Social media and business Ethics in workplace, focused on the effect of social media in business ethics with a real case

1. JW Marriott
Fired for Liking a Tweet on Tibet,
US Worker Feels China’s Reach
Group D :
Hani Abd El- Gawad
Ammar Aly
Salay yousry

2. Table of Content ▪ Case Brief and introduction to
Social Media
▪ Economics implications
▪ Case Stakeholders
▪ Conclusion Suggested solutions
▪ Examples of best practice
▪ Interview & Research Analysis
▪ Q & A

3. Case Brief - Fired for
Liking a Tweet
▪ Periodic Questionnaire Done By JW Marriott with
guests.
▪ a tweet from Friends of Tibet, an independence
organization, congratulating Marriott on recognizing
Tibet, Taiwan and Hong Kong and as countries Jan 9,
2018
▪ When the Marriott International social media account
“liked” a tweet from Tibetan friends, Roy Jones lost his
job
▪ A social media account at Marriott "liked" friends'
tweets, leading to an international incident that Shows
the challenges Some companies such as Apple,
Mercedes, Delta and Zara face while doing business
with China.
▪ Roy Jones told VOA he is still not sure how or what he
did or even if he was the employee who responded to
that tweet.
▪ VOA tried to get comment from Marriott International
Group on Roys case, whom did not respond to emails
and phone calls

5. Social Media definition
Social Media a general term used to describe social interaction
through a set of technology methods, usually based on internet.
includes social media sites such as Facebook, twitter and
linkedin
Online social media shows special characteristics, among which
is that almost all posted content is available to a potential global
audience.

6. Social media and business ethics
▪ Ethical violations continue to grow, more than 45% of employees
acknowledge at least one violation, and it seems clear that social
media use is a powerful contributor to the problem.
▪ Social media is closely linked and directly linked to an increase in
ethical abuse
▪ Social media users appear to be more open to accepting
questionable behavior.
▪ Social media monitoring tools and employee policies help keep
employees adhering to your policies

7. Economics implications
▪ China is Marriott’s second largest market
▪ JW Marriott owns around 300 Hotel in china
▪ 20.7 Billion USD of Revenue in 2018 with 1.5 Increase from 2017
▪ Occupancy rate of Marriott International hotels in Asia Pacific is one
of the highest world wide 73% in 2018
▪ China is both a the big customer and a difficult business partner.
▪ Chinese government suspended online booking services for a full
week as a punishment.

8. China History with Companies Punishment
▪ China has a well-known history of punishing
companies that insult or underestimate the Chinese
government and violate China official policies.
▪ Delta Airlines issued an apology after listing Taiwan,
Tibet and Hong Kong as countries.
▪ Zara, Marriott, Qantas, and Delta Air Lines have all
updated their websites after China slammed several
companies for listing Hong Kong and Taiwan as
countries.

9. ● The Marriott Twitter account issued a response two days later apologizing for
their actions after being forced by the the Shanghai Municipal Tourism
Administration to do so

10. ● He received no training on how to deal
with the issues that might inflame the
Chinese government.
● He says he found out he was fired
when he read it in the China Daily story
● In the 18 months he spent there, he
was promoted once, then earned a
bonus, rewarding presidents for his
skill and hard work.
https://www.voanews.com/usa/fired-liking-tweet-tibet-us-worker-feels-chinas-reach
Roy Jones - the Victim

11. Case: Stakeholders ▪ Enablers stakeholders: (stockholders)
JW marriott Owners
▪ Functional stakeholders: (JW Marriott
employee “”Jone) and Chinese Market
“Guests and partners”
▪ Normative stakeholders : Other Hotels
competitors hosted in China
▪ Diffused stakeholders: Media “Twitter”
NGO “Friends of Tibet”

12. Action of Firing Jone from
JW Marriott Ethically or
not from stakeholder JW
Marriott perspectives?
JW Marriott owner: ( Market image)
Marriott used least Utilitarian and least Kantian:
Consequentialism – rightness of action determined solely by consequences
Hedonism – pleasure and only pleasure is the ultimate good (only for profit)
Maximalism – greatest amount of good consequences possible when bad
consequences are considered
But they didn’t achieve the Universalism consequences considered for everyone
But Action was related to the weakness of kantian deontological (lock of emotions)

13. Action of Firing Jone
from JW Marriott
Ethically or not from
stakeholder employee
perspectives?
▪ Employee right:
▪ Jone it was injustice they didn’t use
the two factors of dismissal:
He fried without a good cause
▪ He fired without a fair hearing
▪ One states that JW Marriott didn’t
use the formal statement code of
Ethics specific and loose enough.

14. ▪ Chinese Market “Guests and partners”
they are a stakeholder group and
weighted as influence over and interest
and its relationship to the firm.
▪ Chinese Market Power and interest
high priority stakeholder for its
interest.
Action of Firing Jone
from JW Marriott
Ethically or not from
stakeholder Chinese
market perspectives?

15. ▪ Tibet they are the flame of the
descrimination unjust campaign
comparative to Chinese policy
through effective social media
channel “Twitter”
Action of Firing Jone
from JW Marriott
Ethically or not from
stakeholder “Tibet”
market perspectives?

16. Conclusion &
Suggested
solutions
▪ JW Marriott has the rights to protect its
market image with its customers and
maximize the revenue.
▪ JW Marriott should follow high response to
any issues related to firm image.
▪ JW Marriott should use Fair ethical
business method with employees.
▪ JW Marriott should share its policies with
employees through trainings especially
with customers policies”big deals
customers”.
▪ JW Marriott should use MIX between
deontological(Kantian) and teleological.
▪ Justice by Marriott should be distributed.

17. Interview & Analysis
▪ Interview with Mr. AG , the operation
manager in one of the Egyptian
prominent public enterprise
companie in the field of
Communication.

18. Ethical Culture --
Discriminationُ
To some extent employees are treated
equally although some discriminating
practices were noticed as below.
▪ Age preferences in some positions.
▪ Gender bias in some jobs due to nature or
requirements by job which contradict with society
culture regarding working hours and hard working
environment like remote deserted sites ,…
▪ Sort of Life style or communities discrimination, for
some high community groups or teams against
normal or regular employees.
▪ cases of influence peddling and partiality.

19. Occupational
safety & Health
Environmental
issues
Occupational safety & Health is one of the highest
influenced aspects of company’s ethical consideration.
Workplace safety, fire detection and fighting
systems and related training programs in addition
to medical care programs
Environmental issues are away from prioritized matters, we
still highly dependent in paper documents and even no
consideration for color trash and garbage separation recycle
or environment friendly waste approach.
No agreements with partners ,subcontractors or
vendor regarding environmental issues.

20. Transparency
whistleblowing
Transparency, the term confidential is seems to
be overused, keeping information from others
is considered sort of power and control over
subordinates.
Complains or whistleblowing Managers are
over trusted and whistleblowing process or
even 360 feedback is considered disrespect to
managers.
Fear of retaliation is playing big role that
employees prefer to stay silent.

21. Code of conduct
Training
Code of conduct is implemented among company's
rules and policies but in reality not well used or
communicated or influenced by top management
in as strategic objective.
Code of conduct may only be considered when
problem or conflict is detected.
Business ethics Training is barely considered for
newcomers.

22. Diversity and
Inclusion
▪ Accepting religious and usual Egyptian
cultural practices is normal theme of
company’s culture.
▪ Represented in worship areas, religious
vacations, greetings ,….
▪ Most of facilities are designed and equipped
to be suitable for employees with physical
disabilities.
▪ Special policies are applied for Females in
forms of maternity leaves and work from

23. Ethical strategy
Ethical strategy is barely noticed as
Company most ethical behaviors are
significantly influenced by society culture
due to absence of sense of urgency or
priority of business ethics from top
management or inclusion in company
strategy.
Management of ethics is not highest priority.
Usually Ethics are addressed reactively, after
a high impact problem occurred,
Focus is highly directed towards targets,
deadlines and sales,.....

24. Monitoring or
Reporting
No regular measures or reports to
evaluate company’s ethics.

25. Ethical Culture
strength
Company’s Ethical culture is at fair or
primitive level and still need much effort to
reach strong or acceptable stage.
Ethics influenced by situational approaches more
than strategic approach

26. Theoretical
Framework
Business nature highly consider rules in
high discipline way rather than results
or any other consideration which put
business in more matching position
with
Deontological approach
Utilitarian approach is very challenging
to apply because company's strategy to
highly consider profit also in return all
employees consider self interest to only
do what they should do to get paid
without further consideration.

27. Theoretical
Framework
Selfishness is obvious in management
and board practices rather than ethical
egoism.

28. Q & A

29. Thank You

30. references
● Voice of America : https://www.voanews.com/usa/fired-liking-tweet-tibet-us-worker-
feels-chinas-reach
● omaha world herald: https://omaha.com/archives/hansen-omaha-man-liked-a-
tweet-and-then-he-lost-his-dream-job/article_74b9021a-3753-5b33-b096-
f0af3c8372d6.html
● https://www.businessinsider.com/zara-marriott-qantas-apologized-to-china-listing-
taiwan-as-country-2018-1