Phishy pharmaceuticals

Section one: International Business Communications

Deliverable Length:

400-600 words

Details:

Students will be expected to post their first initial discussion board posting by Wednesday of each week. Discussion posts will be graded and late submissions will be assigned a late penalty in accordance with the late penalty policy found in the syllabus. NOTE: All submission posting times are based on midnight Central Time.

Students are expected to post their responses to peers by Sunday. NOTE: All submission posting times are based on midnight Central Time.

Primary Task Response: Within the Discussion Board area, write 400-600 words that respond to the following questions with your thoughts, ideas, and comments. This will be the foundation for future discussions by your classmates. Be substantive and clear, and use examples to reinforce your ideas.

Briefly discuss the economic, political, educational, family, and marital systems of a country of your choice. Include a response to the following questions in your discussion:

· If your company was to do business in your chosen country, what kind of social hierarchies and social interactions should you be aware of?

· What kind of management style would you use to be most effective given the cultural attributes of the country?

· How would you overcome the barriers to communication?

· Do you agree with the saying, "When in Rome, do as the Romans do" when it comes to doing business with another country?

Section 2: Business Law

Primary Task Response: Within the Discussion Board area, write 400–600 words that respond to the following questions with your thoughts, ideas, and comments. This will be the foundation for future discussions by your classmates. Be substantive and clear, and use examples to reinforce your ideas.

Corporations have a lot of influence over the economy, the community, and people. The traditional view of corporate responsibility is that a corporation has no additional social responsibility beyond making a profit for its shareholders. In more recent years, arguments have arisen with the belief that corporations have a high degree of social responsibility to people affected by the corporation’s decisions.

You are returning for a second interview for a management position at a pharmaceutical corporation. The hiring committee wants to hear your views on a corporation’s social responsibility. The hiring committee has even provided to you a case example to review and discuss during your interview. To prepare for the interview, you decide to write out your thoughts that you plan on discussing with the hiring team.

In your paper, you decide to include the following topics:

· Definition of what corporate social responsibility means to you

· Arguments supporting social responsibility

· Description of a real-life example of a specific corporation acting in a socially responsible manner

· Your opinion and supportive reasoning on the case example and questions provided below

Case Example: Phishy Pharmaceuticals is a corporation that recently kicked off the sale of its new weight-loss pill, Lose It Fast. After three months of sales, the management team has received some troubling reports of some unanticipated side effects caused by the pill. The management team asks the accounting department to run some numbers to determine how much it would cost to recall Lose It Fast, to suspend manufacturing, and to conduct more tests to determine the pill’s safety and other possible side effects.

After running some numbers, the accounting department states that it would be more cost-effective to leave the product on the market shelves and propose settlement proceedings with anyone who is injured and initiates a lawsuit.

The corporate attorney has advised that the product states on the package that the pill is not FDA approved, and off-the-record has stated that everyone who buys a weight-loss product knows there are some risks involved, so it is likely that the majority of injured consumers will not initiate a lawsuit.

If you recall the product, it will result in a delay of dividends paid to shareholders and a loss in revenue, affecting shareholder profit. Consider the following questions regarding this example:

· What would you do, and why?

· Would you leave the product on the shelves because you feel your duty as a corporate manager is to maximize shareholder profits?

· Would you recall the product because you feel the corporation owes a duty to the public, consumers, and the government in terms of social responsibility?