Author Archives: Mubtasem Ali

Job Retention

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

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

I think the most demotivating part is the lack of importance that her due must feel to the company’s lack of efforts to address her segment of work. This attitude from the company may be felt by Harper in part due to two reasons. One is the lack of urgency to replace her old manager, sending a sign that this work Is not being prioritized or Harper’s overwork isn’t being accounted for by management. Furthermore, her work and increased efforts to make up for the lack of staff is not being by her new supervisor. Even though, the manager is busy this extra work should be recognized at the least.

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 were in an HR meeting to advise how to handle Harper’s situation, I would first try to get extra hands in her department. Although, this is not always possible and the hiring of a new employee may not be feasible right away. A few other solutions we could instead first give Harper some recognition for her work. You can also incentive and reward her, this can be finical since this is a temporary situation and may be enough to make her feel appreciated during these challenging times. Another solution could be asking Harper if she would be interested in an internal promotion to her old supervisor’s position. If she is competent enough to fill in for her supervisor and do her job she may be ready to take on the new role and responsibility. Given the increased responsibility may be willing to do extra work that is required at the time. This may even save the company time and money depending on the market conditions, as sometimes a lower-level position is easier to fill.

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

The major downsides will be the financial cost of finding a new hire and training them. As well as, the financial cost of not one but two people in the same department who worked together. This can lead to a big gap in workers and lead to a sharp drop in productivity. This loss in productivity will be further exasperated by the fact a new employee may not have the experience at the company Harper has and could be less efficient. Finally, employees leaving and leaving more work to do by others could lead to a cycle of overwork, burnout, and increased turnover.

“The Founder” Reflection

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

Ray Kroc is a serial entrepreneur who is after maximizing profits and growth of his businesses while the brothers are social entrepreneurs whose main focus is creating something that fits their values and adds to the community. Furthermore, they prioritize their own lifestyle at times as can be seen with their choice to slow down growth due to their battle with diabetes. Ray Kroc is willing to comprise the values of the company and the product for profits and growth like we saw in the milkshake changes in the movie.

  • 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 think the brothers made the right decision in the sense that they did not want to be involved in the expansion and Ray had expanded the company far past the sights of the original store. However, some of the rights like the Mcdonald’s name should not have been sold in that manner. I think selling such a revolutionary restaurant without keeping a cut was a bad deal, especially when the one percent of the company they received was a handshake deal from somebody who has proven to be untrustworthy. Furthermore, the value of the golden arches and various other Mcdonald’s branding is worth more than the stores themselves.

  • How did the local store franchisees make money?

The local franchisees paid a franchise fee originally, then everything else was purchased by the franchisee including the storefront. The franchises had to comply with the standards of McDonald’s but otherwise pay for the costs and kept the profits minus the fees. Later this would change when Ray Kroc decided to buy the property and have the franchisees lease the land from him.

  • How did Kroc make money? How was that different than the franchisees, running the local stores?

What made Kroc’s money was first the 1.9% of gross sales from the franchising fee and gave back the brothers .5% of that. However, this was only breaking even for Kroc, so Kroc after receiving advice from a finical investor choose to implement a new idea that differentiated his Franchising model from others. The model had Kroc first buy plots of land for stores and the franchisees would pay Kroc to lease the land. Giving Kroc greater control and Negotaiiting power over his franchisees.

  • Does this film change your view of McDonald’s?

Yes, I did not credit McDonald’s in the past for all its innovation in the restaurant and business space. From the revolution of the concept of fast food to the equipment and structure of the processes themselves all the way to Ray Kroc’s franchising model. I view Mcdonald’s as revolutionizing and being business savvy, however, my view of McDonald’s lack of quality is still persists. I do them credit for the consistency of their menu items from store to store despite wait time not being so.

Patagonia: They do more than you think? A look into their efforts to be consistently ethical.

Many industries claim to be ethical but do not follow through with the perception they put out through advertising and social media campaigns. Such examples include Amazon’s attempts to brand themselves as being continuous and taking strides towards employment standards in the industry. Jeff Bezos’s stance is well known as he has repeatedly reiterated a 15$ an hour work week[1]. Despite that amazon actively monitors employees, penalizes employees, and is aggressively anti-union [2]. In contrast, I will discuss a company that from its inception has aimed to be socially and ethically responsible first Patagonia. Their original mission statement read “Build the best product, cause no unnecessary harm, use business to inspire and implement solutions to the environmental crisis”.

Patagonia’s original mission statement was new and fresh during the 90s, to have a clothing business committed to doing no harm and looking to implement solutions for the environment first was fresh. They are not only looking to be socially responsible to their customers and employees but to the world. So, what has Patagonia done to follow through with that statement? “94%” of Patagonia’s current lines of clothing and equipment use recycled materials, leading to “20000 tons of Co2 emissions removed in just one year”[3]. Many companies that offshore or outsource work, do not translate their local standards and ethics for employees to the country where their manufacturing is outsourced. Patagonia is not one such company, at Patagonia, employs a Tier 1 monitoring system to monitor all factories and subcontractors that meet the standards of labor Patagonia expects. Furthermore, this system derives from the Fair labor association that Patagfoinia helped found to promote and certify these practices and compliances done at other organizations. The code of conduct includes detailed expectations on child labor, forced labor, wages, and more.

Most people associate Patagoinia with a clothing and equipment brand and do not know about their other business ventures. One significant one is a more recent venture Patagonia Provisions, a canned food brand. The canned food venture extends Patagonia’s principles of sustainability and is a part of their efforts to fulfill their new mission statement “We’re in business to save our home planet”, where they aim to not only be sustainably but actively make new ventures that help save the planet. It first started as a way to create “sustainably farmed tinned food” that was aimed at their already developed consumer base of outdoor activity participants like fish and buffalo jerky. But it has greatly expanded to creating certification programs as well as working with sustainability non-profits to change farmers’ practices to be better for the environment, many farmers that complied were subsidized and became part of Patagonia’s supply chain. Furthermore, the Provisions part of the company is actively trying to change consumer eating habits that would be greater for the environment like moving meat a known carbon-heavy part of people’s diet to become a side of a meal and replacing the loss protein with more sustainable proteins.

Dissecting all this information and the efforts Patagonia has gone to be an environmentally and socially conscious operation I have found many characteristics to aspire for in a business. They have not only made effort to be ethical employers, and be environmentally conscious while executing their business, but they have also gone out of their way to make it an integral mission of the company and make great efforts to save the planet in a wider scope beyond their business through staring various non-profits, organizations that promote sustainable activity and certifications programs. While Patagonia products are not the cheapest, they are high quality and apart funding a greater mission that many consumers do not mind paying the premium for due to various efforts they make toward social responsibility that I have listed above. I think many other businesses can look at Patagonia as an example of making quality products and socially conscious while still being a successful and profitable business.

  1. https://www.aboutamazon.com/impact/economy/15-minimum-wage
  2. https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2022/06/13/amazon-union-retaliation-allegations/
  3. https://www.tiso.com/blog/patagonia-sustainable-brand#:~:text=By%20using%20recycled%20content%2C%20Patagonia,buying%20well%20and%20buying%20less.
  4. https://www.patagonia.com/our-footprint/working-with-factories.html
  5. https://www.eater.com/23153166/patagonia-provisions-sustainable-pantry-tinned-fish-interview

Mubtasem Ali

My name is Mubtasem Ali. Im a visiting student from the University of Rochester. I major in computer science and am going to my final semester. I aspire to be a product manager in the tech field, I hope this business class will fill some soft skills gaps. My interests are PC gaming, Basketball, Soccer, world economics, and Technology in general. Here’s my BMCC email: mubtasem.ali001@STU.BMCC.CUNY.EDU