Discussion: View Thread

I think you are dreaming.

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On Apr 5, 2009, at 4:19 PM, George Graen <Lmxlotus@AOL.COM> wrote:

I've just returned from the Organizational Psychologists meeting in New Orleans with a fresh understanding of the financial crash of 9-11-08.  It has become clear that our corporate system based in the US is obsolete and requires building a more up-to-date one.  Clearly, organizations systematically selected, trained and rewarded outrageously managers and professionals that were strongly wealth-driven and without ethics or fear of consequences.  Once the regulators were pressured to not slow down the money machines, the bubble went wild then exploded suddenly.

 

We need to build a new corporate meta-system in which managers and professionals are selected, developed, and rewarded for their ethical and responsible performance for stakeholders and regulators are developed and supervised to do their jobs.  I think management faculty in economics, psychology and sociology have important roles to play in building the new responsible corporation.  What do you think?

 

George Graen

/jag

---

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There is sometimes a thin line between a dream and an ambitious but not-impossible goal. To what George says I would add that Management Schools need to select Management Faculty on the basis of their ethical values and willingness to do their best to impart them to their students. We need to develop in business schools a sense of corporate mission to contribute to the good of society not simply by teaching people how to make quick money, but rather by teaching them how to create a business environment suitable for sustainable money-making in the long term. This is not an utopian dream. My School has such strong corporate values, and the readiness to embrace those values is part of the selection criteria. We may not be 100% successful in passing on those values to our students, but we do have evidence that there is an impact, and this is what matters. Of course it will take a long time before the whole system gets sanitized; but at least we can try, and acknowledge the positive impact of a few additional people becoming more ethical each year.

Chantal Epie

Associate Professor

Lagos Business School

Pan-African University

Lagos, Nigeria.

I think you need to read more on the subject of corporate responsibility.

It appears to me that this discussion seems to be taking an "either/or" approach to the focus of finances and economics.  It seems that we can either have organizations and people who are financially successful, which seems to indicate that they are greedy, or we can have organizations and people who are fulfilling a larger corporate and individual responsibility to the world.  This seems to pit successful economics on one side and relationship building on the other, which just sets us up for the pendulum effect as we swing back and forth between the two.  Yet, I am unsure why they should be mutually exclusive.

The American Indian Medicine Wheel teaches us that the goal is not to seek an abundance of just one thing, but to find balance in all things.  Both Relationships and Economics appear in the teachings of the Medicine Wheel, but not on opposite sides.  Rather, Relationships reside in the South and Economics reside in the West.  Understanding this, we can quickly realize that simply focusing on these two areas alone will not help organizations be the kind of organizations that I think we all would like to see.  By only focusing on these two areas we see that we quickly become unbalanced towards the southwest. 

We have to keep in mind that to the North is the area of the Social/Political.  This area defines the constraints and what we must be doing in order to insure that the organization will have the ability to take action.  As much as many would like to point towards the outside of the organization, it is involved just as much with the internal operations, if not more so.  And to the East is the area of Culture.  This area is where we are concerned with creating the kind of climate, again, internally, to insure the longevity of the organization. 

Around the outside of the Circle are Values.  Values are the constraints upon our actions as we seek to achieve the goals within each of the four aspects: Relationships, Economics, Social/Political, and Culture.  These aren't universal Values, but rather Values specific to each organization that will assist it to achieve its Purpose, which is located at the center of the Circle.  Purpose is defined as "why the organization exists, other than to just make money."  Purpose gives meaning and reason for the existence of the organization and for the positions within the organization. 

There is no reason why an organization, or an individual, can't make money.  We just have to realize that it is not the sole reason for the existence of the organization, nor is it the sole goal or measure of achievement for the organization.  We can make as much money as we want as long as we insure that it is in balance with and insure the growth in the other three aspect areas; as long as it is accomplished within the boundaries of the Values; and as long as it furthers the Purpose. 

Perhaps if we were able to move away from the typical "either/or" approach towards dealing with money as we teach managers and instead help them see the larger picture of how money fits within achieving the Purpose of the organization, we might have a greater and longer lasting impact.  In the end, Capitalism remains intact, just as does Social Responsibility.  Being economically successful does not have to equate to "greed" as long as we and the organization remain in balance. 

Thank you Gary.  Am I correct when I translate your comments to mean that "maximizing the wealth of the shareholders" is not consistent with the model you present?

Some e-mails ago the word paradigm was used.  Since Reagonism began about 1980 we have been functioning under a paradigm for "market driven economy" where the purpose of business was to "maximize the wealth of the shareholders." 

There is an interesting paper at http://mitsloan.mit.edu/50th/pdf/corpcitizenship.pdf

C.

-----Original Message-----
From: Management Education and Development Discussion [mailto:MG-ED-DV@AOMLISTS.PACE.EDU] On Behalf Of Gary Lear
Sent: Monday, April 06, 2009 3:26 PM
To: MG-ED-DV@AOMLISTS.PACE.EDU
Subject: Re: Financial crash of 9-11-08

It appears to me that this discussion seems to be taking an "either/or" approach to the focus of finances and economics.  It seems that we can either have organizations and people who are financially successful, which seems to indicate that they are greedy, or we can have organizations and people who are fulfilling a larger corporate and individual responsibility to the world.  This seems to pit successful economics on one side and relationship building on the other, which just sets us up for the pendulum effect as we swing back and forth between the two.  Yet, I am unsure why they should be mutually exclusive.

The American Indian Medicine Wheel teaches us that the goal is not to seek an abundance of just one thing, but to find balance in all things.  Both Relationships and Economics appear in the teachings of the Medicine Wheel, but not on opposite sides.  Rather, Relationships reside in the South and Economics reside in the West.  Understanding this, we can quickly realize that simply focusing on these two areas alone will not help organizations be the kind of organizations that I think we all would like to see.  By only focusing on these two areas we see that we quickly become unbalanced towards the southwest. 

We have to keep in mind that to the North is the area of the Social/Political.  This area defines the constraints and what we must be doing in order to insure that the organization will have the ability to take action.  As much as many would like to point towards the outside of the organization, it is involved just as much with the internal operations, if not more so.  And to the East is the area of Culture.  This area is where we are concerned with creating the kind of climate, again, internally, to insure the longevity of the organization. 

Around the outside of the Circle are Values.  Values are the constraints upon our actions as we seek to achieve the goals within each of the four aspects: Relationships, Economics, Social/Political, and Culture.  These aren't universal Values, but rather Values specific to each organization that will assist it to achieve its Purpose, which is located at the center of the Circle.  Purpose is defined as "why the organization exists, other than to just make money."  Purpose gives meaning and reason for the existence of the organization and for the positions within the organization. 

There is no reason why an organization, or an individual, can't make money.  We just have to realize that it is not the sole reason for the existence of the organization, nor is it the sole goal or measure of achievement for the organization.  We can make as much money as we want as long as we insure that it is in balance with and insure the growth in the other three aspect areas; as long as it is accomplished within the boundaries of the Values; and as long as it furthers the Purpose. 

Perhaps if we were able to move away from the typical "either/or" approach towards dealing with money as we teach managers and instead help them see the larger picture of how money fits within achieving the Purpose of the organization, we might have a greater and longer lasting impact.  In the end, Capitalism remains intact, just as does Social Responsibility.  Being economically successful does not have to equate to "greed" as long as we and the organization remain in balance. 

Carolyn,

Thank you for your question, and thank you for the article. 

I am not sure that "maximizing the wealth of the shareholders" would be precluded from the model that I have offered.  Again, this is not an "either/or" situation.  We can maximize wealth of shareholders at the same time as we insure balance in the other areas by maximizing them.  After all, there is a considerable body of research that seems to show that when organizations maximize all of the other areas that they also maximize financial performance, which can lead to maximized shareholder wealth. 

In addition, we do have to define our term of wealth, the time frame, and the constraints in which we will be maximizing it.  Will we get the shareholders the maximum wealth over the course of a quarter?  A year?  Or consistently over many years?  How are we measuring "wealth?"  Is it through stock price?  Dividends?  Increased book value of the organization?  A better world because of the products or services that the organization provides?  And are we going to operate within a set of laws, rules and regulations imposed by society?  Are we going to establish our own Values to guide our operations?  Or are we going to do what ever we want in maximizing that wealth?

If we are going to consistently provide value to the shareholders over time, then we must be doing things that will insure the long-term viability of the organization.  That includes, in addition to the economics, the building of relationships, the creation of the systems that will allow the organization to operate, and the creation of a healthy culture that will allow it to be sustainable; and operating within the boundaries of our Values.  After all, to do otherwise will eventually cause some set of shareholders to lose wealth through the eventual destruction of the organization, right?

So, no, I don't necessarily see that maximizing wealth for shareholders as being in opposition to the model that I've shared. 

Also, something that I think we have to keep in mind is that what seems to be the focus of most of our discussion are the for-profit, publically traded companies.  While having a huge impact on our society as a whole, it is wise to keep in mind that we have far more people employed by small, privately held companies, non-profit organizations, and a slew of governmental entities in the USA and around the world.  All have managers, and all have need of an understanding of how to help their organizations operate in the balanced approach that I've mentioned.  After all, they have an impact on the system, as well.

As for the article you referenced, I found it interesting, but still somewhat dichotomous.  As I shared, I believe that we should be looking at much more. 

After reading the responses to your excellent post, it occurs to me that several points are lacking:

1. Business schools have deliberately excludes faculty from the disciplines of philosophy, sociology, psychology, political science, and the other social sciences (not to mention public administration) from consideration in new hires; such disciplinary faculty typically are not graduates of AACSB accredited programs, which was a requirement for some time.  This has resulted in a deplorable condition of academic inbreeding.  I concur with your observation that it will take Ph.D. faculty from outside of the field of business to prompt some of the changes you advocate.
2. Much of the "greed" that many students exhibit is a function of their student loans and trying to work their way through school. This is a demonstrated driver to the fact that business majors comprise over half of the undergraduate majors in the <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:country-region w:st="on">United States</st1:country-region></st1:place>.
3. The difficulties we are experiencing now with the economic collapse have been perpetuated by the educated class.  Same was true of Enron. This should give every one of us as educators considerable pause, as our teaching has direct moral consequences.
4. Historically, decades ago, the Conference Board embraced a strong sense of employees and communities as stakeholders in business enterprise, and this view was widely practiced and assumed. Obviously, this changed over time. The dynamics of these changes, the associated consequences and impacts, are well worth a step back to examine.
5. The argument that it is legitimate to teach students how to take advantage of others with the expectation that the students will obtain wealth and then give back to the community/university, becoming philanthropists, is one that any ethics/philosophy professor can easily dismantle. 
6. In my day, academic buildings were named for leaders of the nation and community: Washington Hall, Mason Hall, Monroe Hall, etc. These names represented our icons to emulate.  That practice on many campuses has since been replaced by corporations as the icons.
7. A question worth asking:  How has U.S higher education (in general and structurally) contributed to fostering a culture of greed in the <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:country-region w:st="on">United States</st1:country-region></st1:place>?

Many thanks for launching this valuable conversation.

Best regards, Laurie

From: George Graen [mailto:Lmxlotus@AOL.COM]

Ben

The Aspen Institute has a curriculum, perhaps now still in the pilot phase of development, on Giving Voice to Values, created in collaboration with the Yale School of Management, also with contributions from Columbia School of Business, Harvard Business School, University of Texas-Austin, Net Impact, Babson College Center for Women's Leadership and others. Its focus is, not on ethical analysis, but on ethical implementation. We may be surprised how many people do have a true sense of right and wrong, but feel inhibited, insecure, embarrassed, helpless, at the moment of truth, and so they act as they think they are expected to act rather than acting as they think. The Giving Voice to Values programme gives them practice on articulating their values in the presence of their peers; in the process, there is a good chance that some with dysfunctional values exposed to the views of those with positive values will learn.

For me, values are more than just preferences. They are preferences that inform our decisions; once you focus on preferences that inform decisions affecting other people, you are bound to get into the area of ethics.

Regards

Chantal Epie

Associate Professor in Organizational Behaviour

Lagos Business School

Pan-African University

Lagos, Nigeria

www.lbs.edu.ng

Hi Gary and everyone,

I smiled and appreciated your comments below about beginning to think about your values system at age 55. I'm a little jealous because I didn't get to that point till 65. I'd like to describe some of what I discovered since then and ask you a question at the end that may help me understand a little more. I want to get some other perspectives and test my own beliefs.

First, I think of the definition of values as being personal standards or principles that influence our thinking, feeling, and behavior. What I've discovered since getting to 65 is that if I take my values and arrange them in a structure according to their cause-effect relationships it gives me what I would call a sense of my world view, or at least well on the way to understanding it. I'm not sure if what I mean by world view is what you mean. I do know it helps me in many ways understand why I (using your words) react the way I do. I'll be more specific and I'd be curious afterward about what you think.

These are my most important values IN THE CONTEXT OF WORK organized according to their cause-effect relationships. I've put them in the format of an organization chart type hierarchy and I'll describe the way I think about my values and how they work for me. Please keep in mind that the lower positioned values are causes of the values above them. SHARING causes or leads to the effect of RELATIONSHIPS. The top value of INNER PEACE (call it the CEO of my values) is the total effect of all my other values directly or indirectly. All the other values flow into INNER PEACE.

I hope the format of a rough triangle holds when you get the e-mail.

Inner peace

Joy

Making a difference

Relationships   Breakthrough   Integrity

Sharing

The way it works for me is that when SHARING is present the way I want it, it's likely to lead to great RELATIONSHIPS. When RELATIONSHIPS, BREAKTHROUGH and INTEGRITY are being satisfied then I usually have great opportunities to MAKE A DIFFERENCE in the world of work. That leads to a feeling of JOY, which always brings a tear to my eyes and/or it leads to INNER PEACE. INNER PEACE is what I want more than anything else at the end of the day. In order to get INNER PEACE I know I must at least get SHARING, RELATIONSHIPS and INTEGRITY taken care of.

When I ask myself what each value means to me personally in the context of work (a short list for each value), it gets very deep and meaningful very quickly and explains many of the important things that have been driving me for decades, why I changed in certain ways over time, many of the most important work decisions I made during my life and much more. It helps me understand the vision I have for what's possible in organizations, relationships, technology and the world.

Understanding my values and especially realizing my most important value was INNER PEACE clarified for me the purpose of my life and work.  It made me realize that deeply understanding our most important values can help us be at peace with ourselves ... which can help us be at peace with the people we love, live and work with. That life experience in turn can help us develop a model within ourselves of what it takes to have peace in the world. After all, can we really have sustainable peace in the world without the capability to create and experience peace in our own worldly corner?

So I believe our values can help us understand our world view and/or cause us to make changes in our life that alter our world view.

I'm curious if those are at least some of the elements of what you mean by world view. If not, I'd appreciate it if you would describe what you mean by world view so I could test if I could apply my values to that and see what I might learn. Or perhaps there are some elements of what I've said that don't seem to make logical sense.

Best regards,

Manny

Manny Elkind

Mindtech, Inc.

35 Williams Road

Sharon, MA 02067

Tel: 781-784-2315

Fax: 781-784-4764

E-mail: melkind@mindtech3.com

Website:www.mindtech3.com

-----Original Message-----
From: Management Education and Development Discussion [mailto:MG-ED-DV@AOMLISTS.PACE.EDU] On Behalf Of Gary Lundquist
Sent: Monday, April 06, 2009 3:40 PM
To: MG-ED-DV@AOMLISTS.PACE.EDU
Subject: Re: Financial crash of 9-11-08

Colleagues,

I read with interest your dialog on preparation in school for ethical

behavior when employed.  Requests for paths to values have not been met. 

I discovered my lack of value system at age 55.  I had values, but not a

clear value system.  So I asked myself, simply, what do I value?  How do

these topics on my brand new list inter-relate?  Why do I value these

topics?  Do others value the same or similar?

Where did I learn to value these topics?  When?  What values are most

important to me?

Ask your students simple questions.  In management courses, focus the values

on business. 

The problem, however, may be bigger than values.  We are dealing with whole

paradigms.  Whole worldviews.  We rarely notice our paradigms.  Fish don't

know their environment is wet.  We act and react from perspectives taught by

family, church, schools, community, and nation.  We just don't know why we

react the way we do.

We don't know how thoroughly conditioned we are.  ("We" includes professors

as well as students.)

Best,

Gary

...........................................

Gary Lundquist

Director@InnoSearchColorado.com

Colorado Resources*for Innovation

303-840-9929*

...........................................

GaryL@Market-Engineering.com

  Innovation of Business and

  the Business of InnovationT 

-----Original Message-----

From: Management Education and Development Discussion

[mailto:MG-ED-DV@AOMLISTS.PACE.EDU] On Behalf Of Daniel E. Martin

Sent: Monday, April 06, 2009 12:47 PM

To: MG-ED-DV@AOMLISTS.PACE.EDU

Subject: Re: Financial crash of 9-11-08

Folks,

Good to be talking about the issue on both the social and intrapersonal

level. It seems we are dealing with an ethically attenuated group of

students at least in terms of cheating and consensual racism (McCabe &

Trevino, 1995; Roig & Ballew, 1994; Sidanius, Pratto, Martin, & Stallworth,

1991) irrespective of the best intentions of faculty. Most would argue it is

too late to truly alter values or shift predispositions/traits.

Please suggest worthwhile literature regarding the effectiveness of ethics

classes. I'd be happy to see what has worked up to this point.

Best,

Dan 

-----Original Message-----

From: Management Education and Development Discussion

[mailto:MG-ED-DV@AOMLISTS.PACE.EDU] On Behalf Of Carolyn Fausnaugh

Sent: Monday, April 06, 2009 10:20 AM

To: MG-ED-DV@AOMLISTS.PACE.EDU

Subject: Re: Financial crash of 9-11-08

Another good response.  What are techniques for having people discover their

personal values?

C.

Carolyn J. Fausnaugh PhD CPA

Assistant Professor of Strategy & New Ventures

College of Business

Florida Institute of Technology

150 W. University Boulevard

Melbourne, Florida 32901 - 6975

321-674-7375  Office Phone

321-674-8896  FAX

cfausnau@fit.edu  E-mail

-----Original Message-----

From: Management Education and Development Discussion

[mailto:MG-ED-DV@AOMLISTS.PACE.EDU] On Behalf Of Mansfield Elkind

Sent: Monday, April 06, 2009 1:12 PM

To: MG-ED-DV@AOMLISTS.PACE.EDU

Subject: Re: Financial crash of 9-11-08

It may make sense to take the road back to personal values again. When

executives or students discover their most important personal values in the

context of work it provides a built-in gyroscope that can keep them on

purpose relative to what's most important to them deeply and personally when

they're making decisions, communicating and behaving. Values almost

automatically redirect people away from committing ethics violations. Money

is very rarely an important value and that's a shocker for a lot of people

when they discover their values. Unfortunately, hardly anyone is aware of

their most important values.

It's usually a challenge to discover one's most important values but it's

typically surprising to people how easy it is to apply them. I believe that

discovering one's personal values is one of the key's for dealing with the

important issues that I've enjoyed reading about in your discussions.

Manny

Manny Elkind

Mindtech, Inc.

35 Williams Road

Sharon, MA 02067

Tel: 781-784-2315

Fax: 781-784-4764

E-mail: melkind@mindtech3.com

Website:www.mindtech3.com

-----Original Message-----

From: Management Education and Development Discussion

[mailto:MG-ED-DV@AOMLISTS.PACE.EDU] On Behalf Of Zane Berge

Sent: Monday, April 06, 2009 11:52 AM

To: MG-ED-DV@AOMLISTS.PACE.EDU

Subject: Re: Financial crash of 9-11-08

It seems to me that if a person or people in a company are unethical,

he/she/they can not maximize profits.  While good to bring up ethical

considerations whenever an issue or opportunity arises, to focus on ethics

(in other than a business ethics class) may be senseless.

Regards,

Zane

Zane Berge, Ph.D.

Professor of Education

berge@umbc.edu

www.emoderators.com