Lobbying Individual Assignment.docx

Lobbying Individual Assignment Rahil Kumar Mehta- UIBS01755 26/01/19 Lobbying, defined at its simplest is the act of influencing a business or government leader to create a law or perform a particular activity that will help a specific organization. Over time, lobbying has been handed much positive connotation, with undertones of greed, and shadiness. However, this broad scale opinion has ignored how necessary lobbying actually is. In almost any country in the world, businesses and the government go hand in hand, with their goals and focuses being entirely different, they still have to work with each other all the time. A business is ultimately looking for profit maximization and cost and production efficiency, whereas within the government the main focus is power and authority. In today’s day and age, lobbying has been regulated so as to shake off the shady image it had in earlier times. The Lobbying Disclosure act of 1995 states that three criteria must be met for an individual to be recognized as a lobbyist.  Individual must earn at least $3000 over three months from lobbying activities.  Individual must have multiple contacts he/she is trying to influence.  Individual must spend in excess of 20% of his/her time doing lobbying work for a single client over a 3-month period. (Hill n.d.) As is the case with any business, the following of ethical considerations is vital to operations of a company. Therefore, there is a fine line between manipulation and pressure from a lobbyist to have legislation passed and the contribution towards a policy proposal. It is considered unethical for a lobbyist to use the wrong kind of influence in hopes of performing their persuasion for their interests. When it comes to lobbying in the business environment, as has been mentioned already, a large factor is influence, lobbying is the art of influencing, therefore should a firm or a group want any particular legislation passed, they would need to adapt the correct approach of influence, as Clamen stated, influence heavily depends on situations, past conversations, and partners. Often in the business environment, lobbyists are required to present a proposal in a way where the firm itself or the group of interest just would be unable to do so. For example, in industries where businesses are heavily regulated such as logistics or public transport, a firm must be thorough in their knowledge of political dealings, without knowledge of these policies, the firm would open themselves up to large scale problems at the core of their enterprise. Lobbying allows for the key decision makers to understand what is going on, and in doing so lets the correct person create a strategy to be ahead of the problem at all times. Another important part of lobbying is that, in these regulated sectors, lobbying will allow companies to overcome system boundaries, this is because lobbyists are often able to communicate information in an effective manner, as mentioned above, businesses are often leaning towards profit maximization and cost and production efficiency, so for the perfect decisions to be made, all information has to be communicated efficiently and effectively.

Advantages of lobbyists in business environments: Lobbyists allow for a business to have good relationships with select officials in the government, these lobbyists who present proposals to the government officials, are appealing to the beliefs of the official, when these beliefs line up properly, the official is more likely to vote on behalf of the lobbyist and in favor of the firm he/she may be representing. If done ethically, lobbying gives the average human a voice in the government, and as mentioned, if the human and the government official are on the same wave of thought, these two like minded people will be able to secure significant momentum towards a cause. Lobbying does not take any special training, it takes a drive towards a cause, lobbying allows people to have a voice and reach out to a government official to make progress towards a cause. Lobbying is free, finances are not necessarily an issue for a lobbyist, their main investment is time, they spend time voicing their opinions in an attempt to influence the the government officials, it could be argued that one must have certain resources such as a laptop or a telephone, however, it is possible to voice your opinion in hopes to influence the government officials through other means.

Disadvantages of lobbyists in business environments: Whilst lobbyists have many positives as have been mentioned above, the entire idea of lobbying comes from the needs of the minority, at any given time under normal circumstances, more people aren’t looking for the idea at hand, they are often just influenced out of the blue due to the needs of the minority. Lobbying can also be seen as advocating only for personal needs, therefore attracts negative connotations, which often result in lobbying being discontinued and these negative connotations include threatening and imposition of one’s self upon authority, having the government in the pocket. As mentioned before, it requires nothing but a time investment and a cause to become a lobbyist, however, as is with life, the one with the more resources will generally find a way to be more recognized and therefore successful in pushing their lobbying dossier ahead. This ties in with the negative connotations, with less resources, the individual will look to use any means necessary to get ahead with their dossier such as bribes or threats, this will render certain cases of lobbying illegal. With so much money being spent on lobbying, government operations are altered, this situation will lead to more money being spent on lobbyists instead of being spent on the needs of the people. Legislation would be passed more freely and as a result the government would more often be looking out for lobbyists instead of the general population. The most basic disadvantage is, that even the best lobbyist in the world could fail, this would result in wasted resources and still no legislation to work with.

Lobbying is very important to the business environment because it fits right in, the attempt at influencing the decision making process, requires communication and negotiation, there are multiple ways of doing both these things. There are multiple ways of communication,

such as formal and informal, lobbying is heavily reliant on this communication, because the aim is to influence, in my opinion it is important for the business environment to understand the lobbyist and his/her opinions, therefore the most effective method of communication would be formal or informal face-to-face, this would result in unnecessary gaps in communication to be avoided and not lead to any blunders potentially disrupting the entire lobbying campaign and/or government balance. In conclusion, lobbyists are absolutely vital to the business environment, they heavily influence decision making, their approach must be considerate of ethical considerations, and would not be illegal, whilst lobbying is an advantage as it looks to give everyone an equal say, and allows for the common person to have a say in governmental procedures and passing legislation.