Panel 4 - Risk and Resilience in the Digital

Speakers:

Cecilia Yu (PGR, Warwick Business School)

Sheila Sakkyananda (PGT, Warwick Business School)

Mengxuan Zhang (PGT, Centre for Interdisciplinary Methodologies)

Yifan Wu (PGR, Warwick Manufacturing Group)

Chair:

Abdullah Safir (PGT, Centre for Interdisciplinary Methodologies)

A multidisciplinary approach about Sustainability and Cultural impact on the current Climate Crisis via New Media

Cecilia Yu (PGR, Warwick Business School)

Keywords: Sustainability, Art, Culture, Cultural Heritage, Tangible Intangible, United Nations Sustainable Development Goals, Climate & other Crisis, UN SDG implmentation Strategies

Geo-political conflicts and Anthropogenic Crisis created a Global Macro drive to transition towards renewable energy and implement UN SDGs. Within tense geo-political situations where Management of communications are vital to the decisions that enable survival of human life and all lives on the Anthropocene, I noticed ICH was used as a resource via New Media, by Top leaders and negotiators at High level FCEs, in a comparatively different way to individuals at the grassroot trying to use ICH to seek help in crisis. As a “temporal insider”, I collated and studied the different ways c-suite equivalent leaders of organisation used ICH and referenced ICH for SDGs implementation at FCEs. In contrast, I documented the ways grassroot groups of self-organised civil society NGOs, caught in existential conflicts and climate crisis, used ICH in different ways to those in leaderships. Many NGOs referenced ICH as a resource to explain the plight of their “at risk” stakeholders. Based on the data collated there is Asymmetry in communications and discourse in crisis context, even when the two study groups are using the same referential ICHs. My research will contribute to the Sustainability SDG implementation process and will lead to more effective and inclusive actionable strategies in crisis management; especially when implementing SDGs strategies from “super-macro” (UN, WEF, NATO) to “micro-micro” organisational (e.g., National funders servicing new creative SMEs) delivery of solutions during global crisis (like Climate Change, Global Pandemic and/or Extreme Conflicts). The contribution to theory is that a “living culture”, can ascribe usage not envisaged by the marketisation principle underlying New media and Commercial Arts/Designs. Applied as a multi-disciplinary intervention, an ICH framework may enhance Trust building in conflict, or at least, contribute to disarm polarity caused by propaganda (via new media) and the spread of disinformation during global crisis, away from “Greenwash”.

Hierarchical clustering of MSMEs to reduce risk in high Non-Performing Loans

Sheila Sakkyananda (PGT, Warwick Business School)

Keywords: MSMEs, CGSs, Risk, Clustering

SME credit markets are often seen as risky sectors, with their high Non-performing Loan (NPL) due to fewer assets and less credit history. As the last risk resource that addresses these imperfections, PT Jamkrindo exists as one of the Indonesia Government interventions in CGSs to increase financing facilities for MSMEs. Thus, PT Jamkrindo must have the financial stability to guarantee MSME's credit adequately. The research will focus on the working capital loan guarantee business performance for the government's National Economic Recovery program. In the concept of the clustering method, I plan to organize a set of data from Jamkrindo's database into some groups of MSMEs with similar characteristics and compare them with those from a different group for the risk analysis. Credit risk measurement will rely on appropriate quantitative and qualitative variables; profitability, leverage, liquidity, capital, and percentage of enterprises that provide training. This research proposes to generate an MSMEs cluster using R Studio for hierarchical clustering, where the MSMEs will be organized into three major groups according to those variables. This research will begin with a comparative analysis of the dendrogram obtained by Euclidian distance based on their similarity. If two MSMEs are close, their business performance is similar; if they are not, their business performance is entirely different. The following step plots the distribution of factors for each MSME of the three major groups to identify each cluster based on their risk level, low risk, intermediate-risk, and high risk. I aim to recommend that the company assess MSMEs' risks through cluster analysis to provide a basis for the company before guarantee decision-making based on MSME's risk level and determine the guarantee fee (higher risk, higher guarantee fee) to maintain its financial stability.

Humans as Infrastructure: A Case Study of Meituan Delivery Riders During the Pandemic Era

Mengxuan Zhang (PGT, Centre for Interdisciplinary Methodologies)

Keywords: delivery, algorithms, platform economy, gig worker

Facing booming demand in China’s delivery industry in the pandemic era, Meituan delivery riders are even in a more precarious situation. As the ‘self-employed’ workers who are supposed to be flexible, Meituan labour put themselves in an ‘unfree’ work environment initiatively. Combined with the Meituan delivery riders’ statistical reports, this essay explores Meituan’s delivery riders’ circumstances in the post-pandemic world. From the standpoints of the platform, country and subject (as carriers), this study intends to shed new light on Meituan delivery riders’ exploited condition explorations. This essay demonstrates Meituan’s platform, as the primary contributor, physically and emotionally exploits delivery riders through its algorithmic control and ‘soul’ management. Chinese government shapes delivery riders’ ideology to engage in their jobs by empowering a grand meaning and ‘connives’ through platform capitalism development due to the lack of legal protection. Meituan delivery riders, as alienated items of ‘infrastructure’, are vulnerable workers who need any job they can obtain. Although platform capitalism contributes directly to the precarity of Meituan’s delivery riders, the underlying cause for it is the inequality of resources in a rigid social system. As persons with limited social resources, delivery riders have attempted to improve their conditions by moving to cities that offer higher earning potential. However, pursuing a dream is more difficult for them. In the blank space where the workers have lost their voice, the power of the state and capital continues to expand. In this way, a possible meaning of this study is to act as the ‘speaker’ for Meituan’s delivery labours’ in the new lens of the pandemic era.

The impact of Digital servitization on employee well being and productivity in manufacturing sector: A microfoundational perspective

Yifan Wu (PGR, Warwick Manufacturing Group)

Keywords: Digitalization, servitization, manufacturing sector, employee well being, productivity

Manufacturing companies are facing challenges, especially in the post-pandamic era. Lower profit margins and more intense competition have forced many companies to transform. The term “Servitization” means the transformation of product-based firms to create competitive advantages through providing services. Adoption of digital technologies can eliminate productivity risks from increased service offerings and provides opportunities for product service systems innovation. Based on the heterogeneity of resources between firms, different digital servitized business models have emerged. Many scholars claim that digital servitization are profitable for the organization. However, few studies pay attention to the impact of digital servitization at the micro-foundation level. In fact, to the individual the changes are huge and the impact is complex. Digital technologies has changed the specific approach and content of work, which requires employees to adapt to the fast pace of work, but also requires their digital capability. The service-oriented business model have different organizational value creation logic and different supply chain relationship model. This research will investigate the changes of job characteristics in the individual level and the consequent effect on employee well-being. Based on The Job Demands-Resources Model. It is a practical tools developed in the field of Managerial psychology. This research would apply pseudo-experimental research design. Using a psychological scale based on The Job Demands-Resources Model, employees from two groups of companies were surveyed with digital servitization as the independent variable. Quantitative analysis would be carried out based on the survey results. The results of the research can help to understand the micro-influence of digital servitization and guide the human resource management of enterprises to achieve excellent social sustainability.