A634.4.4.RB_HallMike

I am not going to lie.  When I read the assignment my very first thought was “of course affirmative action isn’t ethical – its reverse racism.”  Man was I wrong.  After reading chapters 5 and 6 I can say I am rather ashamed of my short-sightedness when it came to the issue.  LaFoullette does a great job breaking down my thoughts against affirmative action (all of which he hit on in chapter 6) and then did a great job building a case for it.  I’m only going to hit on the one key point that really sealed the deal for me.

The thought that solidified my thoughts on affirmative action are based on how much of an effect past transgressions can have on the future.  Why I never really thought about affirmative action with respect to that fact is beyond me.  After reading other books (Freakonomics comes to mind where they discuss at length the fact that a person’s chances at success in life are directly linked to the parent’s education levels), I’m surprised that I never thought of this fact.  Of course discrimination 100 years ago has had an effect on people today.  Holding people down 100 years ago resulted in fewer opportunities 50 years ago, which has limited opportunities today.  Limited educational opportunities of people just 30 years ago has resulted in less opportunity for people entering the workforce today.  As a result, you must take steps to level that playing field for them since the past has harmed them.  If it was a level playing field in this country from the get go, the country/workforce might have a considerably different look to it.  For example, I know that the military officer corps struggles to find minorities to fill the ranks.  In a perfect world, the all parts of the military would represent the society we are protecting, however that is not the case.  I do not have exact numbers for all of the branches, but I know the Army is severely lacking in black officers, especially at higher ranks.  As a result, they have pushed to bring in young black officers into the corps in order to fix the problem.

The other fact that always made me give some support to affirmative action was the fact that its mere presence means that blatant racism can’t exist.  As much as I would like to think it (racism) doesn’t exist with people who are in positions of power, I know that there are people making decisions based purely on racist ideals.  These people must be held in check at a minimum, and affirmative action ensures that.  In the end, people that get upset about affirmative action very well maybe closet racists or just naïve.  Prior to the readings I would have thought affirmative action is wrong, but I was quite naïve also… 

A634.3.5.RB_HallMike

After reading the article by Kramer about how/why successful leaders makes meteoric rises to the top only to come crashing down a short while later, the first real dilemma that comes to mind is a very basic principle that we all are faced with quite often: integrity.  Integrity is a rather simple idea that has many definitions.  The nuclear navy has a pretty easy one to remember that I am a fan of: doing what is right even when no one is looking.  For example, you come across a valve out of position.  You know why it is in the wrong position and could easily reposition it with no one ever knowing but you also know that you should report this.  The nuclear navy would hope your only response would be to report the valve out of position and thus you have integrity.  Unfortunately however this is not always the case.  In my opinion, you either have integrity or you do not; you will either do what is right or you will not, and I think part of the problem with some of these leaders is a result of that.

The article directly mentioned that many successful CEOs have a winner take all mentality and are willing to do whatever it takes to succeed, including as we saw in the article, lying and cheating the system.  For example, the CEO of DreamWorks who forged a UCLA diploma in order to advance up the company.  Clearly this was a dishonest act aimed at promoting only himself.  I would venture to say that that was also probably not the only time he acted in a selfish, unethical manner.  So why then is it surprising to us when they do exactly what they have always done just because they are at the pinnacle of success?  They had no integrity to get to the top so why would they have any once they are at the top?  They aren’t going to change who they are; after all, it did lead them to some of the most powerful positions in the country. 

A634.2.4.RB_HallMike

Bottom line, I think that both theories are good in their own respects, however you must use pieces of each to get the best set of ideals out of them because each isolated is not complete.  For example, take consequentialism and specifically Utilitarianism.  As a military officer, there are multiple facets of being in the military that exude Utilitarianism.  For example, a triage – instead of wasting time and resources on people that are probably going to die anyway, I instead focus on people that might be saved.  This would go against some views other hold that all life is the same and that equal effort should be put in to conserve it.  Another example would be sending someone to their doom to save the lives of others.  Take for example the movie U571.  The officer orders the small enlisted guy to get back into the bilge to shut the leaking valve so that they can shoot a torpedo to save the ship knowing that he will probably drown in the process – under Utilitarianism, this is perfectly ok and to some respects I agree with it.  With that being said, you must be careful to not apply it to all situations.  For example, some Utilitarianism theoriest argued that from the theory you could conclude that it would be ok to sacrifice 1 person to harvest their organs in order to save the lives of others.  I do like Mill’s discussion on how the goal of people should be to promote happiness.  Additionally, the point that your own happiness must not be the overriding consideration – it should be looked at as if you are considering someone else’s happiness – would go a long way in this world if people thought about that more often.

Moving to Deontology, I concur with the author’s statement on page 31 when he states that, “deontology relects the way most of us acquired and developed our moral beliefs” (Lafollette, 2007).  In fact, I would have partially defined ethics by stating it is a set of rules to live by prior to this class.  I also like the aspect of Deontology that essentially there are universal truths out there.  It is completely irrelevant of the consequences associated with an act, something is wrong or right because it just is wrong or right.  I especially liked how the author compared breaking down complex rules in football and thus making them more understandable to why some moral rules are overly simplistic.  Deontologist would argue that when we say something like “don’t lie”, that is an overly simplistic version of an underlying rule that is just too complex to initially teach.  It is only when you are old enough to really understand that you are taught that it very well may be ok to lie in certain situations.  This then leads to a problem with Deontology which is which rules are more important than others.  Kant would argue that there is only 1 rule – the good will is the underlying principle (i.e. you can never act wrongly if you have good will in mind).  Clearly this isn’t true because there can be good will that is misguided. 

A634.1.6.RB_HallMike

I’m positive that if you asked people to name the least most trusted people on the planet, business executives would be in the top 5 responses.  Ethics and business just aren’t two words that people generally put together, and there is a reason for that.  Much of the economic hardship over the past several years was the result of business leaders looking to make some money by cutting corners and skirting by ethical considerations.  In addition to the economic woes the country has experienced, several other executives have made the headlines due to downright unethical decision making (see Bernie Madoff, CFOs at Seimens, Robert Rubin to name a few) (Kostigen, 2009).  In all reality though, I have a hard time really faulting these guys for doing what they do – in the end it is just a by-product or the nature of the beast when you deal with a free market, rather unregulated capitalist economy.  Your goal as a business man is to make money for the business and make a few dollars yourself in the process.  Understanding that I think that people are inherently evil and generally selfish, it is hard to fault someone for taking advantage of a situation when they think that no one is looking.  It is like trying to blame a 4 year old for trying to sneak a cookie out of the cookie jar.

With that being said, you absolutely can fault them because what they did was wrong and they knew it when they did so.  Many people point to the fact that business schools are at the root of this problem (executives doing what makes sense monetarily while removing all other considerations from the equation) because they focus on performance at all costs vice doing so under constraints.  What is strange in my opinion is that a more stressful environment – the battlefield – has a much deeper ethical understanding and application from leaders in general compared to the business world.  If leaders can maintain ethical standards on a battlefield then business leaders should be able to do the same in the meeting rooms.  The difference between the two cultures though is that military leaders receive extensive ethical training and are constantly reminded of what is right and wrong whereas business leaders might get taught some in business school but are then left to fend for themselves in the complex business world.

So what can these schools do in order to improve on the ethical decision making track record of their graduates.  Joel Podolny of the Harvard Business Review has some ideas that include stopping the ranking system of schools (and thus stopping the cutthroat mentality), increase the amount of qualitative research (diversifying education and limiting the focus on just hard numbers), and diversifying the education (have more ethics discussions) (Podolny, 2009).  Doing these things hopefully will show future business leaders that the bottom line is not always the bottom line; that numbers can be misleading, especially if they were achieved unethically.  As luck would have it, there are business schools out there that have taken notice of the unethical practices that have started to implement some of Podolny’s ideas.  Schools like Michigan State, the Universities of Colorado and Pittsburg, and Katz Graduate School of business have all started requiring ethical discussions in class (Korn, 2013).  While it will require some time to see if their efforts work since the graduates will have to work their way up the ladder, having at least a few ethical business leaders out there certainly will not hurt!

 

Kostigen, T. (2009, Jan 15). The 10 most unethical people in business. Retrieved from http://www.marketwatch.com/story/the-10-most-unethical-people-in-business

Podolny, J. (2009). The buck stops (and starts) at business school. Harvard Business Review, 87(6), 62-67. Retrieved from http://web.ebscohost.com.ezproxy.libproxy.db.erau.edu/ehost/detail?sid=ae0a377b-bb55-41cf-bf1e-8cdd0619f018@sessionmgr110&vid=1&hid=108&bdata=JnNpdGU9ZWhvc3QtbGl2ZQ==

Korn, M. (2013, Feb 6). Does an "a" in ethics have any value?. The Wall Street Journal. Retrieved from http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887324761004578286102004694378.html