I did not have a weekend as I had a grad business class all night Friday and all day Saturday. It was about as fun as sitting in rush hour traffic but I will admit that I learned a few things and really thought about some new concepts. The class is all about how corporations are governed and ties in a lot of business ethics.
When ethics are brought up in the context of business I think of all the corporations that have shown a blatant lack of ethics, Enron, WorldCom, etc. and have a hard time understanding how it could be so hard to be an ethical business leader. Through other ethics classes and through this weekend, I realized that ethical business decisions are more than just not cheating your accounting books or dumping waste into a river. I have become almost shocked at how hard it is to remain an ethical business leader and still be successful in the competitive business world. Think about the follow scenarios. These decisions are hard to face and business leaders have to face them all the time.
1. You just have a newborn and the formula for your newborn is $4 cheaper at Walmart, however you think that Walmart acts in some unethical ways when it comes to labor policies. Where do you buy the formula?
2. Almost all of our clothes are made in sweatshops, is that ok with you? Would you rather pay 10x the price and go search for clothes that are not?
3. You know that your boss does not always treat your co-worker fairly when it comes to accepting new ideas or promotions. Do you put your job on the line?
4. You are a manager and you know that the stakeholders (owners) are expecting big returns this quarter. You know that in order to produce the best product for the customer, profits will not be that large. Who do you satisfy?
5. Your favorite shoe company makes your gym shoes at a sweatshop in El Salvador but donates a portion of the profits to a children's foundation. Do you buy the shoes?
6. You own a drug company. The company could make billions of dollars by creating a generic blood pressure medication that is similar to one that already exists or the company could make very little money by creating a vaccination that could save thousands of lives. What do you do?
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