Category: business ethics

Is IT Ethical (via Cognitive Noise)

On By southwerkIn business ethics

I have read that knowing the right questions may well be better than knowing the answers. This is because you can always ask the questions again when circumstances change and what used to be the answers is now irrelevant.

These are good questions.

I liked the opening comments about War and Peace. I never was able to get very far with it either but I did see the Russian six-hour movie. Maybe that counts.

James Pilant

Special thanks to Cognitive Noise (The best blog title I have seen in quite some time.)

One of my KM gurus (Dave Snowden) once said to get primed on ethics you just need to read War and Peace, earnestly I tried and could not go past the first 30 pages. So understand that my knowledge is limited and so is yours I assume. Ethics are challenged in every industry; specifically my view on “ethical IT services” is possible just by questioning, Questions on what we do when no one else is looking 1. Is it fine for a Project Manage … Read More

via Cognitive Noise

Beware of Foreclosure Rescue Scams (via RE/MAX Premier Group’s Blog)

On By southwerkIn business ethics

I’ve been seeing these scams on the web and occasionally hearing them on the radio. These scammers are like vultures circling over people already in financial difficulties to extract their last dollar.

Business ethics? There really isn’t much to say. The people who run these scams are merely low life scum without any intention of providing any legitimate service. If there is no legitimate service in the first place, we are talking fraud.

If you are in foreclosure or near foreclosure – Follow the advice in this article.

James Pilant

Beware of Foreclosure Rescue Scams The threat of losing your home can lead some homeowners to take desperate measures to find companies who claim to reduce your monthly mortgage payment or take other steps to save your home. Unfortunately, there are many scam artists stealing millions of dollars from distressed homeowners by promising immediate relief from foreclosure. Keep this in mind: If the advice or information sounds too good to be true, it probably is. Don’t be taken advant … Read More

via RE/MAX Premier Group’s Blog

To Hell in a Handbasket (via professional civilian)

On By southwerkIn business ethics2 Comments

In India, they are having a nation wide discussion, a debate over what can be done about corruption in that country. They have policemen who take bribes apparently as a regular part of their income. They have governmental scandals involving utterly incredible amounts of money.

Here we don’t have much of that kind of corruption. Because of this we think of ourselves as a less corrupt nation. In fact, we think highly of ourselves here in the United States.

But the kind of corruption we see here, it’s the really high quality kind. It’s legal. It’s incredibly profitable. And it conveys with complete accuracy the decay of our society and continuing decline in any level of trust for the government or business. More and more, they look more like a joint conspiracy than any attempt at the common welfare or simple profits.

Talking about business ethics is almost humorous. Almost.

James Pilant

To Hell in a Handbasket I am writing now on a dying medium. I am also using hyperbole but only just. Today Meredith Attwell Baker left her position at the FCC to take a job at NBC Universal. Her new job, strangely, is as the senior vice president of government affairs. Odd, because as one of the FCC’s four members out of five who voted in favor of the Comcast-NBC merger, I would have thought Baker already was a part of NBC’s government affairs board. Stranger still beca … Read More

via professional civilian

Rain On The Parade: Class of 2011, Most Indebted Ever (via iRok Fashion)

On By southwerkIn business ethics

And it’s raining hard. The decision made over time to place almost all the financing of education on the backs of the students is contrary to the practice in much of the world. It has had terrible consequences. College graduates are no longer able to make a wide variety of decisions as to what jobs to take, they must take the most profitable or profitable enough to stay even with their debts.

It forces students to choose the most profitable fields of endeavor and imposes horrifying penalties on those that make the wrong vocational choices. If you chose correctional officer as a career over the last two decades you scored, good job prospects, low but steady pay and a good package of benefits (if you avoided working for a private corrections company). But if you chose journalism you are probably eeking out a living as some minor paper shuffling prole. In that case, your debt load is crushing and is never going to go away.

You see, in a very real way, going for a higher education is gambling. There are no guaranteed professions or majors. History, economics and technology can shift winners and losers dramatically in a very few years. You can take many times more financial damage from a wrong choice in a college career than you can in a dozen gambling binge visits to Vegas.

But get this, when do people get to decide this critical decision? Usually when they have the least experience and knowledge – just out of high school.

I would be curious as to what the psychological effects of that kind of debt are over time. This is not just any kind of debt, creditors have power with this kind of debt they have with no other money owed.

They have counseling sessions to warn you about the consequences of student debt, that’s almost nothing compared to what’s needed. What is needed is an explanation of the risks being taken. Students should be told that double majors in different fields will significantly improve their chances of survival in a changing economy. They need to be told that income varies widely not by ability but by geography. It is much easier to pay off student loans with a salary earned on the coast. The more you move toward the center of the United States, the lower your income and the more a burden student loans will be. When I read the estimates of what college graduates will make based on national estimates, I just laugh. The job might have a starting salary of $44,000. Yeah, right. That’s about 65k to 70k in a state like New York and 24k in Kansas or Oklahoma.

We can do this better, but as usual the great intellects of the beltway will scream, “personal responsibility” over and over again. You see, the phrase, personal responsibility, means that no matter how deliberately misinformed, how unfair the deal, how distorted the situation, how manipulated a body of citizens are, it is irrelevant.

There is another word, we use in this country. It seems to have fallen out of favor. It’s called fairness. That means that we have to take into consideration the circumstances of the decision that led to the contract.

That means that when a college prints up thousands of pretty pamphlets selling their very expensive program in broadcast journalism so that you can become a television anchor, a job where there are only a few thousand jobs in the entire nation, we as a society get to ask some tough questions. Questions like “How much are you making selling this program?” “Were these students properly advised?” – that is, were they informed of the job prospects? Is there any data, any data at all, about successful employment out of the program?

Adherence to contracts is important, but so is fairness.

James Pilant

Rain On The Parade: Class of 2011, Most Indebted Ever So when I’m not looking at fashion or music related crap on the internet (and out in the world)…I brush up on my current events. Especially if it pertains to my living conditions in the years to come. I came across an interesting article about the debt for college grads this year (2011). Although the article basically goes on to say that going to college and collecting the student loan debt is ultimately worth it, it does still suck a big one. … Read More

via iRok Fashion

Offshoring and Business Ethics (via seonie23)

On By southwerkIn business ethics

Many videos on off-shoring are simple news stories or long commentary. This is a cartoon that discusses the effects of off-shoring on American workers and the ethics of it. The plot goes like this: an astronaut returns to earth from a long journey into space and the first person he encounters is a man who has been laid off from his job due to off-shoring. The conversation gets interesting very quickly.

James Pilant

Nuclear Collapse Looms? Fukushima Reactor No. 4 “Leaning” (via RT)

On By southwerkIn business ethics

What are the business ethics problems revealed in this particular news article? First we have a with holding from the residents of critical information about their exposure to radiation. Second, we have worker safety issues on a very large scale. Workers have already died at the site. Third, we have a continuous underestimate of the radiation being released. It seems every time, TEPCO gives the public radiation numbers, it is later discovered to be too low.

It seems that the Japanese government and the utility, TEPCO, are in full damage control mode. They now hold one press conference a week. They invite only establishment press. They limit access to the site, not so much for safety’s sake but to prevent independent coverage.

As a business ethics disaster, these events will be featured in textbooks for generations.

James Pilant

Interesting Conversation [1] (via Nai2-tok ! where I ramble..non-stop)

On By southwerkIn business ethics

Here is one small example of a worldwide problem but that is how the problem is usually felt, one human being at a time.

James Pilant

I always get my morning newspaper on my way to the office. In Indonesia, there are people who sell newspaper, magazine on the traffic light. So for you foreigners don’t be surprised by this sight. This is very common in Indonesia. And you can get all your media needs from them. Up until 1 year ago, I always buy my newspaper from this 1 person (let’s call him A). But then, in a sudden almost 1 week I coudln’t see him everywhere. I came in to concl … Read More

via Nai2-tok ! where I ramble..non-stop

Business Ethics Memo: Internet Kids’ Games as Junk Food Advertising (via guvedipivady)

On By southwerkIn business ethics

Saying one thing and doing another as part of your business strategy is a failure of business ethics. Here we have a good example. This is not just an academic violation. This kind of marketing to children can take a terrible toll of lives lost or diminished.

Why would you want to do this? Is it just the ethos of let the buyer beware? The Ayn Rand concept of only profit as the measure of morality? Will they blame the often lower class families for poor decision making when they have gone to enormous, billions of dollars, lengths to persuade them to make those decisions?

In a prison, you can interview or survey the populations as to why they committed crimes. Some will tell you they had no choice, they were made to do it by forces in the larger society. Very few people buy that argument. But these corporate officials are quite likely to say things like, “If we don’t do it, our competitors will.” From their point of view social pressure forces them to do immoral things, and they are not to blame not only because they have to do it, but in a world with 100% free will (that’s right, many corporate officials believe in total free will), they merely provide a product, it is its misuse by a unlettered and immediate gratification oriented population that is the problem.

I don’t like the current corporate ethos, but with the “Citizens United” decision and a capacity for unlimited campaign contributions, new horrors await us all.

James Pilant

My thanks to guvedipivady.

Myriad processed-food conglomerates including General Mills, Unilever (which also owns Ben & Jerry’s Ice Cream), Post Foods, Kraft and Kellogg’s, have pledged to stop or significantly limit their marketing of less healthy options to kids. But is seems that few if any of these companies are actually sticking to their word. As this excellent investigative report in the NYT?reveals, it seems all (except for perhaps Kraft, which is not mentioned) … Read More

via guvedipivady

Moral Implications of the Workplace Part 2 (via Ethical Realism)

On By southwerkIn business ethics

I found this an informative post. There were things in it I didn’t know. It touches on many ethical issues, many of the critical ones in the lives of employees. Take this for an example –

Companies often pressure employees to get involved in civic activities, such as “running for the local school board or heading up a commission in the arts,” but such pressure must not constitute coercion (ibid.). Employees must not be disciplined or dismissed for a lack of participation, and even public embarrassment could be considered to be a form of coercion. For example, “[m]embers of the Army Band… won a suit claiming that the posting of names of soldiers who had not contributed to the United Way constituted coercion” (245).

Now that coercion is going to become far more intense. The supreme court’s Citizens United decision allows limitless spending on influencing employees.

And how about this?

Some businesses pressure employees to undergo “personal growth” to help people “realize their potential for perceiving, thinking, feeling, creating, and experiencing” (ibid.). There are many different kinds of intensive groups and companies often use “team-building groups to facilitate the attainment of production and related goals as well as to provide opportunities for improved human relations and personal growth” (ibid.). Again, intensive group experience can improve productivity, so it is relevant to job performance. However, employees should not be punished for refusing to participate.

This is one I find particularly loathsome. Chasing around as forced comrades in some strange locale for some strange idea of development inevitably tied in to some bizarre theory like “emotional intelligence,” is pretty close to forcing me to live in a version of a horror movie without hope of escape.

So, please give this writing your attention.

James Pilant

My thanks to Ethical Realism.

I have already discussed various moral implications of the workplace in part 1 of “Moral Implications of the Workplace,” and I will continue the discussion here by considering (a) privacy, (b) work conditions, and (c) job satisfaction. This discussion is based on chapter seven of Business Ethics (Third Edition, 1999) by William Shaw. Privacy We have a right to privacy, and a lack of privacy can endanger our livelyhood. We don’t want people to see … Read More

via Ethical Realism

Do Not Spam Me Again! (via Paul Daniel’s Views On The World, For What They’re Worth)

On By southwerkIn business ethics

As my regular readers are aware I love outrage. I think people should be angry about a lot of what is happening in the field of ethics. This blog is full of outrage and the good kind – directed outrage with an inclination toward action. Not only is our brave blogger upset – he is fighting against those wicked spammers. He should get awards and letters of congratulation. While others gripe, he lets the spammers know what he thinks..

I am delighted to repost this. There is an e-mail exchange he posts that is a must read. I like the wit, the intelligence and the outrage of our writer. Go get ’em.

James Pilant

Thanks to the web site, Paul Daniel’s View on the World, For What They’re Worth.

Do Not Spam Me Again! As far as I’m concerned, most IT recruiters should be transported by air to New Zealand and dropped 30,000 feet into a boiling mud pool. Mind you, I do have a few colleagues who are recruiters, who are generally good people, but generally it hasn’t been a great experience when I have had to deal with them. Unfortunately, the one for whom I have the most respect supports Collingwood. Consider the following e-mail extract, reading from the bottom u … Read More

via Paul Daniel’s Views On The World, For What They’re Worth