Category: business ethics

Educating My Students – To What End?

On By southwerkIn business ethics, Capitalism, Economic measurement, ethics, Government Failure, Teaching2 Comments

I have students. I am college professor. Generally speaking in these very tough economic times, they come to school not for an education but to get that piece of paper they have been grandly told over and over again will get them a job. Oh, yeah, I guess that is confusing, going to school but not for an education. Let me explain.

We have a thing in America called No Child Left Behind, which makes the mammoth and bizarre claim that we can measure progress based on tests. That’s right, bizarre. I might agree with you if had some numbers correlating success with grades (and you don’t). Oh, there are some university studies, which since they develop their very own concept of what we might call success, don’t amount to anything useful. (If you get to decide what determines success for your own programs, you have a tendency to win.)

No Child Left Behind means that for a school to be determined to be successful (worthy of money from the State and the Feds), it has to have good test scores generated by its students. So, in pursuit of this, students are drilled relentlessly in the subjects to be tested. The school that drills its students longer and harder than the others is supposed to be improving. Since the primary indicator of grades is social and economic class, the scores fall into utterly predictable categories. Obviously there are variations. An inspired group of teachers can pump up test scores with skill and effort. But inspired teachers are just like inspired politicians, inspired architects, inspired pediatricians, etc. There are only so many per profession.

Now, you will find that there are people who say we can train teacher to be inspired in large numbers. That enthusiasm and a willingness to go beyond requirements should be the standard. This is nonsense. There are only so many inspired, truly dedicated individuals on earth and that’s it.

The effect over time of teaching to large scale tests is devastating. Students are conditioned not to think but to remember. The advent of the internet solves many problems of remembering and great deal of remembering is useless trivia. America needs thinkers and it’s as if we wish to exterminate them that we do this crazy testing. We have perverted the idea of education from developing human beings to the production of standard products as if on an assembly line. My students aren’t products, they are people. Human achievement is not measured by tests. No test will ever be a substitute for the real life measurements of success these people will produce.

It fills me with rage to look at what has been done to my students. I want thinkers, doers and patriots. What I get are rote learners, good passive students and bumper sticker patriots whose knowledge of the greatness of this nation is limited to the most trivial.

You see, there is a funny thing about these people, these students; they’re magnificent. When I look over my classes I don’t see A and B and C students. I see these people waiting to be told of the enormous power, potential and talent they each carry within them.

My students are the heart and soul of America. They are leaders of the next generation. They work hard. I don’t see the government of the United States lavishing care on these most vital people for the future of this country. There is more an attitude of how much we can make them financially obligated for the rest of their lives and make sure that they don’t escape paying a dime of it.

We need to figure out our priorities. If you truly desire a second rate society of “information” workers, if you truly believe that this country is merely a corporate resource to be disdained if the money is too dear and that only the “right” people should have a say in what happens, this educational system is perfect for you.

This is the United States of American. We can do better.

James Alan Pilant

State of the Nation – It’s About To Get Worse

On By southwerkIn business ethics, Capitalism, ethics, Government Failure, Teaching

The statistics coming in are generally aligned one way, they point down. We’ve had a rough ride so far and it’s going to get worse. The governments of the world are just reacting to the crisis and have no real concept of what to do. The United States government led by Barack Obama appears to have a vague idea that an economic stimulus might be a good idea. However, that same government has had no appetite for bold action and is unlikely to develop any.

We float between two eras. The line between the two time periods will be marked at the banking crisis of 2007-2009 (and the continuing economic crisis left in its wake) and the environmental disaster of 2010. There will be a different United States after these two crisis play themselves out.

Currently we are locked in a battle of ideas. I break them into two kinds. One set of ideas say that there are unchanging and permanent solutions to the economic and social problems we face. The other says that solutions differ with time, place and circumstance. I side for the most part with the second group.

I teach business law and business ethics at the college level. I try to explain to my students that there is no glorious past where everyone was good and obeyed the law, etc. The only promised land is the one we build ourselves. Currently the only promise we seem to feel of any importance is the promise of making money.

You see, if there is a glorious past in which everyone goes to church and everyone obeys the law and in which the nation is a “city on a hill,” then it follows that there are a set of beliefs that all we have to do is emulate. We duplicate the virtues and rules of these paragons of virtue and righteousness, and we become great.

One problem, there is no such time. American history is messy. A lot of people die, often for very little reason. A lot of people wind up suffering terrible discrimination for very little reason. And a lot of people are made to lives lives of pain because they believe something other than common beliefs, and very often, those unfashionable beliefs are the exact beliefs held by the majority now.

However, since there is a loud and vocal part in this country who believe virtue resides in a past America, history will just have to be rewritten. I went to Barnes and Noble on Saturday, and there they were, books explaining that the history of the United States was everything you’d want it to be, that is, if you believe in a kind of Disneyland/Hollywood view of the nation’s history. There is good money in “Disneylanding” history. I don’t want any of it myself. Reality is disgustingly painful, but I will do my best to live there.

If you don’t live in a world hoping for a return to an earlier American, you know, “Take America Back” style people, then you have to deal with current circumstances. The way forward is obscure and difficult. You can’t be sure what’s going to happen and what will work. It gives those advocating a return to the promised land an enormous advantage. They have certainty.

We live in a terrible time. It would be nice if things were simple. They are not. It would be nice if things were certain. They are not.

I do believe in ethics, right and wrong. There are definitely some eternal verities in ethical beliefs. However, the great nostrums I hear are seldom based on ethical principle. When “free market” economics takes on the trappings of religion, it is no more ethical an idea than it was before. When you discover that the founding fathers were all evangelicals and thus, America was based on the Christian religion, you aren’t ethical; you’re lying. When you say that killing, torture, stealing and lying are wrong, and that they always will be, you speak based on ethical principles and we are brothers and sisters under the skin.

I don’t know what is going to come. There is a lot of pain ahead. I believe current levels of unemployment, the highest in American history since the Great Depression, will continue through 2014. I do not believe our government is willing to deal with the challenges facing this country and that if they did, that they are not in any way competent to do so.

We are betwixt and between. Societies under these conditions change or shatter.

I think that what this web site is all about is doing the right thing. I firmly believe that if Americans try to do the right thing, not the greedy thing, the power thing or any thing other than just a sheer dogged devotion to acting as if our only end was what kind of world we would want to have after us, then we will get through this and have the kind of society that the righteous deserve. You get to live in the “City on the Hill” when you deserve it, not because you are supposed to have it.

James Pilant

Planned Obsolescence: Is it Ethical? No. Can We Still Have the Newest Gadgets? Yes! (via Leading in Context™ Blog)

On By southwerkIn business ethics, ethics, Teaching

Linda Fisher Thornton has a discussion of ethical values in the context of planned obsolescence. She backs it up with a wide variety of links. Her blog posts about once a week. So, you might want to check on her in that time frame. She also writes a guest column for the Richmond Times Dispatch.

Is Planned Obsolescence Ethical?  Every business should know its position on this important question.  Do you know yours? Many companies have the technology to make products that last far longer, and choose not to use it. You know what comes next – the products wear out faster and we have to buy them more often. Is that a responsible way to achieve profitability? Here are some opinions on that question (all of which could be used for good leader … Read More

via Leading in Context™ Blog

Ethics Blogs Roundup July 3rd, 2010

On By southwerkIn business ethics, ethics, Privatization

Lauren Bloom has a post wondering how often British Petroleum has lied.

Gael O’Brien on the website, The Week in Ethics, has another post about British Petroleum, in which she discusses the human toll using an an example the life of William Kruse. This is some fine writing. I’d give it a look if I were you.

David Gebler writing from the web site, Free Management Library, discusses safety and costs from an ethical standpoint. Here’s a nice quote from the article:

“However, as we have seen from the fallout from the Gulf Oil Spill, the recent mine accidents in West Virginia, as well as FAA intervention on airline safety issues, relying on government identification of safety issues may no longer be a viable fall back position for companies that have greater knowledge of the issue than the government.”

Shel Horowitz writing from his blog, Principled Profit, argues against the government guaranteeing loans to private companies to build nuclear power plants. He discusses the dangers of nuclear power plants. I am astonished at the hypocrisy of people who continuously shout “free market” to drown out alternative ideas thinking that the government guaranteeing loans to private industry is anything more than corporate hands in the public till. It’s a complete rejection of capitalism. If private industry and investors are unwilling to bear the risks of building nuclear power plants, should they be built?

Ethics: Where are you? part 11 (via Life is what you make it)

On By southwerkIn business ethics, ethics, Teaching

Denise Scammon is looking for the answers. She describes her thoughts on virtue ethics in this recent post and there are apparently ten more before it, explaining previous stages in her search. She’s obviously smart. The work is disjointed but she’s developing a pattern for her ideas and it takes a bit. We’re looking at someone not afraid to put her thinking down and let other see how far she has gotten. It’s nice work, give it a look!

“Ethics: Where are you? part 11”
Both deontological theories and utilitarian theories contribute to virtue ethics because “virtue ethics and theories of right action complement each other” but “virtue ethics emphasizes right being over right action” (Boss, 2008, p. 400). Kant explains “the importance of good will” in his Groundwork of the Metaphysic of Morals (p. 405). Mill believed that reflection and cultivation of a “benevolent disposition” led to virtue (p. 405). The main po … Read More

via Life is what you make it

bad business and ransom (via Answer Starts With You)

On By southwerkIn business ethics, ethics2 Comments

This is a brief meditation on the nature of those willing to work in firms or business that live to rip off. There’s a lot of compassion here. I admire that. I long ago decided I only had compassion for the victims. That’s pretty hardcore and not particularly ethical. This is probably a better person than me.

Every working day, I've been dealing with what I'll call one particular "bad business".  Those organizations who prey on consumers, or opportunities.  The best way to describe it is a company that I'd never be able to work at.  Its sad really.  Across my desk, I happened to see a letter sent out by said "bad business" signed by an employee and I wondered what poor soul could possibly feel comfortable working for an organization like that.  I goog … Read More

via Answer Starts With You

Dell’s full scale ethical meltdown (via Minding the Workplace)

On By southwerkIn business ethics

David Yamada’s blog, Minding the Workplace, has a great post about Dell computers and the company’s ethical problems as revealed in a current lawsuit. I could say a lot but I’ll let the article speak for itself.

James Pilant

Here's one they'll be studying in business school ethics classes for years to come: The story of how Dell, one of the world's leading computer manufacturers, morphed from being an industry icon to the latest ethics-challenged poster company. As reported by Ashlee Vance for the New York Times, a major lawsuit against Dell is unearthing a corporate cover-up campaign that concealed from customers serious malfunctions in millions of computers sold be … Read More

via Minding the Workplace

Business Ethics?

On By southwerkIn business ethics, ethics1 Comment

Chris MacDonald has some insightful comments on what is meant by business ethics. He points out that you could also use the topic of corporate citizenship, stakeholder theory, the triple bottom line, corporate sustainability, etc. All of these cover part of the matter at hand: what is the right thing to do ethically? I believe that he wishes the subject title, business ethics, to be the primary one to simplify the field. I also use the phrase, business ethics, as the title and the subject of my blog. But what part of the field does mine cover? I aim heavily at corporate crime and let my indignation flourish at times.

This blog and what I want to do with it evolve over time. Keep watching.

MacDonald suggests that the Oxford Handbook of Business Ethics will provide some clarity to the field.

I hope he’s right. Ethical clarity is relatively rare and a tighter definition of our terms could at least move us in that direction.

James Pilant

“Ace” Greenberg – Not My Fault

On By southwerkIn business ethics, Government Failure1 Comment

Alan “Ace” Greenberg, a few days ago, gave an interview to Newsweek’s Nancy Cook. The former head of Bear-Stearns, took time from his busy schedule in order to enlighten and engage with us. It was everything that poor unlettered blogger like myself could have hoped for. The pearls of wisdom fell on me like a warm, summer rain.

When asked if he had any regrets about his time at Bear-Stearns, he had none. (During his tenure, the price of Bear Stearns stock went from a 52 week high of 133.20 to the ten dollars a share it finally sold for, although strangely enough, not as low as the two dollars that Bear Stearns originally agreed to.)

When asked if he had learned anything from the financial collapse, he said, “Nothing that I didn’t know before.” (Could the concept that maybe your company shouldn’t acquire notional contract amounts of approximately $13.40 trillion in derivative financial instruments, of which $1.85 trillion were listed futures and option contracts, be something new to you?)

When asked about a remark in his new book that the presidents of companies never really know what’s going on, he said, “I don’t care how much you watch things or how acutely involved you are, there are probably bad things that happen.” (Is this the same thing as saying that the president of a company is never really at fault?)

The interview continued in this manner. Let me sum up for Mr. Greenberg. “I did nothing wrong. I did not exercise poor judgment. Banking institutions are already regulated enough. No new regulations are needed. Derivatives are good. Derivatives make money; how then can they be bad? People don’t understand derivatives. Bad loans made to people who couldn’t pay for the homes they bought are responsible for the crisis. Bear Stearns was in no way whatsoever at fault.”

It is interesting to contrast the interview with reports of what happened at Bear Stearns. They seem to be two different versions of reality. I remember reading in philosophy that attitude is a key element in happiness. Mr. Greenberg has an excellent attitude in regard to his personal happiness.

Unfortunately, reality is not easily mocked.

Karl Jaspers wrote in his book, General Psychopathology that a delusion has three central characteristics. The first is certainty. The belief is held with absolute conviction. The second is incorrigibility. That is, the belief is not subject to change by argument or facts. The third is the impossibility of the content. Bizarre, implausible or patently untrue.

Let’s go through the elements. Let’s begin with certainty. Was there any self doubt or questioning at any point in the interview? Let me quote Greenberg from the article: “Certainly at Bear Stearns, I think that I didn’t make many mistakes. But, you know, you have to keep in mind that the only people who don’t make mistakes are the ones who don’t do anything.” That’s as close as we’re going to get to self doubt in the interview.

The second element is that the belief is not subject to change by counter argument or facts. In the excerpt from the full interview, we don’t see Nancy Cook press very hard. However, I would point out that Greenberg says clearly that he learned nothing from what happened” Let’s look at the exchange –

(Nancy Cook) Do you feel like you, as a businessman, learned anything following the financial collapse?

(Alan “Ace” Greenberg) Nothing that I didn’t know before.

His belief system did not change under enormous pressure from contrary events. This is a good argument for incorrigiblity but not conclusive argument, I would like to see him challenged with facts in a tough interview. That may very well happen in the larger Newsweek article.

The third element is impossibility or falsity of content. Well, the idea that Bear Stearn’s only error was too much trust in other banks is a difficult concept considering the massive evidence of poor judgment, poor management and poor leadership.

Greenberg lives in a world where he is faultless, the economic system works fine and whether or not you make money is the only measure of human accomplishment. I tend to believe that a great many of those leading both the government of the United States and, more in particular, the “titans” of industry, believe these things. There is a problem with hubris here.

Once again quoting from wiki: Hubris often indicates being out of touch with reality and overestimating one’s own competence or capabilities, especially for people in positions of power.

Believing in your own infallibility has only limited potential for damage in isolated settlements, in a giant metropolis or a great nation, the possibilities of overreach and massive damage are far more likely. The worst and deadliest of the characteristics we see here is that even after financial catastrophe unrivaled since the Great Depression, there is no feeling of guilt or mistake. If you don’t acknowledge a mistake, you cannot change your behavior.

What will the next acts of these individuals be and where will they take us?

James Pilant

What’s The Verdict – Financial Reform?

On By southwerkIn business ethics, Government Failure

Loren Steffy of the Houston Chronicle writes, “Most of the provisions that would have forced Wall Street to change its ways were compromised out of this law weeks ago.”

John Talton of the Seattle Times chooses this title: Financial ‘reform’: Big bankers cry all the way to the…

David Moon writing from the Knoxville Biz entitled his blog entry – Financial reform is a political charade. The rest of the article is even tougher.

I was looking at this newspaper’s web site and discovered they had no new column on the financial reform disaster but they did make an excellent prediction and for that I must honor them. Read below.

In its June 23rd editorial, the St. Petersburg Times said, “Congressional negotiators have a choice as they hammer out the final details on much-needed financial reform. They can stand for financial reform with real teeth and stand up to the pressure of the banking lobbyists. Or they can bow to those deep-pocket financial interests that have sponsored more than 800 fundraisers over the past year for members of the congressional banking committees. A weak reform bill that offers too little oversight and too many loopholes would not be in the nation’s best interest.”

I will follow up with more newspaper comments. I have looked at a dozen newspaper business pages after checking the ones above. It appears that the editorial pages have not caught up with the news. So, I will return to the subject probably on Monday.

James Pilant