would not be able to achieve this simply because they did not know how, they were not specialized in marketing like Ray was. Ray also had his own secretary in his other multi-mixer business called “Prince Castle” where she would help him negotiate deals, handle calls with possible business partners, sponsors, etc. This was a big help and a time saver for Ray since he was managing more than 1 restaurant, as the brothers only managed 1.

  1. Do you think the McDonald’s brothers did the right thing by selling out to Ray Kroc? Did Ray Kroc give the brothers a good deal?

   I believe the brothers did the right thing by selling out to Kroc. As big as McDonald’s has gotten, they knew that if Ray re-sings they would not know how to keep up with all of the other McDonald’s restaurants. This would later cause bankruptcy and a lot of stress to the brothers, especially to Mac, since he has diabetes, and the doctor told him if he continues to have stress he will develop kidney failure. Also, when negotiating the sell-out contract, Ray promised the brothers royalties of $2.7 million and 1% of the company’s profits in perpetuity. 

 In my opinion, Ray Kroc gave the brothers a terrible deal. Regarding the 1% of the company profits in perpetuity, royalties, and the check, Ray agreed to the deal but on a handshake basis, which means only in good faith. Which as we have seen in the film Ray is not a faithful person, Ray is the Pure definition of what a businessman should do to get to the top, and it was lying and working behind the back of the brothers. I’m sure nobody would like a business partner like Ray. Furthermore, Ray was unable to prove the handshake deal where the brothers never received their royalties and the 1% profits in perpetuity, and instead of the $2.7 million dollar check, the brothers received a $1.3 million dollar check instead. I truly feel awful for the brothers, especially Mac, who was such a positive, pleasant man who had so much trust in Ray and gave him second chances, only for everything to backfire on him. All Mac wanted was for his brother Dick to have accomplished his dream. 

  1. How did the local store franchises make money?

            The local stores make money by establishing carhops where cars will pull up to the restaurant and pick up their food. This would attract a lot of attention since their “speedy system” was easy for people to adapt to. Customers’ food was placed in a bag from which they can easily dispose to the garbage can after they are done eating. 

  1. How did Kroc make money? How was that different from the franchises, running the local stores?

     After Kroc saw that McDonald’s was almost out of capital due to the monthly cost of all stores(especially the manufacturing of the ice cream-making machines) and the 1.4% cut of his contract with the brothers, he saw that he needed to renegotiate his deal in order to break even or more. But the brothers declined his demand. So Harry J. Sonneborn, the vice president and a real estate representative from “The Tastee Free Corporation” gave great advice to Kroc on how he could make money. Harry noticed that the restaurant was on leased land. Harry told Ray to buy the leased land and later flip the deal by leasing the land that he owns to the restaurants. This gave Ric two things, one was a steady revenue stream and the other was greater capital expansion, as stated by Harry in the film. 

  This was very different from the franchises run by the local stores because the local stores had to pay monthly fees to the lease owner, mainly being banks or whatnot, but in Kroc’s case, Kroc was the bank where he was getting the lease money from the restaurant. This would help Ric a lot by having enough revenue to expand even more nationwide.

  1. Does this film change your view of McDonalds?

This does not change my view of McDonald’s at all. This can be expected from every major multinational billion-dollar business. For example, Facebook was mainly started by a group of 5 individuals, including Mark Zuckerberg, Eduardo Saverin, Andrew McCollum, Dustin Moskovitz, and Chris Hughes. Now the only remaining founder in the business is Mark Zuckerberg. The film “ The Social Network” explains how this happens. I recommend it to anyone who has not seen this film. It’s a very good one. So to conclude, this does not change my view on Mcdonald’s at all since this would be expected from any business person who had the same vision as Ray Kroc.

Segment E: Understanding of Ethics, Social Responsibility, and Employee Relations Assignment.(Dilson Abreu)

Google is a company with which I have constant interaction. If I have a question about my homework, work, personal life, or want to look up reviews of companies, etc., Google is only two clicks away from linking me to the most relevant source for my search. I don’t think there will ever be a browser search company that can ever top such a successful and big company as Google. In this paper, I will discuss Google’s influence on its social and ethical responsibilities.

I believe Google is the perfect example of what social and ethical responsibilities bring to the table. Climate change has been a big global issue since 1988, and we haven’t seen any solution to it yet. According to www.worldwildlife.org, it states, “More frequent and intense droughts, storms, heat waves, rising sea levels, melting glaciers, and warming oceans can directly harm animals, destroy the places they live, and wreak havoc on people’s livelihoods and communities.” Therefore, because of this, animals and humans are at risk. But Google saw this and had to take action. Google collaborated with the United Nations to provide the public with simple information on the dangers of climate change in around seven different languages. Google has also launched a project named “Google.org Impact Challenge on Climate Innovation”, which helps fund projects as much as $5 million to help improve technological advances to help inform about climate change and take action on climate change. Some big projects are the Climate TRACE project, which is a greenhouse gas monitoring platform that provides neutral data that helps drive faster climate change action; and the RESTOR project, which is a platform that supports and speeds the restoration of our ecosystem by gathering data, funding, and each other to increase the impact and restoration of our environment, all stated by the “impactchallenge.withgoogle.com” website.

Moreover, another reason why Google handles social and ethical responsibilities so well, in my opinion, is because of its rewarding benefits to its stakeholders. A lot of people like to work at Google because of its competitive compensation and very reasonable benefits. According to “Google Stakeholders & Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR)” by Pauline Meyer, it states, ” The company’s compensation strategy includes high salaries and various incentives and benefits, such as free meals and flexible workflows.” “Google’s facilities are also fun workplaces where workers can exercise, play games, and enjoy sharing ideas with each other.” This shows that Google is not a demanding firm that only cares about the work and not its employees, but a place where people’s lives actually matter in the business world. They could work to maintain a healthy lifestyle, get free meals, flexible workflows, and get highly competitive pay. This may seem too good to be true since it is the dream job anybody would like to have. If you ask me, this rarely gets seen on jobs, especially with Amazon since their employment treatment is horrible.

I used to work for Amazon in 2020 as an Amazon Fresh employee(stocking and picking groceries). I quit in under a month because you get treated like a robot, they rush you to get back to work when you’re at break, and overall it’s not a good place for your mental health. Because of this, I believe that Google is fulfilling a positive ethical responsibility because it brings responsibilities, trust, reliability, relationships, morale, and having a choice with its employees and partners. Also for the social responsibilities that fall under the categories of the general public, the environment, and investors.

To conclude, some recommendations that I have to create a more ethical, socially responsible, and/or sustainable business is to create not a competitive work lifestyle among your employees but a more friendly and comfortable place where your employees don’t feel like they are being forced to do the task and generally have fun while working at the same time. Every employee you hired has a different personality and interest, so with that being said, some practices that could be done can be little events such as raffles, group food, and going out your way to creating small talks to understand a person could greatly benefit your workplace.

Dilson

Hello professor and fellow classmates, my name is Dilson Abreu, I am a sophomore at BMCC and my major is VAT(Video Arts and technology). I decided to take this course because I will become a transfer student at Lehman college where I will be pursuing another career. Instead of VAT, I will be majoring in accounting because I enjoy dealing with numbers and networking more than being behind a camera. I also have entry-level experience with google workspace applications such as excel and have a sense of what business is about as also as accounting. In my free time, I enjoy watching sports such as the NBA, NFL, and baseball. I also enjoy reading Manga which is basically Japanese comics such as "One piece", "Jujutsu Kaisen", etc. Here’s my BMCC email: dilson.abreu@stu.bmcc.cuny.edu