Ethics in the digital workplace
Digitisation and automation technologies, including artificial intelligence (AI), can affect working conditions in a variety of ways and their use in the workplace raises a host of new ethical concerns.
The German chemical giant BASF has announced 6,000 job cuts worldwide, including 3,000 in Germany. The job cuts represent about 6% of the workforce. The group wants to reorganise in order to 'create the conditions for greater proximity to customers, increased competitiveness and more profitable growth'. Administration, services, and operations divisions will be affected by the cuts. The headquarter in Ludwigshaffen will be heavily affected as the group will centralise its purchasing, human resources, finance and logistics.
In addition to the cuts, BASF also plans to make 29,000 jobs more flexible through the deployment of engineers, digital experts and other employees to different sites or business units when needed. One of the central elements in the new corporate structure will be a Corporate Centre with fewer than 1,000 employees. It will support the Executive Board in managing the company and assuming central tasks in areas such as strategy development, finance, legal affairs, human resources and communications. A new unit called 'Global Business Services' is to be created, a worldwide network of around 8,000 employees that will provide services for the individual divisions.
The group employs 122,000 people worldwide.
Eurofound (2019), BASF, Internal restructuring in World, factsheet number 98074, European Restructuring Monitor. Dublin, https://restructuringeventsprod.azurewebsites.net/restructuring-events/detail/98074.