Gap Analysis: Telecommunications Industry

The telecommunications industry and other United States manufacturing sectors have been severely challenged by continuously competitive market place. The future of telecommunication and the manufacturing of goods is truly at risk. With consumers demanding more for less, high infrastructure costs and outsourcing most can barely keep up. Deregulation, digitalization of services have made telecommunications one of the most volatile growth industries in history and one of the more extraordinarily competitive.

The inspiration of outsourcing has been a round for years but there are many challenges that still remain. Competitive pressures, increasingly rapid pace of technology, dwindling product life cycles and stockholder concerns have forced more companies to streamline operations globally. On the contrary, union workers struggle to keep pace with a changing mark place that strongly supports outsourcing. This phenomenon has led to many issues within manufacturing for United States (US) organizations including but not limited to massive job loss. (Neblett 2004)

While many manufacturers have reduced the quantity of jobs, many are also turning to unconventional measures as a means to preserve as many jobs as possible. Some organizations are reducing the benefits of worker while others are delaying salary increases and decreasing hours. When business does recover these moves can lead to a substantial pay off. Behlen Manufacturing Co., a metal fabricator, avoided massive downsizing by reducing factory worker’s hours and solicited salaried employees to take a 10% pay cut, The Wall Street Journal recently reported. When orders increased late last year, the firm was able to restore hours and wage levels, and moved to meet the demand with its experienced workforce undamaged. When the economy does revitalize, companies that have eliminated a generous quantities of laborers may be unable to respond quickly enough to meet the over-whelming demand, consequently leading to lost sales and decreased market share. If possible, the job eliminations should be avoided; however the layoff is not the only area of concern. As noted by John Di Frances, a Wales, WI-based management consultant, substantial layoffs carry concealed costs that are never fully known. Declining morale and disrupted customer relations among those costs frustrate the remaining employees who often can not absorb the responsibilities of their departed coworkers. The result is that workers create short cuts wherever possible contributing to more quality complaints and product robustness concerns (Iversen 2005).

Through beliefs and values a code of ethics forms the building blocks of organizational behavior with an organization.