4994-Article Text-9592-1-10-20210106
4994-Article Text-9592-1-10-20210106
4994-Article Text-9592-1-10-20210106
(2020)
ABSTRACT
Pandemics such as Covid-19 are a severe pandemic with significant consequences for both
business and employees' performances globally which Thailand is no exception. The Covid-
19 related impact on the productive economic mechanisms such as the employees through
domestic lockdowns has disrupted the world of the working class in the first and second
quarter of 2020 in Thailand. There are threatening economic signals that this might deepen in
the remaining months of this year. The entire sectors (medium or high) at risk experienced
low economic output due to Covid-19 that diminish working hours and wages or worse still
complete job loss especially in the second quarter of the pandemic in Thailand. The job
disruption has affected 6.6 to 7.5 million workers in the first quarter of 2020. The paper cited
the research gap of crisis attributed to the financial crisis and natural disasters which Covid-
19 is the first to cripple global economies more any natural or artificial crises. The focus is on
how to counter-intuitive implications for workers (human resources) functioning in Covid-19
period that suggest organizational fair forums to manage and supervise corporate responses to
employees' conditions for encouraging business recovery in Thailand. The paper cites the role
of organizational management in mitigating the effects of Covid-19 through labour retention,
employee performance, and other variables such as pay cuts, businesses lockdown/shut down
and operational shifts.
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INTRODUCTION
COVID-19 has now been a pandemic impacting the entire planet since its
initial launch in China. This report reflects on the effect of the virus on
Thailand's labour market. With significant diminishes or stoppages in the
mobility of persons, plus tourists, and significantly damaged flow of products
and services through global value chains, the impact of the virus has brought
to a standstill in Thailand, as elsewhere, the typical platforms of economic
production(Hartmann & Lussier, 2020).Export-oriented manufacturing and
tourism remained significant segments of Thailand's economy in 2019, with
18% and 39% respectively of GDP shares. It is precisely these two industries
that are pinpointed as most fragile in the face of demand and supply-side
shocks connected with the COVID-19 crisis, bringing in an extremely
precarious position the millions of tourism-related and manufacturing workers
in Thailand(Goodwin et al., 2020).
The economy of Thailand was still declining in 2019 (GDP growth rate of
only 2.4% and employment projections for 250,000 below the number of
workers in 2018). The latest forecast of the IMF to decrease GDP by 6.7 per
cent in 2020 shows the magnitude of the COVID-related that struck Thai
economy. Workers and those dependent (i.e. children) on their earnings are
already endangered by severe repercussions of the economic crisis inflicted by
COVID-19(Sohrabi et al., 2020).In Thailand, the risk of infection with
COVID-19 is comparatively small, and the spread has been gradual. Thailand
numbered 3,084 cases of COVID-19 infections as of 1 June. At the time, the
global estimates were about 6.4 million. The government has been stepping up
its efforts to curb the transmission of the virus since late March when most of
the reported cases were transmitted locally. The Premier Minister signed an
immediate order to monitor the pandemic on 25 March 2020(Acter et al.,
2020).
Thus, all colleges, hospitals, stores, shops, dine-in restaurants, salons, spas,
gyms, beauty parlours, amusement parks, sporting centres, convention centres,
cinemas, and theatres were eventually locked. The directive excluded stores,
fresh food markets and restaurants (i.e. selling delivery meals). Local schools,
already on their summer breaks, have been ordered to postpone students'
return from May to July.During the first quarter of 2020, the average working
hours in Thailand declined slightly by 6%, which is approximately equal to the
loss of 2, 2 million full-time jobs (presuming a 40-hour working week). The
decline is projected to accelerate in the second quarter to around 10 per cent,
thereby increasing the total reduction to a full-time equivalent of 4 million
workers.
Jobs in the informal sector are the workers most severely impacted by the
COVID-19 crisis because of their lack of stability of employment and absence
from specific social safety initiatives. Already, in the first quarter of 2019 and
the first quarter of 2020, the ten sectors with the most significant numbers of
regular and seasonal staff have seen a decline of about half a million
employees(Narula, 2020).Some of the COVID-19's significant effects on
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Figure 1
The decline in job opportunities between the fourth quarter of 2019 and the
first quarter of 2020 was due entirely to the sizable deterioration between the
two-quarters of over one million jobs in the agricultural sector. That is
probably a reflection of the current climate situation in the country. Between
the fourth quarter of 2019 and the first quarter of 2020, the number of people
working in all industries except forestry, services and mining rose (Figure 1).
The contrast is made to restrict seasonal impacts in the first quarters of 2019
and 2020. There are new industries that are shown to be declining in the
number of workers working.In comparison to agriculture, the falls in job
statistics in the first quarters of 2019 and 2020 are the highest in the wholesale
and retail trading and industrial industries, with 157,000 workers declining in
jobs in all fields combined. Smaller declines were also seen in government,
construction, real estate, and other services. The jobs continued to grow in the
housing and food services industry, as well as in the transport sector, which is
tourism-related industries, show the lagging impact of the crisis (Hartmann &
Lussier, 2020 and Crick & Crick, 2020).
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Figure 2
Given the decline in tourist numbers towards the ending of the 2020 first
quarter, as foreign travel to Thailand was still feasible until the end of March,
and the outburst of the virus slowly occurred throughout the time, jobs in
tourism-related sectors has not yet been adversely affected. Generally,
employment details in tourism-related industries as a whole rose by 139,000
employees or 4 per cent from Q4 2019 to Q1 2020 (Figure 2). As of Q1 2019,
the growth in jobs attributable to tourism was 145,000 individuals (4.2 per
cent). The job impacts of COVID-19 already began to diminish (from Q4
2019) only in the sub-sectors of the water transport sector and air
transportation services.It will undoubtedly be noteworthy to see the results
with the results of the subsequent quarter when the country's hotels and other
tourist sites were under total lockdown.
One potential early indication of the effects of the COVID-19 crisis is the
rapid accelerated number of employees unexpectedly away from work during
the first quarter of 2020. The figure grows by 17.8 per cent from 562,000 to
662,000 compared with the first quarter of 2020. The COVID-19 crisis offered
various excuses, such as workplace cuts, illness or quarantine, for a worker to
stay working while still away from work. In other industries, leisure and
sports, music, medical, science and technological training, administrative and
support facilities, as well as staff in the textile industry, the sectors showed
significant rises (100 per cent or more) in the amount of "working yet
temporarily absent" individuals. The measure will be closely monitored
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Figure 3
The new COVID-19 global survey by the ILO predicts that active working
hours across the world will decrease by 10.7 per cent from the last quarter of
2019 to the second quarter of 2020, which is equal to the reduction of 305
million full-time jobs (ILO 2020). The ILO Monitor also recognizes what the
hardest-hit sectors are expected to be in terms of decreasing working hours
and job interruption. The primary industries that are projected to see a
significant diminish in production and a high probability of labor displacement
– at global level – plus retail trade, lodging and food services, mining and real
estate and business services (Donthu & Gustafsson, 2020).
The organizational impact of the Q2 2020 crisis will rest on the bedrock of
economic disruptions in each sector adversely affected, and the size of the
workforce. To some extent, the results of Thailand's first-quarter labor force
survey affirm the forecasted sectoral disruptions recognized in the ILO
monitor. However, the sectoral threats of each country are anticipated to vary
according to their specific business structures and the approval process of
COVID-19 lockdown policies. The workforce in Thailand (see figure 3) was
seen to be declining in what the monitor viewed as high-impact sectors
(manufacturing, retail trade, wholesale and real estate excluding housing and
food services)(Donthu & Gustafsson, 2020).Even where Q1 2020 outcomes do
not yet ascertain the expected disruption – as, for example, in the tourism
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sector – the paper certainly sees the interruption in the second quarter
outcomes; also recall that the labor market adjustments that occur in the
industries struck by the COVID-19 recession will emerge first. That will lead
to reduced working hours and wage cuts rather than job cuts as employers try
to hold on to employees and some pretence of activity as long before their pay
cheques falls.
The COVID-19 pandemic has now had drastic, rippling consequences through
global economic operations in every area of the world (Bofinger et al., 2020).
In an attempt to flatten the curve of outbreak levels, many nations around the
globe have implemented sweeping prohibitions (e.g., quarantines, lockdowns
and closing of physical shops and businesses) to secure the operation of
healthcare facilities (Michie, 2020). Such cuts have, unsurprisingly, had an
enormous, direct effect on nearly any sector's economic
development.Activities including direct communication with customers and
service suppliers, for example, have been adversely impacted by travel limits
and social barriers (Giritli Nygren & Olofsson 2020). The closing of the
market has also raised the costs of households and companies saving. Many
businesses either risk bankruptcy or decrease their manufacturing capacity,
contributing to increased unemployment and underemployment (Bofinger et
al., 2020). A sustained lockout further raises the possibility of a significant rise
in corporate and government debt that might extend the stabilization process
from the COVID-19 crisis (Donthu & Gustafsson, 2020).
LITERATURE REVIEW
The study performed a critical review by comparing and contrasting the works
of various authors that related to the research topic which is highlighted in a
tabular diagram in the appendix section to identify possible gaps and theories
adapted. The secondary results on twelve (12) papers showed that there were
inadequate empirical investigations into the strategy methodologies of
accessing the effects/impacts of Covid-19 on organizational and employees'
performances in Thailand. The paper cites the effects of Convid-19 on
organizations and employees as reduced working hours (Hartmann & Lussier,
2020), pay cuts (Verma & Gustafsson, 2020; Barrero et al., 2020 and
Hartmann & Lussier, 2020). Other includes operational business shifts (Crick
& Crick, 2020), employees retention and businesses lockdown/shut down
(Crick & Crick, 2020). The paper utilizes related theories to complement its
study of the effects Convid-19 on organizational and employees' performance
in Thailand to pinpoint the essence of the health model of operation (for
businesses and employees) (Mendiola, 2020).
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the previous
model of
operation.
1 Mazur et Pandemic Qualitative The paper The paper
2. al., 2020 Covid-19 discovered concentrated
that firms’ mainly on firms’
revenue revenue
earning generation
varies during the
during the Convid-19.
Convid-19.
Source: Author
Hypotheses development
The hypotheses in this study address the study gaps found in past studies
related to this topic.
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Source: Author
Hypothesis (H1b): Workers’ pay cut has zero influence on employees’ and
organizational performances during Convid-19.
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Verma & Gustafsson (2020) argued that Convid-19 had affected all segments
of human endeavor, which include employees and organizational
performances. This paper pinpointed that employees’ contributions to
organizational are linked directly to businesses performances which is
inseparable. The motive that human safety comes before economic
sustainability by Verma & Gustafsson (2020) means that Convid-19 has
effected damages to business across industries leading to operational business
shifts as an avenue for businesses’ survival.
The fact that online firms, the online entertainment industry and online
sopping enterprises are booming without any adverse effect on sales/returns. It
means that Convid-19 has zero impact on employees (employees of listed
industries) and organizational performances (especially online firms) (Donthu
& Gustafsson, 2020). The general motion byVerma & Gustafsson (2020),
Kuckertz et al. (2020), Hartmann & Lussier (2020),Barrero et al., (2020) and
Kumar et al., (2020) concerning Convid -19 might be wrong because online
businesses are experiencing high returns due to the pandemic.
Source: Author
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distribution of goods and services to cope with the epidemic resulted in severe
disruptions, particularly those considered vital to humans (Kumar et al., 2020).
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1b
1a
2a
Reduced working hours
2b
Businesses lockdown/shut 5a
down
5b
H1: State that there is a relationship that is unlikely to be by chance. (Non dash arrows)
Research theoretical
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The study contributes to the survival mechanisms for both employees and
organizations because both are interrelated connected to each other because
without employees, organizations cannot perform actively in the economy and
without organizations to work there will be no employees(Saxena, 2014).
Practical implications
CONCLUSION
Fresh guidelines suggested by this paper for the sustainability of companies
and workers frequently emerge during transformation times. However, as it
should, as the recession subsides, while it can leave an economic crater behind
real economic worth, it is once again the ultimate arbiter of economic
performance (Porter, 2001). Throughout the immediate term, the C-19 issue
has forced companies to search into automated alternatives or find methods of
providing their goods and services with limited and secure human interaction.
Such options have provided businesses with incentives to be creative in
redesigning their current goods; developing emerging digital products and
services; or rethinking their platforms and processes for product and service
delivery. It includes searching for competitive roles and collaborators in the
modern environment who will help them accomplish this. To remain active in
the current pandemic environment; businesses need to be flexible, possess
diverse skills that will help them respond to the evolving times (Tronvoll et al
. , 2020).
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