Practice And Ethics of Telstra Corporation Limited †Free Samples

Question: Discuss about the Practice And Ethics of Telstra Corporation Limited. Answer: Introduction Telstra digital was formed in 2010, as it knew that the company had to extend its origins from conventional engineering culture to a fast paced digital one. It sources some of the best digital talent in the market and now it is one of the biggest and best digital company in the country. Its move from one platform and integrated approach to information architecture was a challenging decision (Thomas, Barraket, Ewing, MacDonald, Mundell Tucker, 2016). Telstra Corporation Limited is a prominent telecommunications and technology company operating in Australia. The company builds telecommunication networks and offer product and services like mobile, internet access, pay television and many others. It provides 17.4 million mobile services, 6.8 million fixed voice services and 3.5 million retail fixed broadband services. The mission and vision of the company is to connect more and more people and provide more opportunities. For this, the company form simple and easy to use technology and content solutions, which makes it best and largest mobile network of Australia (Nicholls, 2017). The purpose of this report is to address the ethical implication of changes occurred in company from the journey of conventional engineering culture to a fast paced digital one. Background Telstra believes that more connection with people can help to create more opportunities. So, the company initiates the technology which is easy to use. Telstra was previously created with the Australia Post as a government department but now it is fully denationalized. The CEO of Telstra is now aiming to make the company more consumers focused by undertaking a change program. In August 2011, Telstra announces to develop its customer services to social media having 24/7 coverage. By the end of November 2012, the company enjoys the increase in its live chats and the growth rate of this service has also improved to a great extent (Gregory, 2015). As of 2016, the company retains about 360 retail stores and more than 300 stores are equipped with low energy Bluetooth beacons. After the privatization, the shares of Telstra have risen to $5 per share in December 2013 to $6 per share in December 2014. The company is listed on Australian Stock Exchange (ASX) and traded as ASX: TLS. The company is looking forward to extend its growth in the international markets under the new CEO Andy Penn (Feeney Freeman, 2015). Framework for analysis Doing the ethic Whats going on Telstra has changed the way it was working by the introduction of digital. The company requires employees to attain high standard of business and particular ethics in the conduct of duties. The framework of ethical behaviour of the company provides guidance on the ethical and responsible decision making (Schaufeli, Maslach Marek, 2017). It is based on the companys integrity policies: Anti-bribery and anti-corruption Conflicts of interest and outside activities Fraud and criminal conduct Gifts, prizes and hospitality The ethical behaviour risk assessment is on schedule with other two business units undergoing risk assessments. The goal of the program is to develop an ethical behaviour risk profile for the company. 90% of companys executives, employees and executive support group complete face to face training for identifying and addressing ethical behaviour issues (Sharp, et. al. 2015). The company also develops a toolkit to enable risk leaders in every business unit to conduct ethical behaviour training. What are the facts? The company obliges all employees to attain high standard of business and personal ethics. Telstra provides facts through which objectives are set out and performance is monitored. The employees and contractors are required to complete compulsory compliance training refresher course. Telstra provides face to face ethical behaviour training to employees across 12 countries (FitzPatrick, 2015). It has also conducted climate change risk valuation to better identify risks and actions to build flexibility within business. It launches standards to help team members to turn value of organisation into behaviour so that they can be responsible for their day to day work. The company carries training and awareness sessions across the organisation to progress ethical behaviour (Pullen Rhodes, 2015). What are the issues There are many online services which rely on SMS for delivering confidential information such as pin number, links for setting passwords, banking and email services. In May 2013 Telstra faced issues of messages after breaking out fire at exchange. It also damaged equipment of company. It sent personal messages to random recipients. It leaked private data of almost 16000 customers. The company breached the privacy act by exposing information of customers including telephone number, name and address (Tran Pedler, 2017). The Office of the Australian Information Commissioner (OAIC) found that the company failed to keep personal information of customers and revealed the personal information. Who is affected In Australia Telstra provides communication service to 17.4 million mobile users, 6.8 million fixed voice services and 3.5 million retail fixed broad band service. There were almost 16000 customers who were affected by the incidence. Their personal information was leaked from the misdirected messages. It affected equally to 1257 silent line customers. They were affected as their personal information such as name, address and phone numbers could be searched through the simple Google search. The employees, shareholders and stake holders of the company were also affected as the company closed down the software platforms after the incidence occurred. The other customers were also not able to access the information available on the site in the while time (Welsh, 2017). What are the ethical issues and implications Telstra exposed data online and revealed personal information of customers after fire at exchange. Along with the misdirected messages the company have been threatened by ACCC for misleading NBN speeds. ACCC took tough stand about the ambiguous consumers about NBN broadband speeds. The company has been using terms like fast and superfast to identify its service but the speed is inaccessible and stops within. The ACCC is going to take action if the practices do not improve till the end of year. It affected employees of the organisation in every way. The problem behind the NBN speeds is lack of transparency (Gregory, 2015). Telstra was investigated by federal privacy commissioner and fined for breaching privacy so that it does not repeat in future. The decision support system is a computer based application. It analyses business data and presents it in such a way that business decisions can be made by users easily. Business analytics is used to systematise and improve business processes (Haney, 2017). The positive implications of the use of decision support system and business analytics can be: It compares sales figures between one and next week or selected time periods. It defines the consequences of different decision alternatives and the past experiences. It improves the decision making process in the terms of quality and relevance. It organizes inventory data into relational databases for time to time analysis. It is helpful in conducting data mining and sharing information with wider audience. They are useful in smart decision making into the culture of company (Power, Sharda Burstein, 2015). The negative implication of using decision support system and business analytics are: It is high cost for the company to use decision support system and business analytics as it requires statistics, data analysis and information system. So the company requires heavy investment in information system (Hartman, DesJardins MacDonald, 2014). Sometimes considering all the aspects of problem is not required in many situations. The effective DSS considers all aspects all the time. The business analytics is available for every company but as per industry it is not developed. To get advanced data it is required to invest in various business intelligent applications. What can be done about it Telstra was ordered to audit systems by June 2013 so that such incident does not happen again. The company took a number of actions comprising closing down of software platforms on which the incidence was happened. It created a clear policy for central software management. The company revised contacts with third parties linked to the personal information handling. The company was fined $10,200 for the infringement of ACMAs codes. In the digital environment there is no set and forget rule for the information security and privacy. The organisation can review and mend security systems regularly to avoid data breaches. ACMA and OAIC investigation can be used to enforce powers to fine up to $1.7 million for beaching customer data. The data analysis tools can point out various business benefits such as new business opportunities, effective marketing, better operational efficiency and improved customer service. It results in gaining competitive advantage. The data analysing tools provide a means of evaluating data sets and drawing conclusions which helps an organisation to make business decisions (Gale Aarons, 2017). It includes data from both internal and external sources. The tools of data analysis can be Tableau, Rapid miner, Google fusion tables, Google search operators and more. Data analysis is an efficient way to reduce costs and improve efficiency. The data analysis tools can transform an organisation. It gives fast and convenient access as a result the organisations can improve decision making and improve business performance. Telstra can achieve competitive advantage by using data analysis tools effectively (Witten, Frank, Hall Pal, 2016). What are the options The options provided by Telstra are: Data and IP: It is a unique option that makes a business competitive with simple, flexible data and IP solutions. It can be backed up by the range of assurance options. The company is constantly investing in its business to provide best solutions and to meet need of customers. The IP experts work with the companies to create unique solutions as per their requirement (Clegg, Kornberger Pitsis, 2015). Broadband and voice: Telstra creates broadband and voice solutions which is right for customers. A customer can choose nbn network or copper network. The company is potential in technologies and innovation to meet need of customers. The customers can easily avail the broadband service by ordering online. Mobility: Telstra creates new services as per the latest technologies used in mobiles. The mobile market keeps on changing constantly so the company updates itself to provide great mobile experience (Medcraft, 2016). It offers the best mobile service. Application and services: The customers expect fast and hustle free access to services. The customers believe in using digital era service so the company provides innovative network application services. It helps in adding value to the customer and generates more business opportunities. Which option is best and buy From the above explained options, application and services is the best. The 24X7 app gives more control than ever. It helps to manage bills. The customer can get bill notification when the bill is ready, instant account status enables to view account balance instantly and estimated usage can also be checked and can view bill history by checking summary of last eight months. Along with these options it also enables to view mobile data usage by group and individual services, manage data allowance and can also add a data pack by 24X7 app and international roaming and day pass can also be managed by monitoring data usage at the time of using handset overseas. It is the best buy as a customer can manage by himself (McCosker, 2017). Assessment of ethical consequences Utilitarianism is a type of ethical theory, states that something is right from wrong by focusing on outcomes or when something is produced for the greatest number of people. It focuses on humans and performs actions which are good for them. The theory believes that something is held to be good in it. It is the most common theory of method used in organisation the way in which it accounts for cost and reimbursements. It asks whether the action taken by firm is good or bad, moral or immoral. It also insures that the least harm is done to the customers who are involved. It can be applied for the particular actions, which is called act utilitarianism. It can be applied directly in a situation of choice causing the greatest amount of happiness. The principle of utility applying for general rules is called rule utilitarianism. It figure outs the cause of happiness and turns it into rules. Utilitarianism is a kind of consequentialism. Utilitarianism could be used by Telstra at the time of issue faced by fire exchange (Hartman, DesJardins MacDonald, 2014). The confidential information of customers was shared with other customers as a result of misdirection. The information was all about name, telephone number, address, pin numbers, banking and email services. It damaged equipment of company. It led company to closing down of software platforms. At this time utilitarianism could be useful in bringing out the good from wrong by focusing on the outcome. It could account for reimbursements. It is going to ensure that the action taken by form of shutting down software is good or bad. The theory is going to ensure that the least harm is done to the involved customers. It could be done by tracking number of customers on which the misdirected message was sent and action could be taken against them if they misused the information. The employees could be managed by company at the time of such issues as the employees shaken at the time of issues and more likely to leave company. They can be managed by concentrating on the right things of organisation from wrong by focusing on the outcome. They are tried to be less harmed by such issues. It helps in analysing ethical aspects of organisation. It gives advice to business sector to take actions which benefits are greater than actions for employees (Congress, 2017). An awareness of IT governance and IT standards and frameworks Telstra is committed to excellence in IT governance and standards and frameworks. It is essential to protect and enhance interest of shareholders for the long term performance of company. The governance framework plays an important role in delivering strategy of business. It provides the structure through which performance can be achieved (Barns, Cosgrave, Acuto Mcneill, 2017). The governance of Telstra includes shareholders, board committee and accountability frameworks, robust system of risk management and assurance and code of conduct. Engaging with shareholders: Telstra maintains a clear an open communication with its shareholders. The company believes in two way communication with shareholders as it can provide relevant and efficient information. Telstra take a number of initiatives to promote efficient communication with its shareholders. It helps in encouraging their participation in meetings. It includes: Retail shareholder information sessions Encouraging questions ahead of AGM Electronic communications Investor seminars Webcast company events Board of directors: The board of directors are responsible for managing business of company and are answerable to shareholders for their actions. Their responsibilities are: Approving, digital innovative plans and monitoring application of strategies and performance against the company plan (Long Inbar, 2016). Appointment and the valuation of the performance of CEO. It decides remuneration and approval of appointments. It also remunerates senior managers and supervises their performance. Managing financial position and approving decisions related to capital management. It also includes share buy backs and dividends. Regulating overall remuneration framework. Recommendations Digital communication is not a one time process. It should be keeping check on time and should be updated shortly. Whenever the issue occurs related to corruption of messages, the SMS platform should be stopped for a short period meanwhile the problem could be solved. The incidence of misdirect happened in Telstra was a result of power outage which caused fire at exchange. The company should follow Australias data privacy to protect personal information of customers. The company can stop SMS platform in such incidences and can held the messages until the surety of the reliability of messages (Tran Pedler, 2017). The approach to ethical behaviour issue of the company can be guided by the members of external organisations such as Transparency International Australia. The company does not pay fees to political parties for the events organised by them on discussion of major policy issues. The company should take all the necessary steps that it does not happen again. The company can provide defiance training and ethical behaviour training to identify risks which can result in big incidence (McDougal, 2017). The awareness sessions can also be conducted and face to face ethical behaviour training of employees to increase flexibility of operations. Conclusion From the above report it can be concluded that Telstra is one of the Australias leading telecommunication company. It has transformed the functioning of organisation by the major decision taken by it that is transforming from engineering culture to digital one. It was the game challenging decision taken by company. The company is successfully leading its operations among the countrys main telecommunication companies. The companys Telstra 24X7 smartphone and tablet app delivers the best customer control. The fire occurred at exchange in 2014, as a result its operations lead to misdirection of messages. It sent personal messages to random recipients and leaked information of customers. 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