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 Peterson Group is a Norwegian packaging group owned by Peterson AS. The total number of employees is about 1250. The group produces fiber based packaging material and consists of several mills in Norway and Finland. This summer it announced the aquisition of four paperboard mills in Sweden and Denmark. Peterson Linerboard AS consists of the kraftliner mill (kraftliner is paper or paperboard whose fiber content has no less than 80% fibers obtained by the chemical sulfate or soda processes) in Moss, and the mill for manufacturing testliner (papers of different bursting strengths) and coreboard in Ranheim outside Trondheim. 325 employees work at the mill in Moss.
After large deficits in 2005 there has been some downsizing and restructuring within the group. At a union meeting on 24 August for the mill in Moss, the union informed about the company's decision to downsize the number of staff by one third of the employees. Of these, 119 are production workers and 16 administrative staff. The news was received with shock amongst the employees. Dismissals are expected and still no redundancy packages have been announced. Dismissals will be carried out according to seniority.
Details on number of dismissals, redundancy packages and timeline will be decided at the Board meeting 4th September after negotiations between the union and management.
Eurofound (2006), Peterson Linerboard AS, Internal restructuring in Norway, factsheet number 63955, European Restructuring Monitor. Dublin, https://restructuringeventsprod.azurewebsites.net/restructuring-events/detail/63955.