People Management & Development in Business – Paper 3 (DUBAI)
SEEN CASE STUDY
Overleaf pp2-7
· carries 50% of the module assessment weighting and
· is scheduled for the JULY Examination period for January Start students in July 2021,
· is based on a seen case study to be released 3 weeks prior to the Examination Date
· is ‘open book’ i.e. approved resources will be available for use during the Exam
· 2.5 hrs duration ….PLUS 50% EXTRA TIME = TOTAL 3 ¾ to allow download of question paper beforehand and upload of completed answer paper to Turnitin
· with unseen questions.
The Learning Outcomes to be demonstrated via this paper were validated as:
1.Compare and contrast major contemporary research debates in the fields of people management and development and business;
2. Critically evaluate the changing employment and learning landscapes and their influence on people management and development and business;
3. Critically evaluate the strategic implications for leadership, people management and development in an ever changing competitive and market environment;
4. Apply a critical, reflective and integrated understanding of people management and development within a context of business sustainability, corporate social responsibility and authenticity.
5. Formulate cogent arguments of what it means to deliver organisational performance and growth through people as well as the practical constraints and difficulties in meeting multiple aims
7
Case Study Source 1
The British Broadcasting Company, as the BBC was originally called, was formed on 18 October 1922 by a group of leading wireless manufacturers including Marconi.[footnoteRef:1] [1: https://www.bbc.com/historyofthebbc/timelines/1920s#:~:text=The%20British%20Broadcasting%20Company%2C%20as,%2C%20on%20November%2014%2C%201922. ]
The BBC is a public service broadcaster established by Royal Charter. It’s funded by the licence fee paid by UK households. It provides ten national TV channels, regional TV programmes, an internet TV service (BBC Three), 10 national radio stations, 40 local radio stations and an extensive website. “Our mission is to act in the public interest, serving all audiences through the provision of impartial, high-quality and distinctive output and services which inform, educate and entertain. Our vision? To be the most creative organisation in the world.”[footnoteRef:2] [2: https://www.bbc.com/academy-guides/what-do-i-need-to-know-about-the-bbc ]
On the 14th May 2021, the Right Honourable Lord Dyson published a report (‘The Dyson Investigation’). The Executive Summary is copied here below[footnoteRef:3]: It is followed by an article in The Financial Times newspaper on 21stMay 2021. [3: http://downloads.bbc.co.uk/aboutthebbc/reports/reports/dyson-report-20-may-21.pdf ]
Executive Summary of the Report of The Right Honourable Lord Dyson
The interview with HRH Diana, Princess of Wales that was (shown on television) on 20 November 1995 was a sensational triumph for the BBC and Martin Bashir, both nationally and internationally. Whatever reservations she may have had about it later, Princess Diana was pleased with the interview at the time. By early to mid-August 1995 at the latest, she was keen on the idea of a television interview. She would probably have agreed to be interviewed by any experienced and reputable reporter in whom she had confidence even without the intervention of Mr Bashir.
In this Report, I describe in considerable detail the way in which Mr Bashir commissioned fake bank statements from Matt Wiessler. These documents purported to show payments by Penfolds Consultants and News International into the bank account of Alan Waller, a former employee of Earl Spencer, Princess Diana’s brother. Mr Bashir showed the documents to Earl Spencer on a date early in September 1995. Mr Wiessler is an entirely reputable graphic designer who did freelance work for the BBC. Nobody has criticised him for accepting the commission.
A few days later, probably on 14 September, Mr Bashir also produced to Earl Spencer other bank statements which, he (Bashir) said, showed payments into the account of Commander Patrick Jephson (Princess Diana’s Private Secretary) and Commander Richard Aylard (the Prince of Wales’ Private Secretary). It is likely that these statements were created by Mr Bashir and contained information that he had fabricated.
By showing Earl Spencer the fake Waller and Jephson/Aylard statements and informing him of their contents, Mr Bashir deceived and induced him to arrange a meeting with Princess Diana. By gaining access to Princess Diana in this way, Mr Bashir was able to persuade her to agree to give the 3 interview. This behaviour was in serious breach of the 1993 edition of the BBC’s Producer Guidelines on straight dealing.
On seeing the interview on screen, Mr Wiessler immediately made the connection between the Waller bank statements and the interview. He was concerned that he might have played a role in obtaining the interview by deception.
Acting responsibly and appropriately, he (Mr Wiessler) reported his concerns to the BBC. A detailed account of how the BBC responded is set out (in the full report). The matter was eventually referred to Tim Gardam (Head of Weekly Programmes in BBC News and Current Affairs). Mr Gardam’s investigation culminated in a meeting between himself (and two other senior BBC persons) and Mr Bashir. Mr Bashir gave them an account of the faking of the documents. Crucially, he told them that he had not shown them to anyone. They accepted that he was telling them the truth, but asked him to provide independent evidence that Princess Diana had not been shown the documents. Within a few hours, Mr Bashir obtained a note dated 22 December 1995, signed by her (Princess Diana) which supported what he had said. I (Lord Dyson) am satisfied that the Diana note is a genuine document.
Mr Gardam did not then know that Mr Bashir had lied when he said that he had not shown the documents to anyone and did not know that he had in fact shown them to Earl Spencer in September 1995. Mr Bashir was to repeat this lie twice in March 1996. It was only on 23 March 1996 that Mr Bashir admitted that he had lied.
Mr Gardam did not consider the possibility that Mr Bashir secured the interview with Princess Diana indirectly by showing the documents to Earl Spencer. In the light of what he (Mr Gardam) knew at the time (and in particular the Diana note), I (Lord Dyson) do not consider that it would be reasonable to criticise Mr Gardam for failing to ask Earl Spencer for his version of the facts. But Mr Gardam too readily accepted that Mr Bashir was telling the truth about the fake documents.
There were rumours in early 1996 that something had been amiss (i.e. wrong) about the interview. The Mail on Sunday took the lead in carrying out further investigations which led to Mr Bashir admitting to Mr Gardam that he had shown the fake Waller statements to Earl Spencer. The BBC now decided that it must find out the entire truth behind Mr Bashir’s activities.
Mr Bashir was interviewed by Tim Suter (Managing Director of Weekly Programmes in BBC News and Current Affairs) and Richard Peel (Head of Communications and Information) on 28 March 1996. The conclusions that were reached after this meeting were expressed in a letter to Mr Bashir dated 4 April 1996, which was drafted by Mr Suter and agreed by Tony Hall (now Lord Hall, then Managing Director of News and Current Affairs at the BBC) but probably not sent. One of their conclusions was that Mr Bashir’s dealings with Princess Diana in securing the interview were absolutely straight and fair; but that his use of some material in the early preparation of the programme was in breach of the BBC Producers’ Guidelines on straight dealing and justified a reprimand.
This conclusion was not justified, even on an interim basis. It was based in large part on the uncorroborated assertions of Mr Bashir. This error was compounded by their failure to approach Earl Spencer once they knew that Mr Bashir had shown the Waller statements to him.
In early April 1996, the press continued to ask searching questions about the methods used by Mr Bashir to secure the interview. The BBC gave evasive answers to these questions. On 7 April 1996, The Mail on Sunday published an article which asked whether Mr Bashir had intended to show the fake Waller statements to Earl Spencer and thereby convince him that he (Mr Bashir) was the right person to interview Princess Diana.
Suggestions by the press that the Princess Diana interview had been secured by deception persisted. Lord Hall recognised that it was important for the BBC to conduct a full inquiry into what Mr Bashir had done and why he had done it and to resolve the matter once and for all. To that end, he arranged to meet Mr Bashir together with Anne Sloman (successor to Mr Gardam). The meeting took place on 17 April 1996. Mr Bashir was unable or unwilling to give Lord Hall and Mrs Sloman any credible explanation of why he had commissioned the faking of the Waller statements and why he had shown them to Earl Spencer. 5 They did not approach Earl Spencer to ask him for his version of what had happened. They accepted the account that Mr Bashir gave them as truthful.
The investigation conducted by Lord Hall and Mrs Sloman was woefully ineffective for the following reasons:
(i) they failed to interview Earl Spencer: this was a big mistake and the points they (and Lord Birt, the former Director-General) have made to justify their not doing so are rejected;
(ii) they did not scrutinise Mr Bashir’s account with the necessary degree of scepticism and caution: they knew he had lied three times when he said that he had not shown the fake statements to Earl Spencer (these were serious lies for which he gave no explanation); they knew that he been unable to provide any credible explanation of why he had commissioned the fake statements (which was a serious breach of the BBC’s Producers’ Guidelines on straight dealing); and they knew that Mr Bashir’s account of what happened was largely uncorroborated; and
(iii) without knowing Earl Spencer’s version of the facts; without receiving from Mr Bashir a credible explanation of what he had done and why he had done it; and in the light of his serious and unexplained lies, Lord Hall could not reasonably have concluded, as he did, that Mr Bashir was an honest and honourable man.
Without justification, the BBC fell short of the high standards of integrity and transparency which are its hallmark by (i) covering up in its press logs (records) such facts as it had been able to establish about how Mr Bashir secured the interview and (ii) failing to mention Mr Bashir’s activities or the BBC investigations of them on any news programme.
End of Case Study Source 1 – Case Study Source 2 is on the next page Case Study Source 2
Diana interview inquiry sparks fresh crisis of trust for the BBC
Reporter Martin Bashir’s web of deceit and the cover up that followed has given ammunition to broadcaster’s enemies
The Financial Times, Alex Barker and Patricia Nilsson , 21st May 2021
Source: https://www.ft.com/content/ead2be61-d450-49ad-b853-705101df1f9d
Diana, Princess of Wales plunged the BBC into crisis even before her Panorama interview was aired, the lies and forged documents behind it were exposed, and the UK broadcaster was dragged, 25 years later, into yet another scandal over editorial standards and a cover-up culture.
Recorded on Guy Fawkes day in 1995 and secretly edited in an Eastbourne hotel, the super-scoop by the journalist Martin Bashir was, from its inception, understood to be a historic gamble for a public corporation whose existence depends on a royal charter, and the consent of licence fee payers and the government.
So sensitive was the decision that Lord John Birt, the director-general at the time, kept his own chair Marmaduke Hussey, an arch monarchist, in the dark until Diana had described her “crowded” marriage on tape. Birt faced calls for his resignation before 23m viewers had even tuned in to watch it. “I had the chilling sense that a few centuries earlier my head would literally have rolled for the crime committed,” he wrote in his memoirs.
His reasons for approving the interview — the need to move with audience demands in what Birt saw as a more democratic age — cut to the heart of the repercussions for the BBC today: the threat of losing audience support.
“Modern institutions in the end have to operate as the public would wish — and we did,” Birt told Robert Fellowes, the Queen’s then private secretary. “And they have no choice any longer but to be completely transparent. There are no long-lasting secrets at the BBC.”
A quarter century on, that proved true. An official inquiry finally laid bare Bashir’s web of deceit in securing the interview and the cover-up that followed, leaving the BBC facing a firestorm of criticism from Diana’s sons and ministers. Oliver Dowden, culture secretary, remarked on the “damning failings” potentially requiring a rethink of governance.
Dame Melanie Dawes, chief executive of media watchdog Ofcom, said Dyson’s report raised “important questions about the BBC’s transparency and accountability”. She added that the regulator would be discussing with the BBC “what further actions may be needed to ensure that this situation can never be repeated”.
Bashir resigned from the BBC last week on grounds of ill health and on Friday Tim Suter, a former BBC News executive who was involved in the original in-house investigation, stepped down from the Ofcom board.
The episode has left the BBC scrambling to retain the confidence of the public — who have watched the heir to the throne Prince William accuse it of betraying his parents and fuelling his mother’s “fear, paranoia and isolation”.
It leaves a dangerously open flank for the BBC’s enemies in Westminster and “Fleet Street”.
“In one sense, it’s 25 years ago and the BBC is a completely different place — it is already much more overseen by outside bodies, it has much less revenue — so the notion that the BBC is the same place as 25 years ago is wrong,” said Jean Seaton, the official BBC historian. “But it does undoubtedly give parts of the government — if they fail to see the importance of the BBC for the future — a case that moves the British public.”
The failings uncovered from 1995, and the “woefully ineffective” investigation that followed, are devastating — and have prompted apologies from all involved. The misconduct does not have the industrial scale of the UK’s tabloid phone hacking scandal, nor a chain of responsibility leading to individuals still serving at the top of the BBC’s news organisation.
But there is no doubt about the deep questions it raises for the BBC, which until last year was run by Lord Tony Hall, who led one of the most heavily criticised investigations into Bashir’s conduct in 1996. Despite being aware of the use of faked documents, he found him to be “honest and honourable” and, later as director-general, blessed Bashir’s return to the BBC in a senior reporting position.
“In most organisations they would have called the police and instantly dismissed Bashir for deceit,” said Mark Stephens, a prominent media lawyer at Howard Kennedy. “Instead the BBC made him their religious correspondent.” One former BBC executive of that era said: “The euphoria of landing the scoop of the century just blinded them.”
Hall’s departure last year means he is fighting an uphill battle to keep his job as chair of the National Gallery, rather than at the head of the BBC. One government insider noted his next meeting with the gallery’s patron — Prince Charles — might be “quite difficult”.
Rather than the leadership, the immediate threat to Tim Davie and the BBC he took charge of last June is more political and financial.
Since his appointment as Hall’s successor, Davie has smoothed relations with Boris Johnson’s Number 10, in part by embracing its priorities: pride in flags and impartiality in news coverage. The Bashir scandal may reawaken the debate about metropolitan bias, embolden critics, and potentially prompt the government to take a more aggressive approach.
Dowden is satisfied the overall structure of the BBC — with a revamped board and direct oversight by the media regulator Ofcom — has reduced the risks of another Bashir incident. But he is open to ideas for reform in the BBC’s upcoming mid-charter review.
Lord Michael Grade, the former BBC chair, suggested creating a new editorial board for journalistic standards, saying “platitudes” would not cut it this time. Johnson, prime minister, notably said on Friday it was “up to the BBC” to ensure nothing like the Bashir scandal happened again.
There are potentially financial repercussions too. Lawyers expect the BBC to face significant compensation claims from victims, who include members of the royal household who lost their jobs as a result of made-up allegations of spying on Diana.
Davie is also locked in negotiations with the government over the level of the licence fee, making the case for a bigger BBC budget over the next five years. Given it is essentially a plea for more taxpayer generosity, the timing of the Bashir scandal could hardly be worse.
“Of course this is a stick that critics of the BBC will use to beat it with,” said Pat Younge, a former BBC executive who chairs the British Broadcasting Challenge, a campaign group pressuring the government over its review of public service media. “And the BBC is also a world leader in beating itself up at times like this.”
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