Ethics →
- 12 Mar 2014
- Lessons from the Classroom
Managing the Family Business: Firing the CEO
Firing a CEO is never easy—but the task gets even more difficult in a family business. John A. Davis discusses when to change out the chief executive. Open for comment; 0 Comments.
- 12 Feb 2014
- Research & Ideas
Private Sector, Public Good
What role, if any, does business have in creating social good? A new seminar series at Harvard Business School tackles this complex question. Closed for comment; 0 Comments.
- 18 Dec 2013
- HBS Case
Lessons from the Lance Armstrong Cheating Scandal
Clayton S. Rose's recent case study looks at the behavior of teammates who were swept up in Lance Armstrong's cheating scandal. When do followers need to break away from their leader? Closed for comment; 0 Comments.
- 28 Oct 2013
- Research & Ideas
Book Excerpt: The Good Struggle: Responsible Leadership in an Unforgiving World
In a turbulent, sometimes dangerous world, responsible leaders need a broader view of critical decisions. An excerpt from Joseph L. Badaracco's new book. Closed for comment; 0 Comments.
- 28 Oct 2013
- Research & Ideas
Responsible Leadership in an Unforgiving World
In a provocative new book, Joseph Badaracco argues that our world is increasingly characterized by struggle—for labor, technology, funds, and partners. Leaders who embrace that struggle can also reap its rewards. Closed for comment; 0 Comments.
- 14 Aug 2013
- Working Paper Summaries
Firm Competitiveness and Detection of Bribery
Bribery is widespread around the world, illegal, detrimental to economic progress and social stability, and at the same time it can have clear economic benefits for a firm. While the benefits of bribery for a firm, through acquisition of contracts or avoidance of government bureaucracy, are intuitive and well documented, the costs after detection are less well understood. In this paper the author examines how the impact on firm competitiveness from the detection of bribery varies with the identity of the initiator, the method bribery was detected, and the firm's response after detection. All three dimensions are significantly associated with the impact on firm competitiveness. In addition, the data suggest that the most significant impact is on employee morale, followed by business relations and reputation, and then regulatory relations. Key concepts include: Internally initiated bribery from senior executives is correlated with higher likelihood of significant impact. Bribery cases detected by the internal control systems of the firm are associated with a lower likelihood of significant impact on the business and regulatory relations of a firm. Firms that responded by firing an employee or ceasing business relations with outside parties that initiated the bribery have lower likelihood of significant impact. Understanding how managers' perceptions of impact on firm competitiveness vary with characteristics of the bribery case is likely to provide with useful evidence on how managers think of the costs of bribery. Closed for comment; 0 Comments.
- 29 Jul 2013
- Research & Ideas
A Manager’s Moral Obligation to Preserve Capitalism
Harvard Business School's Rebecca M. Henderson and Karthik Ramanna argue that company managers have a moral obligation to preserve capitalism. Closed for comment; 0 Comments.
- 01 May 2013
- What Do You Think?
Why Isn’t ‘Servant Leadership’ More Prevalent?
Summing Up: After plowing through an unusually full inbox of reader e-mails, Jim Heskett wonders whether the term "servant leadership" is an oxymoron? Closed for comment; 0 Comments.
- 13 Feb 2013
- Research & Ideas
5 Weight Loss Tips From Behavioral Economists
Behavioral economists study what motivates people to buy, save, donate, and any other number of actions that build society. The following studies reveal proven methods of encouraging healthy eating and exercise. Open for comment; 0 Comments.
- 10 Dec 2012
- Research & Ideas
Why We Blab Our Intimate Secrets on Facebook
Leslie K. John and colleagues set out to discover the reason behind a common discrepancy: While many of us purport to be concerned about Internet privacy, we seem to have no worries about sharing our most intimate details on Facebook. Closed for comment; 0 Comments.
- 29 Oct 2012
- Research & Ideas
Are You Paying a Tip--or a Bribe?
Both are rewards for service, so why is one considered outside the boundaries of ethical behavior? Harvard Business School professor Magnus Thor Torfason on the thin line. Open for comment; 0 Comments.
- 18 Jul 2012
- Research & Ideas
Penn State Lesson: Today’s Cover-Up was Yesterday’s Opportunity
While leaders may rationalize that a cover-up protects the interests of their organizations, the inevitable damage harms their institutions far more than acknowledging a mistake, says professor Bill George. Closed for comment; 0 Comments.
- 05 Jul 2012
- What Do You Think?
Why Is Trust So Hard to Achieve in Management?
Summing Up There are many reasons for the trust gap between employees and management—but also many ways to bridge the divide, according to Jim Heskett's readers. What do YOU think? Closed for comment; 0 Comments.
- 11 Jun 2012
- Research & Ideas
When Business Competition Harms Society
In highly competitive markets, many firms are likely to bend the rules if doing so will keep their customers from leaving for a rival, according to new research by professor Michael W. Toffel and colleagues. Case in point: service stations that cheat on auto emissions testing. Key concepts include: Vehicle owners are less likely to return to a service facility that has failed their vehicle in an auto emissions test. Vehicles were much more likely to pass the test if they were tested at a facility that was located near a competitor. Managers should be aware that fostering a culture of intense competition may instead induce unethical behavior. Closed for comment; 0 Comments.
- 04 Jun 2012
- Research & Ideas
The Business of Life
Scholarly economic theory applies to more than just business. The same causal mechanisms that drive big corporations to success can be just as effective in driving our personal lives, says Professor Clayton M. Christensen. Closed for comment; 0 Comments.
- 09 May 2012
- Research & Ideas
Clayton Christensen’s “How Will You Measure Your Life?”
World-renowned innovation expert Clayton M. Christensen explores the personal benefits of business research in the forthcoming book How Will You Measure Your Life? Coauthored with James Allworth and Karen Dillon, the book explains how well-tested academic theories can help us find meaning and happiness not just at work, but in life. Open for comment; 0 Comments.
- 15 Feb 2012
- Op-Ed
Occupy Wall Street Protestors Have a Point
The concerns of the Occupy Wall Street movement are not far different from what business leaders have told professors Joseph L. Bower, Herman B. Leonard, and Lynn S. Paine. Closed for comment; 0 Comments.
- 26 Jan 2012
- Working Paper Summaries
Behavioral Ethics: Toward a Deeper Understanding of Moral Judgment and Dishonesty
What makes even good people cross ethical boundaries? Society demands that business and professional schools address ethics, but the results have been disappointing. This paper argues that a behavioral approach to ethics is essential because it leads to understanding and explaining moral and immoral behavior in systematic ways. The authors first define business ethics and provide an admittedly biased history of the attempts of professional schools to address ethics as a subject of both teaching and research. They next briefly summarize the emergence of the field of behavioral ethics over the last two decades, and turn to recent research findings in behavioral ethics that could provide helpful directions for a social science perspective to ethics. These new findings on both intentional and unintentional unethical behavior can inform new courses on ethics as well as new research investigations. Such new directions can meet the demands of society more effectively than past attempts of professional schools. They can also produce a meaningful and significant change in the behavior of both business school students and professionals. Key concepts include: Shifting the modes of thought can lead to profound differences in how we make ethical decisions. This has implications at the individual and at the societal level. Until recently, little empirical attention was given to how people actually behave when they face ethical dilemmas and decisions or to how their behavior can be improved. A behavioral ethics approach does not teach students how they should behave when facing ethical dilemmas, nor inform them about what philosophers or ethicists would recommend. Instead it sees an opportunity in helping students and professionals better understand their own behavior in the ethics domain, and compare it to how they would ideally like to behave. Behavioral ethics identifies levers at both the individual and the institutional level to change ethically questionable behaviors when individuals are acting in unethical ways that they would not endorse with greater reflection. Prior to the 1990s, it was rare for professional schools to have a significant focus on the area of ethics (or business ethics more specifically) in the courses offered to students. Courses that were taught used philosophical approaches or suggested that morality is a rather stable personality trait that individuals develop by going through differences phases of development. Closed for comment; 0 Comments.
- 07 Dec 2011
- Research & Ideas
Are Creative People More Dishonest?
In a series of studies, Francesca Gino and Dan Ariely found that inherently creative people tend to cheat more than noncreative people. Furthermore, they showed that inducing creative behavior tends to induce unethical behavior. It's a sobering thought in a corporate culture that champions out-of-the-box thinking. Closed for comment; 0 Comments.
Morality Rebooted: Exploring Simple Fixes to Our Moral Bugs
Although scholars know far more now than they used to about the conditions under which individuals are likely to behave, current understandings are still primarily descriptive. This paper responds to the challenge of advancing knowledge of unethical behavior from largely descriptive research to a framework aimed to reduce or even eliminate unethical behavior in organizations. The goal is twofold: First, the authors identify approaches to mitigating unethical behavior based on empirical evidence from existing research in moral psychology and behavioral ethics. Second, they develop a framework for evaluating different strategies with prescriptive recommendations on how to reduce unethical behaviors. Overall they find that ethical fixes emerge in two broad categories: values-oriented and structure-oriented approaches. Values-oriented approaches shift people's preferences to be moral, whereas structure-oriented approaches seek to design incentives, decisions, and tasks such that the unethical option is less tempting. Based on theory and empirical findings, the authors propose that adopting both values-oriented and structure-oriented approaches mitigates the risk of adverse effects from one strategy taken from a single approach. Key concepts include: This paper discusses the power of subtle changes and shows how they can point our moral compass toward a more ethical direction. The distinction the authors draw between values-oriented and structure-oriented approaches demonstrates that there is no one right approach to reduce unethical behavior in organizations and society more broadly. The prescriptions based on ethics research discussed here are grounded in economic and psychological models of unethical behavior. Closed for comment; 0 Comments.