As a CEO of an organization, one should be ethical and lead by example. He or she is seen as the face of the company and should constantly think what his or her actions will reflect upon the company as a whole. If the CEO is unethical or takes part in corrupt behavior, how is the rest of the organization run? When the head of the company is immoral, the rest of the employees do not have much to look up to.
One of the more recent scandals among the business world has to do with the CEO of Hewlett-Packard, Mark Hurd. In August of 2010, Hurd stepped down due to an alleged breach in the sexual harrasment policy. After some investigation, it was found that he did not break any of these rules, but Hurd did take part in "'numerous instances where the contractor received compensation and or expense reimbursement where there was not a legitimate business purpose,'" taken from an article from http://www.msn.com/.
View full article here: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/38597967/ns/business-consumer_news/
Other employees within Hewlett-Packard must have been aware of what was going on. Someone had to sign off on the expense reimbursements, why do you think no one came forward about this act? If you knew the CEO of the organization you work for was practicing unethical behavior, what would you do?
Posted by: Jenny Liechti
I led a team that wrote an 85 page paper on HP last semester for MQM 385. Needless to say, I learned a great deal about HP. While researching the company, I came across this news story. We attacked this report from every angle. There is one particular line of thought that we explored. HP was having serious financial problems. The company was struggling to compete in the global marketplace. That is, until HP made the decision to hire Mark Hurd from outside the company to run the show. HP utilized a policy that promoted executives from within. However, an exception was made for Mark.
ReplyDeleteImmediately, Mark made an impact at HP. He transformed HP's processes and elevated the company to new heights. HP quickly became one of the most successful technology companies in multiple categories. This was all great news until the scandal broke out.
This raises an interesting ethical question. Would you tolerate an unethical leader who has posted record-breaking profits for shareholders and employees alike? Many people personally gained financial success during this time period. If you or I heard about this situation, it would be an easy call: report the unethical behavior. But what if we stood to gain thousands upon thousands of dollars? Millions of dollars in the case of the company as a whole. Would we make the same decision? Just something to think about...
Regards,
Jarek Palmer (BBB)
Dr. Sheep's feedback for your team:
ReplyDeleteIn general, you are off to a relatively good start on your blog. Your posts are interesting in terms of raising issues and questions related to ethics and corporate social responsibility. However, I would encourage you to improve your blog posts in the following ways.
First, several of your posts need to go beyond simply linking an article and then summarizing it followed by a few questions. The questions may be good ones, but you should also provide your own analysis of the article based on a clear and specific application of OB concepts or theories to provide enlightenment and insight into what you have posted. Thus, some of your posts only rise to the level of “reporting,” not analysis.
A relatively good example of applying concepts is your post about former Gov. Blagojevich and how the power-dependency relationship from Chapter 13 applies as a possible explanation of his behavior. Your blog overall would improve if all of the posts were more consistently and intentionally analytical in showing how OB concepts and theories apply to your article (or whatever you post) to offer insight beyond what the article itself states.
Second, we do not know who made the post about Michael Scott because there is no name given on the post. This post at least attempts to apply Herzberg’s two-factor theory, so it would be good to know who posted this.
Third, some of your posts attempt to apply concepts, but are non-specific or ambiguous in how they are being applied. For example, one post might potentially make a point worth pondering: “If someone is working in a negative environment, and dealing with narcissistic coworkers, they are going to be much less motivated.” However, much clearer explanation is needed here (and a precise psychological definition of narcissism—it’s somewhat different than the vernacular) to be specific about the point being made. Otherwise, why is the question being raised? Don’t rely on the article to explain this because, again, you are graded on the specificity and quality of what you say, not what your article says. (With that said, I do appreciate this post for being the first to take the team beyond the “ethical” issues to problematic issues in general—this is more what your blog is supposed to be about, not just ethics alone because that is the topic of another blog).
Overall, keep up the good work in terms or raising interesting issues, and then improve on your specific application of OB course concepts. This would make your blog a more valuable resource for the rest of the MQM 221 class in future posts.