De beers group, formerly known as Anglo American plc, is a worldwide leading company with expertise in exploring Diamond, mining, grading, marketing, and retail. The de beers group has thrived through various join members and is a source of employment for more than twenty thousand people across the diamond pipeline. The company has captured a considerable market share worldwide by designing beautiful diamonds and jewelry, bringing joy and meaning to diamond lovers. The company demonstrates various attributes in its operations that propel the growth and development of the organization. De beers group has created a more inclusive culture by motivating and supporting a diversity of experiences and thoughts by conducting unconscious bias training and mutual mentoring programs led by the executive. However, significant market economic downturns mark the company’s main issue. This report documents the critical components of a learning organization through assessing the De Beer group.
System Context of De Beer Group
The system context of de beer group has enabled the company to lead the way across every engagement of the diamond pipeline, right from exploration to mining, retail, and research. The worldwide dominating diamond firm is owned eighty-five percent by Anglo Americans and fifteen percent by the government of Botswana (De Beers Company). The company workforce gets powered by more than twenty thousand employees working in twenty-eight countries worldwide. The employees dominate, more specifically in countries from which the company recovers diamonds, such as Botswana, Namibia, South Africa, and Canada. Despite demographic differences, the company’s workforce all work towards a similar purpose: to make life brilliant.
De Beer group’s system context reveals its capacity to engage in almost every part of the diamond pipeline. The upstream, downstream, and midstream operations improve the company’s innovative culture, which is essential for extending further beyond the traditional channel. The mining in Botswana under Debswana identity is characterized by sharing fifty-fifty joint partnerships with the Botswana community. The company works in a fifty-fifty joint partnership with Namibian people under Namdeb identity in Namibia.
The company sells ninety percent of overall rough diamond holdings to Sight holders and accredited buyers (De beers Group). These buyers represent the contracted category of royal diamond buyers. The remaining ten percent get auctioned to the online community where the company is the world leader. The system context involves engagements of industrial services whereby the company provides the grading, education, and technology to the diamond industry. Since diamonds come as beautiful, rare, and responsibly sourced, consumers go for a forever mark. Other consumers go for De Beer Jewellery because the company designs the world’s finest diamond.
Description of the Learning Process
The diamond dialogue got launched in 2007 on a roundtable session with various stakeholders both within and beyond the industry to discuss vital issues faced by the company. Such sessions are often intended to provide a chance for open and constructive dialogue across the de beer group business, the civil society, and academia for mutual learning and searching for collaborative solutions. Throughout the years, the De beer group’s dialogue on diamonds has provided a unique ground to engage on emerging and sensitive issues in a conducive environment.
The company’s learning process often uses the forever four central pillars. They form the foundation for a better future that is fairer, healthier, safer, and cleaner. The decisions made in the company gets shaped by these pillars, and the strategies enacted fulfill the core four pillars (Bergenstock and Maskulka). The building forever shapes De beers operations, decisions, and behaviors and is built through the four pillars. It enables the company to stay committed to creating positive and long-term impacts that will persist well even further beyond the discovery of the company’s last diamond. Through the four pillars, de beer group strives to provide protection to the natural world, ensure healthy partnerships to further thrive communities, and accelerate equal chances. The four pillars also shape the company on deciding and realigning to the best ethical conduct. The fourth pillar reveals the best practices that lead to ethical behavior across the industry.
What was the issue?
The emerging issue was known as blood diamonds or conflicts in diamonds because illegal trades were executed. The money funded conflicts in areas torn by war in Africa, specifically in central and western Africa (Billon and Antipode). This report was affirmed by the world diamond council, an organization representing the commercial trade of diamonds. The description of conflict diamonds by the United Nations hinted about the diamonds whose origin was from African regions controlled by militia forces. The reason allegations of conflict diamonds were used to fund conflicts is because the militia forces in Africa illegally traded and could get some good finance to support military actions against their respective globally recognized countries. The estimates of civil war in Sierra Leone under conflict diamond represented four percent of the world’s production of diamond.
How did Leaders Manage Dialogue?
The Kimberly process involved the world diamond council, which represented the industry, the United Nations, the governments of seventy-four engaged in the diamond system context, the European Union, and several interest groups like a global witness. This process commenced when diamond-producing states in southern Africa met in Kimberley for dialogue. The meeting agenda discussed stopping illegal trades in blood diamonds and passing legislation that ensured that diamonds’ purchases were not funding violence.
The leaders managed the dialogue by recognizing the serious concerns about the direct connection between armed conflicts and the trade of rough diamonds (De Beers Group). The leaders also recognized that the activities of those funded militias targeted to undermine the legitimacy of recognized governments. The general process in Kimberly identified the issue. It confirmed to keep providing necessary and robust support for the Kimberly process and the associated certified schemes whose objective was to end the illegal trade of blood diamonds which fueled civil war in central and western Africa.
What Key Stake Holders were Involved, and what strategies were involved to ensure socially responsible decisions?
The key stakeholders in the Kimberly process included the United Nations, the world diamond council, which represented the diamond industry like the De Beers group. In addition, the European Union, the governments of seventy-four countries involved in diamond production, and various interest groups like global witnesses participated in the Kimberley process (United Nations). The stakeholders contributed to this dialogue by discussing ways to end the connection between conflicts in Africa with illegal trade of diamonds.
These world key stakeholders developed the certification scheme for the Kimberly process by requiring all members to certify that all exports of rough diamond are produced via legalized and responsible sales and mining, which are free from violence and conflicts connections. The assembly passed legislation that authorized all shipments to carry a certificate capturing the details about the origin of diamonds and how the mining was conducted, parties involved, the location of actual cutting and polished and ultimate destination. These legislations ensured that the diamond trade was only limited to stakeholders of the Kimberly Process.
Which Key Learning Elements Did The Company Demonstrate?
In my opinion, the company addressed and recognized the issue of blood diamonds in Africa and demonstrated concerns about the safety of all communities involved. De beer group has been shown passion about diamonds and where they originated. The company believes in the responsibility of protecting the natural world and ensuring that diamonds give back to the communities where they are recovered. The leaders demonstrated their capacity to pioneer potential solutions that provide diamonds sourced responsibly and ethically. These actions drive positive change in the whole diamond industry and promise the company’s future growth and development. The leaders also committed to building a forever strategy that lays an integrated approach for building a better future for the people and the entire world.
What are the Learning Values and Principles of the De Beer Organization?
The organization’s vision shapes the ultimate values practices executed by the company. The vision statement, which focuses on turning diamond dreams into lasting reality for the benefit of stakeholders and customers, was satisfied through their engagement in establishing the certified scheme for the Kimberly process (De Beers Group). This move demonstrated organizational effort to ensure safety and shape the future of all stakeholders. The organization also cares for the communities where the diamonds get mined, and thus they cut off illegal diamonds trades. The organization is also passionate about maintaining the consistent production of diamond jewelry while upholding compliance to human rights through ensuring responsible mining.
The organization did well to recognize the security issues affecting the communities where diamonds were mined, cut, and polished. The resolutions, which were among the four pillars of consensus adopted on various diamond-related matters, noted the satisfaction of the assembly that the implementation of the Kimberly process will have continued positive impacts on reducing the chances for diamonds to play a role in fueling armed conflicts. Another effect is that the Kimberly process’s implementation protects the diamond trade’s legitimacy. The company is aware that the solutions raised will contribute to building the company’s reputation because diamond smuggling and illegal diamonds have ended in members of Kimberly’s process.
Key Recommendations
The company should build trust with stakeholders by involving in the legitimate diamond business. The company should also strengthen its faith in the community by advocating and ensuring safe and responsible mining. The company should also be committed to implementing the best practice program (De Beers Group). This program will ensure that the De beers group is trusted to be free from conflicts and regain a reputation of compliance with the international framework of human rights. The company should also demonstrate care for all diamond stakeholders. These efforts should apply throughout the company’s value chain from diamond exploration to retail. The company’s business units, clients, and contractors must provide self-evaluation against every relevant standard.
Work Cited
Bergenstock, Donna J., and James M. Maskulka. “The de beers story: are diamonds forever?.” Business Horizons 44.3 (2001): 37-44.
De Beer Company. De Beers Group, www.debeersgroup.com/~/media/Files/D/De-Beers-Group/documents/reports/library/2019/BPP-Requirements-2019.pdf.
De Beers Group. “Best Practice Principles Assurance Programme.” De Beers Group, www.debeersgroup.com/sustainability-and-ethics/leading-ethical-practices-across-the-industry/best-practice-principles-assurance-programme.
Le Billon, Philippe. “Fatal transactions: Conflict diamonds and the (anti) terrorist consumer.” Antipode 38.4 (2006): 778-801.
United Nations. “General Assembly Reaffirms Strong, Ongoing Support for Kimberley Process Targeting Global Trade-in ‘Blood Diamonds’, by One of Four Resolutions.” Welcome to the United Nations, www.un.org/press/en/2010/ga11039.doc.htm.
write