Transcript Virtues and Virtuous

CRITICAL QUESTION
• HOW DO WE DEFINE WHO WE
ARE?
Corporate Roles, Personal Virtues: An
Aristotelian Approach to Business Ethics
Solomon
• Trade in home is
appropriate
• Trade for profit is not
• One has to think of
oneself as a member
of a larger community
• Our sense of self as a
virtuous person is
defined by that larger
community
Six Dimensions of Virtue
• COMMUNITY
– We are members of a community and our self
interest lies in community
– When we work we make the organization our
community.
• EXCELLENCE
– Excellence is more than following rules and not
doing harm to others. It is constantly raising
the bar. It exhibits itself in our thoughts,
ideas, feelings, action and how we construct our
community.
• ROLE IDENTITY
– Our ethical standard is partially defined by the
role we play in society.
• INTEGRITY
– Provides an anchor against disintegration. It
integrates our roles and responsibilities and the
virtues that define them. MORAL COURAGE
• JUDGEMENT
– Good judgement is the product of upbringing
and education. It requires balancing concerns
and principles as well as justice and fairness.
• TOUGHNESS
– It is the willingness to do what is necessary to
keep organization viable. This is done knowing
it will cause pain and suffering. It is done with
compassion.
• HOLISM
– The process of separation of work, family and
community causes alienation. This separation
causes narrowness of focus in business activity,
education and organizational.
Moral Mazes: Bureaucracy and
Managerial Work
Jackall
• PROTESTANT WORK
ETHIC
– Control of human
impulses by work. The
greater the work the
greater the
accumulation of wealth.
Shifted to mean rugged
individualism to
financial success
BUREAUCRACY
• Started as a small collection of clerks.
Grew into major portion of most
organizations.
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Administrative hierarchies
Standardized work procedures
Regularized time tables
Uniform policies
Centralized control
Bureaucracy and Morality
• Pyramid of Politics
– Power Centralized,
allocated, decentralized
– Never achieve higher
status than boss
• Who Gets Credit
– Senior Management
escapes responsibility
by
• Avoiding decisions
• Delegate
• Involve large groups
of people
• PLEASE THE KING
– CEO throw back to
medieval times
• ORGANIZATIONS ARE
UNSTABLE
– Mergers, sales, low
performance create
power changes
• SUCCESS AND FAILURE
– Socially defined
– Luck is necessary but
capricious
TIPS FOR FUTURE
• APPEARANCE AND DRESS
• SELF CONTROL
– Be human but not
emotional
• STYLE
– Fast, Decisive,
Knowledgeable, Reflect
Organization’s
Standards
• PATRON POWER
– Godfathers, Mentors
necessary
• KNOW HOW TO PLAY
THE GAME
DOWNSIDE TO SYSTEM
ORGANIZATIONS CAN REMOVE THE
PERSON AND REPLACE THEM WITH
A REPRESENTATION OF A PERSON
(EMPTY SUIT)