Taking off from where from where we stopped on this last week, talking about common mistake made in leadership (Misleadership and Situational Leadership), I will be focusing on Governance and Stakeholders by starting with the statement below.
"The speed of the ship was one of the causes
of the disaster, but the captain was following the standard procedure of the
last quarter century to “keep course in clear weather, to maintain speed, and
trust to a sharp look-out to enable them to avoid danger”. It was standard
practice to maintain speed and course through ice treacherous waters when the
weather was clear.” People mistakenly believed that the improving advancements
in construction and safety features made it unnecessary to update regulations
that no longer strictly applied” (Kelly,
2013).
One of the features of sustainable success in an organisation is a proper synergy of Leadership and Governance of stakeholders in an organisation. Many organisations have focused more on the bottom-line (making profit) and traded away
their social and environmental responsibility, while some have devalued good
ethical behaviour for wealth. This article evaluates leadership and governance issues in relation the Titanic.
GOVERNANCE
A few Governance issues that led to the end of The Titanic were;
- The regulations of the shipping industry (Board of Trade): The minimum requirements for lifeboats aboard a vessel; The British Board of Trade required all vessels (ships) over 10,000 metric tons carry a minimum of 16 lifeboats. The Titanic had twenty lifeboats aboard, exceeding the requirement by four devices. However, the Titanic’s total mass was over 40,000 metrics tons (64), considerably more than the classification criteria. The British Board of Trade had not updated the lifeboat requirements in over twenty years.
- Staff Training and Development: Although there was potentially enough capacity for 1,178 people, only 705 were saved. Almost 500 empty seats were left unused on the launched lifeboats. This was partially due to the lack of training of staff with evacuation procedures. No official drill was ever conducted during the voyage and only one had been completed prior to launching, when somr of the staffs were absent. Moral: It’s important that organisation engage their staff in proper learning, training and development to avoid hazardous mistakes in future due to lack of .
.
RESPONSIBILITY
Responsibility - the defined task of an individual, a duty or
obligation is a key role of leadership. Irresponsible
would be the proper term for the actions exhibited by some of the wireless
operators.As passengers were charged for sending
and receiving of messages and were also generous with the tips, so were the wireless
operators very keen to handle as many passenger messages as possible.
The Californian,(which was also on the Atlantic ocean that night) stopped for the night due to the threat of icebergs, had attempted to warn the Titanic that there was ice ahead but was told by the Titanic operator to let be allowed to concentrate on sending passengers’ messages. The Californian's operator reacted by turning off its wireless and going to bed. Later in the night the Californian’s officers saw distress signals in the distance and informed their captain who after some debate decided to take no action, not even to wake the wireless operator (Rayment & Jonathan, 2011). At the time of the sinking, Titanic sent distress call for rescue, the Carpathian was the one who got the message and decided to respond but it took them 2 hour to get to the Titanic. This would have not being the case if the wireless signals of the Californian was not turned off, as they were only 19NM (nautical miles) from the Titanic and the Carpathian who responded was 56 NM.
The Neglect of duty has cost many organisation great loss; mostly financially; but in the case of the Titanic lives were lost. It is therefore important that every individual in the organisation knows and understands their duty and ensure the feedback is being sent to a superior to ensure proper accountability for individuals’ actions. The operators were key stake holders in the Titanic, they were responsible for receiving and sending information, this type of responsibility is crucial and proper attention and supervision should have being kept on the, by a superior (the captain of the ship)
STAKEHOLDER
The investigators discovered that
the Titanic had sufficient lifeboat capacity for all the first class
passengers, but not for their other two classes. In fact, most third class or
steerage passengers had no idea where the lifeboats were. It is very important
in business to recognise that all your stakeholders count, especially if you the organisation deals with life (airline, manufacturing industries, food etc). Every
organisation has to be aware of its moral and ethical side of the business to
avoid corruption and loss of life.
“On average, each lifeboat could take up to 68 people. In total they could accommodate 1,178 people, almost half the amount of people on the Titanic. The shortage of lifeboats was not because of lack of space, neither was that of cost consideration, rather, the White Star Line Company preferred to have the deck with grand views of the sea, which would have been blocked by installing more lifeboats” (Fu-Lai Tony Yu, 2012).
The case of Titanic is one that reveals the need for good leadership and governance in terms of ‘responsibility’ and a sense of stakeholder awareness. Stakeholder theory must answer two important question ‘What is the purpose of the firm?’ and ‘What responsibility does management have to stakeholders?’ (Maak & pless, 2006).
It
is much needed that in all organisations when it comes to; ethics, transparency
and accountability, there must be constant review of rules, regulations and
standards to ensure professionalism, excellence and the security of lives and
properties.
Remi Ademiju
BIZLEAD
writer
07456958256
@remiademiju
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