If you have ever visited London and been onto the world-famous London Eye, you would probably want a similar architectural masterpiece that can represent your city as well. Visionary developer and investor Meir Laufer saw the underlying commercial value within in it, and decided to bring a wheel to New York by teaming up with the London Eye’s lead engineers. The 630-foot-tall New York Wheel located in St. George, Staten Island is expected to attract 4.5 million passengers per year, create more than 1,000 jobs while having a maximum capacity of 1,440 people per ride.

Originally, the project was scheduled to begin in 2014 and end in late 2015. However, this plan has been delayed a number of times due to various factors such as  inferior welds on the giant legs of the wheel, defective pads which the wheel will sit on and a bad attachment between the wheel and the pad. But regardless of these details, one of the most significant causes of these delays is the miscommunication between the developers and the European construction team Mammoet-Starneth. On May 26, the construction company withdrew from the worksite because of the timing of the project as well as a payment dispute. It is quite interesting to find that a multi million project can also have such dilemma that typically happens within students’ teamwork.

Nonetheless, when analyzing their cooperation, their team does lack elements like supportive context and shared mindset which are crucial for effective teamwork. The absence of supportive context is clearly shown by their dispute on the topic of payment and in addition to that, the Mammoet-Starneth also suggests that there was ­“insufficient soil support and parts that don’t work.” When one part of the team(in this case the construction team) does not receive the support they desire, dissatisfaction will eventually lead to fatal conflicts. Despite the lack of support, the developers accused the construction company for “two years of self-inflicted delays and extortionate ­attempts to extract additional payments totaling more than 50 percent of the agreed contract price.” This rigorous accusation reveals the fact that the two parts of the team certainly did not have a good relationship and a shared mindset since the beginning. The misunderstanding that was resulted by miscommunication is the essential reason of why their teamwork did not work out well.

Now, because of this immature teamwork, a ferris wheel that was suppose to be completed two years ago only has its foundation and a terminal station installed by the construction team. Realizing the fact that some enormous projects operated by multiple international companies can also fall into such a chaotic situation helps us to really understand the importance of effective teamwork.

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Citation:

Anon, (2017). [online] Available at: https://www.linkedin.com/in/meir-laufer-b671895b    [Accessed 26 Sep. 2017].

McGeehan, P. (2017). Completion Date of Staten Island’s Giant Wheel Still Up in the Air. [online] Nytimes.com. Available at: https://www.nytimes.com/2017/08/14/nyregion/completion-date-of-staten-islands-giant-wheel-is-up-in-the-air.html [Accessed 26 Sep. 2017].

New York Post. (2017). Staten Island Ferris wheel project is spinning out of control. [online] Available at: http://nypost.com/2017/06/25/staten-island-ferris-wheel-project-is-spinning-out-of-control/ [Accessed 26 Sep. 2017].

En.wikipedia.org. (2017). New York Wheel. [online] Available at: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_York_Wheel#External_links [Accessed 26 Sep. 2017].

Web.b.ebscohost.com. (2017). EBSCO Publishing Service Selection Page. [online] Available at: http://web.b.ebscohost.com/ehost/pdfviewer/pdfviewer?vid=1&sid=f7a2b0a0-b293-4ed2-b165-1ed36e0e2315%40sessionmgr101 [Accessed 26 Sep. 2017].

Ny.curbed.com. (2017). Curbed NY Archives – Staten Island Observation Wheel – Page 1. [online] Available at: https://ny.curbed.com/staten-island-observation-wheel/archives [Accessed 26 Sep. 2017].

In recent years, China’s air pollution has become a serious nationwide problem that is affecting hundred millions of people. The air particle PM2.5 produced by factories is a type of pollutant that can be inhaled by the and cause many health issues. In the article “China’s citizens are complaining more loudly about polluted air”, the author gives a specific example that took place in Daqing, China, where thousands of people demonstrated outside of the city’s government headquarter to resist the plan of building aluminum factories. The projected was later canceled by authorities, therefore, the company that developed this project undoubtedly suffered from it.

This type of event leads us to a question about business ethics: should businesses sacrifice themselves to fulfill other stakeholders benefits or should they only focus on making more profit?

In American economist Milton Friedman’s article “The Social Responsibility of Business Is to Increase Its Profits,” Friedman strongly disagrees with the argument that businesses have social responsibilities. His main argument is that only human can have responsibilities, not a business or a company. But if we think closely, a company can be seen as a group of individuals gathered together to reach a common objective. Despite making a profit, each individual has their responsibilities to others, and together, the business surely has its responsibilities to all of its stakeholders.

When we look into the example of air pollution, despite public citizens, many other stakeholders are also influenced by it. For instance, the workers in the company are heavily affected because research shows that a change of 10 units of PM2.5 can decrease worker’s productivity by an outstanding 6%. Therefore, if a company does not care about business ethics at all and continues to pollute excessively, their profit would not necessarily grow since their workers’ productivity would also fall significantly.

To sum up my point, people sometimes do not consider business ethics as a necessary responsibility for a company because it is a common understanding that a company’s main objective is to simply increase the profit. However, a company that does not bother with business ethics definitely would not be able to survive in the competitive market due to the fact that every single stakeholder has an impact on the business. If a company loses the support from one entire group of people, it can potentially lead to a disaster and damage the business heavily. At the end of the day, it is always nice to do other people a favor because, most of the time, people who help others receive satisfaction and benefits as well.

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Citations:

China’s citizens are complaining more loudly about polluted air. (2017, March 02). Retrieved September 13, 2017, from https://www.economist.com/news/china/21717975-government-wants-silence-them-chinas-citizens-are-complaining-more-loudly-about-polluted-air

Zimmerli, W. C., Richter, K., & Holzinger, M. (Eds.). (n.d.). Corporate Ethics and Corporate Governance. Retrieved September 13, 2017, from https://link-springer-com.ezproxy.library.ubc.ca/content/pdf/10.1007%2F978-3-540-70818-6.pdf

Ferro, S. (2015, June 20). The pollution outside your office window affects your work in a big way. Retrieved September 13, 2017, from http://www.businessinsider.com/pollution-affects-labor-productivity-2015-6

Chinese Air Pollution Kills 4,000 People Each Day (And Why It Will Kill Many More). (2015, August 13). Retrieved September 13, 2017, from http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2015-08-14/chinese-air-pollution-kills-4000-people-each-day-and-why-it-will-kill-many-more

Business Ethics Corporate Social Responsibility and Governance BA8401 Anna University Management of Business Science MBA. (n.d.). Retrieved September 13, 2017, from http://www.brainkart.com/subject/Business-Ethics-Corporate-Social-Responsibility-and-Governance_120/