MGMT3102 Business and its Social Stakeholders

How MGMT3102 is assessed

All five weights come from the Semester 2, 2026 class summary on the ANU Programs and Courses website and total 100%; the Week 1 seminar slides list the same five weights. The presentation brief sets a limit of 10 minutes plus questions, while the class summary describes an 8 to 10 minute presentation, so follow the timing announced on Canvas.

Current MGMT3102 dates

Dates are as published in the Semester 2, 2026 class summary and the assessment briefs. Confirm exact deadlines and submission settings in the live LMS.

What MGMT3102 covers

Thirteen chapters follow the seminar weeks, from the purpose of business through stakeholder diagnosis to the decisions made in the simulation.

You learn to identify stakeholders with tests for inclusion, to explain why some claims command managerial attention through Mitchell, Agle and Wood's attributes of power, legitimacy and urgency, to read the goodwill that relationships carry as social capital, and to trace how procedural fairness and contact quality build the trust behind a social licence to operate.

The Week 4 group presentation applies that kit to a real, recent controversy.

Weeks 5 and 6 widen the frame. A guest seminar on Indigenous stakeholders examines Reconciliation Action Plans and asks whether they produce reconciliation or reputation.

A seminar on regulation sets out the tools government uses when prohibition alone does not change outcomes, with Australia's employer-level gender pay gap disclosure as the test case for whether transparency leads to accountability.

From Week 7 the course becomes a simulation.

In teams you act as senior ethics and responsibility officers in a fictional company, K-Tai, choosing among decision options over five simulated years with a Stakeholder Decision Framework, while seminars add ethical culture and leadership, B Corp certification and shareholder resolutions.

The final exam, held in the examination period, asks you to integrate the concepts in a case analysis: diagnose the relationships, apply the frameworks, recommend a sustainable strategy and communicate it clearly.

Worked example · free

Classifying three stakeholders by power, legitimacy and urgency

Key terms

Stakeholder

In Freeman's broad definition, anyone, individual or group, whose actions can shape an organisation's objectives or who feels the effects of pursuing them.

Stakeholder salience

How far managers put one stakeholder's claim ahead of the competing claims of others.

Power

A stakeholder's ability to impose its will on the firm through coercive, material or symbolic resources.

Legitimacy

A generalised perception that a claim is desirable, proper or appropriate within a socially constructed system of norms and values.

Urgency

The degree to which a claim calls for immediate attention, combining time sensitivity with the importance of the claim to the stakeholder.

Dependent stakeholder

A stakeholder holding legitimacy and urgency but no power, who relies on allies such as regulators or courts to have the claim met.

Social capital

The goodwill available to individuals or groups through their social relations, yielding information, influence and solidarity.

Social licence to operate

The ongoing acceptance and approval of an operation by local community members and other stakeholders who can affect its profitability.

Procedural fairness

Whether people feel that decision makers treat them respectfully and give them a fair say in how decisions are made.

Reconciliation Action Plan

A plan an organisation registers through Reconciliation Australia at one of four levels, Reflect, Innovate, Stretch or Elevate, setting out its commitments to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples.

Mandatory disclosure

A regulatory tool that requires firms to make specified information public and relies on stakeholders to interpret and act on it.

Gender pay gap

The difference between women's and men's average or median earnings, usually expressed relative to men's earnings.

B Corp certification

An independent certification that assesses a business's social and environmental performance across governance, workers, community, environment and customers.

Shareholder resolution

A formal proposal that shareholders submit for consideration and voting at a company's annual general meeting.

MGMT3102 FAQ

Questions students ask in each MGMT3102 chapter

Does the course expect one correct answer to what business is for?

No. The opening seminar offers four positions, from profit maximisation to purpose defined by commitments to society, and treats each as a starting point to defend or revise. What earns credit is testing a position against purpose, beneficiaries, responsibility and limits, and showing which lens from the readings supports it. Chapter 01 · Business Purpose, Capitalism and Stakeholders

What tests decide whether a group belongs on a stakeholder map?

The Week 2 seminar uses five: the group affects the decision, is affected by it, provides resources or support, bears risk or potential harm, or represents something that cannot easily speak for itself. Passing any one test is enough for inclusion; ranking comes later, under salience. Chapter 02 · Identifying Stakeholders: Definitions and Categories

What makes a stakeholder definitive?

Holding power, legitimacy and urgency at the same time, as perceived by managers. Mitchell, Agle and Wood note that the most common route is a dominant stakeholder, which already has power and legitimacy, gaining urgency, as shareholders do when share values fall sharply. Chapter 03 · Power, Legitimacy, Urgency and Salience

What are the three benefits of social capital?

Adler and Kwon name information, influence and solidarity. Information means learning about risks and opportunities earlier and in more detail; influence means shaping decisions and winning cooperation; solidarity means relying on shared norms and trust rather than formal controls. In a case, attach one benefit to each relationship you discuss. Chapter 04 · Social Capital in Stakeholder Relationships

What builds a social licence to operate?

In Moffat and Zhang's study, trust was the key. Residents who felt the company's procedures were fair and whose contact with it was positive trusted it more, and higher trust predicted acceptance and approval. Impacts on local infrastructure lowered trust, and the sheer number of contacts made no significant difference. Chapter 05 · Trust, Procedural Fairness and Social Licence

Do I need to recommend a strategy in the diagnostic presentation?

Not a detailed one. The brief says the focus is diagnosis: what happened, who is affected, what is at stake, how the organisation responded and why it matters. The diagnosis should still make clear what the organisation would need to attend to if it wanted to manage the relationship more responsibly. Chapter 06 · Diagnosing a Contested Stakeholder Relationship

Why does the seminar say Indigenous people are not one stakeholder group?

Because the roles vary. Indigenous people may hold native title, run businesses, invest, hold land through land councils, sit on boards or be community members, and each role brings different claims, power and legitimacy. Treating them as a single box hides those differences and weakens any salience analysis. Chapter 07 · Indigenous Stakeholders and Relational Accountability

Why is government not just another stakeholder?

Because it writes the rules within which every other stakeholder deals with business. Laws decide who has rights, what is forbidden, how claims are enforced and what penalties apply, so a change in law can alter the power and legitimacy of employees, consumers or communities all at once. Chapter 08 · Regulation and the Government Toolkit

Is the gender pay gap the same as unequal pay for the same job?

No. Equal pay concerns whether women and men are paid the same for the same or comparable work. The gap compares average or median earnings across the whole organisation, so it also reflects who holds senior, bonus-bearing or full-time roles. A firm can pay equally for equal work and still report a large gap. Chapter 09 · Gender Pay Gap Disclosure and Accountability

Is there a correct answer to each simulation decision?

The instructions say the aim is less about picking a right answer than about practising analysing relationships, weighing interests, recognising trade-offs and justifying choices. The stakeholder score shows consequences, but the seminar stresses that good or poor reasoning cannot be read from the score alone. Chapter 10 · Stakeholder Decisions and Trade-offs

Why isn't dismissing wrongdoers and issuing a code enough?

Because misconduct reflects context as well as individuals. Treviño and Brown list 'it's just bad apples' and 'a code is enough' among five myths. If incentives, peer norms and leaders' signals still reward the old behaviour, new staff learn it again and the code becomes paper. Chapter 11 · Ethical Culture and Ethical Leadership

What does B Corp certification assess?

It is an independent certification with a standardised assessment of social and environmental performance, made public, covering governance, workers, community, environment and customers. The seminar presents it as one response to the problem that stakeholders cannot easily verify a business's commitments. Chapter 12 · B Corp Certification and Stakeholder Governance

What does it take to file and pass a shareholder resolution?

The Week 9 slides give the filing requirement as holding at least 5% of voting shares or having at least 100 shareholders, and say an ESG resolution generally needs more than half of votes cast to pass. The seminar therefore also looks at what a resolution can achieve beyond the vote. Chapter 13 · Shareholder Activism and ESG Resolutions

How to study for the exam

Revise in two passes. In the first pass, rebuild the diagnostic kit from Chapters 1 to 6: write each framework on one card with its author, its parts and one sentence on when it applies, such as Mitchell, Agle and Wood for whose claim commands attention, Adler and Kwon for what a relationship provides, and Moffat and Zhang for why acceptance follows trust.

Add the confusable pairs that cost marks, including identification against salience, equal pay against the gender pay gap, and certification against impact. In the second pass, practise integration.

Take one case at a time and write a full answer under time pressure: the problem in one sentence, the stakeholders and their attributes, the social capital at risk, the regulatory or governance levers, and a recommendation chosen over named alternatives with its risks.

Use your simulation decision log as a source of examples, because it records real trade-offs you argued about, and finish each answer with the single most important stakeholder risk or opportunity.

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