A friend of mine (let’s call her Louise) recently came to town with her five-year-old daughter, who’s about to start kindergarten.  On the recommendation of a mutual acquaintance, Louise took her daughter to a local pediatrician for her pre-school physical, about two weeks before the school enrollment deadline.  That first visit was pretty traumatic for the little girl, involving blood tests and vaccinations, but it had to be done so the child could start school.  Louise was delighted with the doctor, who seemed exceptionally capable and personable.  She thought two weeks would be plenty of time for the doctor’s office to complete her daughter’s medical forms.

A week went by, and Louise heard nothing.  She called the pediatrician’s office, and was told that the doctor was on vacation that week and to call back in a few days.  Louise wasn’t too worried, because she still had another week before the medical forms absolutely had to be filed.  She got panicky, however, when she called the following Monday morning, was told to leave a message on the “nurse’s call line,” heard nothing all day, and ultimately learned from a voicemail message left after close of business that her daughter’s medical file was missing, including all of the test results, vaccination records, and the forms she needed for school. 

Louise’s story has a happy (or at least acceptable) ending.  The pediatrician’s administrative staff eventually found the file, filled in the forms, and sent Louise on her way to the school registrar.  Privately, though, Louise wonders whether she should switch pediatricians.  She really likes the doctor, but the snafu with the file has seriously shaken her trust.  Louise questions how competent a doctor who can’t train his staff to do something as basic as keeping track of new patients’ records can possiby be.

In my legal practice, I’ve dealt with a lot of professionals who leave “administrivia” to others so that they can concentrate on the more specialized work that they love.  (I can sympathize – paperwork has never been something I enjoy.)  But administration is a critical element of execution, and bad administrative work reflects poorly on any business owner, professional or otherwise.   

Take a look at your own company.  If files get misplaced, e-mails languish unanswered, calls go unreturned, or customers walk away dissatisfied, it’s time to give your administrators a shot of enthusiasm.  You may tend to underrate the importance of the work your administrative staff does but, to clients and customers, your administrators are your representatives.  Make sure they do you proud!

Topics: Business Ethics, business communications, customer relations, ethics | No Comments »

With the 2008 election nearing, it’s inevitable that voters’ interest in the candidates is increasing and the incentive to attack is growing on both sides.  The latest attack on presumptive Democratic nominee Barack Obama comes in the form of a book by conservative Jerome Corsi titled Obama Nation that portrays Senator Obama in far from flattering terms. 

Trouble is, according to the New York Times, “several of the book’s accusations are, in fact, unsubstantiated, misleading, or inaccurate,” and the Obama campaign vigorously denies Corsi’s allegations.

I’m not going to address Corsi’s representations here; he’s clearly an author with a strong point of view, and he has a First Amendment right to express it.  What troubles me, however, is that Simon & Schuster, a respected New York publishing house, apparently made little or no effort to fact-check the book before publishing it.  Yes, Senator Obama is a public figure (which significantly raises the legal threshhold for any defamation suit he might bring against Corsi or Simon & Schuster), but the fact that a publisher might have the legal right to publish inaccuracies doesn’t mean that it should.  A publisher can make a lot of money selling sensational accusations against public figures, but what a lousy way to make a buck.

The presumptive Presidential candidates are both strong men with clearly-articulated opinions, and there’s plenty of actual differences between them without distorting their respective records and points of view.  In my opinion, if Simon & Schuster chose to publish a book that could do serious damage to a Presidential candidate without taking the trouble to make sure that the allegations in that book were substantially true, the publisher seriously breached its ethical obligations to the reading public.

To read the New York Times article on “Obama Nation,” visit http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/13/us/politics/13book.html?scp=3&sq=Obama%20Nation&st=cse.

Topics: Business Ethics, Presidential Campaign, business communications, corporate responsibility, ethics | No Comments »

Continuing my series on ethical dilemmas facing the next President, let’s turn to a trend abroad that’s likely to affect all of our lives.  In his new book, The Post-American World, author Fareed Zakaria describes a world in which the United States will be an important, but no longer dominant, player in international economics, politics and cultural development.  Zakaria doesn’t predict an American decline; rather, he argues that the growth of other nations such as India, China, Brazil, and Russia will overtake America’s successes, making us just one of many powerful countries that must co-exist in a rapidly changing world.

In my experience, Americans tend to presume that our country has a natural, perhaps even God-given, right to dominate world culture and events.  America has been the land of opportunity for people from less prosperous nations, a beacon of hope for citizens of repressive dictatorships, and the home of a fun, funky, populist culture that has enchanted youngsters around the world.  (For example, McDonald’s has become the icon of American cuisine around the world, offering consistent if not especially excellent food at reasonable prices.  It’s not haute cuisine, but it doesn’t have to be.)  We’ve been on top for so long, Americans may take our superpower status for granted.

Zakaria forsees a world in which other countries, having learned from our successes, ascend to meet us face to face. If that happens, America will no longer be able to reign by fiat.  Our continuing influence will have to be earned through careful diplomacy, reasonable positions, and behavior becoming a nation that leads by example, not by birthright or force.

How will the next President conduct himself as the “leader of the free world”?  Would it be ethical to force continued American dominance on the rest of the world?  Would it be ethical for the United States to continue gorging on the world’s resources, especially when other countries now have both the need and the means to compete with us for them?  And if we sometimes lose that competition, how should the next President ethically respond?

Would your Presidential candidate have the courage to address this issue?  If so, what’s his position, and are you comfortable with it?  You decide.

Topics: Business Ethics | No Comments »

A month or two ago, NPR ran a very cute piece on a research study on procrastination conducted by Dr. Piers Steel of the University of Calgary’s Haskayne School of Business.  I’ve been meaning to write about it, but didn’t get to it until now.  (Actually, I felt a little guilty about putting it off until I went online to research the study and discovered that Dr. Steel published his findings over eighteen months ago.  Apparently NPR didn’t get around to it right away, either.)

In researching Dr. Steel’s study, I was struck by how tongue-in-cheek most of the reporting on it was.  (See, it’s not just me.)  Procrastination is one of those guilty pleasures that nearly all of us indulge in sometimes, and there’s undoubtedly a very real need for overworked Americans to take a break now and then.  I can hardly fault stressed-out reporters for taking the opportunity to joke a little as they wrote up Steel’s research, though I wonder if it bothered Dr. Steel that his research seemed to be taken so lightly.

Maybe we should look a little more seriously at Dr. Steel’s conclusions.  His ten-year study revealed that procrastionation is growing problem.  He reports that, in 1978, only about 5% of Americans thought of themselves as chronic procrastinators, but that number has grown to 26%.  We all know why, of course.  Technology has opened up a whole new world of tempting distractions, with TVs, Blackberries, Ipods, Web surfing, video games, and cellphones all offering attractive alternatives to the daily grind.  Steel estimates that the U.S. gross national product could rise by as much as $50 billion if new e-mail notifications suddenly disappeared from workers’ computers.  That’s a pretty significant chunk of change.

Where procrastination can become a business ethics issue is when dawdling runs up against inflexible deadlines.  Projects that get done in a hurry at the last possible moment are far more likely to contain significant errors and flaws, especially if there’s no time for peer review or other checking before they go out the door.  Consequently, putting work off until tomorrow may increase the risk that the final product will be of lower quality when it finally gets done, and that a client or customer will be seriously disappointed, perhaps even enough to sue.

I don’t know about you, but that’s enough incentive for me to turn off my e-mail notification and get back to work.

Topics: Business Ethics, Risk Management, customer relations, ethics | No Comments »

In my last post, I discussed human rights abuses in China and the ethical challenges that the next U.S. President will face in developing a foreign policy to address them.  It’s well known that the Chinese government takes a dim view of any kind of criticism, and routinely cracks down on dissidents and protesters who dare to challenge its policies.  One of the ways that China maintains its stranglehold on freedom of expression is to spy on its citizens online.  It has been estimated that the Chinese government closed down more than 18,000 individual blogs and websites since April of last year, and in August the Chinese censors started shutting down Internet data centers, too.  And it’s not as though the abuses stop there; critics of the Chinese government have been abducted and held incommunicado, restricted to house arrest, and even murdered.

What may be less well known, at least in the United States, is that the Chinese government carries out its censorship policies with substantial support from U.S. corporations, including Google, Yahoo and Microsoft.  In other words, companies formed in a country where freedom of speech (and particularly the right to criticize the government) is enshrined in its Constitution are actively helping the Chinese government to stifle the right of Chinese citizens to object to human rights abuses and report them to the rest of the world.  It may very well be that these U.S. companies, by helping the Chinese government, have supported the abduction, house arrest or execution of Chinese citizens whose only crime was to speak out against a repressive regime.

How ethical is that?

I recognize that these companies have a legal right to do what they’re doing, and that any refusal on their part to support the Chinese government’s surveillance activities would probably get them kicked out of the country.  I also recognize that China is a potential gold mine, that it would be tough to walk away from all that revenue, and that if U.S. companies don’t do business in China companies from other countries undoubtedly will.   However, just because U.S. companies can help the Chinese government censor its citizens doesn’t mean that they should.  In my opinion, it’s time for U.S. Internet companies to take a long, hard look at their business practices in China, and think about whether the money they’re making is worth the ethical price they pay.

Topics: Business Ethics, Social Ethics, corporate responsibility, ethics | No Comments »

With the Olympics going on in Beijing this week, it seems like a good time to consider what the next President’s diplomatic strategy for China will be. 

The decision to allow China to host the Olympic games was certainly a controversial one, as the protests that greeted the Olympic torch around much of the world demonstrated.  No surprise; China’s record on human rights is appalling.  The Chinese government maintains one of the most extensive and repressive police systems in the world, imposing layers of controls on protesters, critics and social activists.  Suppression of free speech is the norm; China’s system of Internet surveillance and censorship has been called the most advanced in the world.  The Chinese government retains tight controls over the legal system, making it incredibly difficult for ordinary citizens to obtain access to justice.  China’s policies on labor rights, children’s rights, reproductive rights, gender discrimination, and freedom of religion are positively medieval.  Citizens are forcibly resettled to make room for new infrastructure and environmental projects; preparations for the Olympic games accelerated the mandatory evictions.  China has also famously cracked down hard on all efforts to achieve regional autonomy in Tibet and Xinjang, and has blamed the Dalai Lama, spiritual head of the Tibetan Buddhist religion (and, incidentally, a winner of the Nobel Peace Prize), for its repressive actions in Tibet.    

None of this is news to the U.S. government.  For a depressingly lengthy list of China’s human rights abuses, check out the State Department’s Website at http://www.state.gov/g/drl/rls/hrrpt/2003/27768.htm.  At the same time, however, China is a rising international power, with a population of over 1.3 billion people.  Recent projections indicate that China will surpass the United States as the world’s largest manufacturer as early as next year.  Americans certainly enjoy the comforts afforded by inexpensive Chinese goods; almost anything you purchased recently was probably made in China.  And China has enjoyed some notable diplomatic successes of late, particularly in Africa.  The Dalai Lama himself has urged the world community to welcome China … while holding it accountable for improving human rights. 

China is well aware that the Western world does not approve of its approach to human rights, and dismisses criticism from the U.S. as inappropriate meddling in China’s internal affairs.  This suggests that, for the next President, words alone won’t be enough to spur China to improve its human rights record.  Would it be ethical for the next President to continue normalizing relations and trading with China without taking appropriate steps to address human rights abuses?  What should those steps be?  And at what point does it become unethical for the U.S. to interfere in how another nation’s government deals with its citizens?   

What is your candidate’s position on China, and are you okay with that?  You decide.

Topics: Presidential Campaign, Social Ethics, ethics | 2 Comments »

Of late, I’ve noticed a disturbing trend growing in the world of human relations and corporate governance.  Increasingly, employers seem to feel that, unless they have expressly and specifically prohibited specific unethical conduct, they can’t discipline employees who misbehave in that particular way.  Consequently, if an employee lies to a customer, pilfers petty cash or bullies a co-worker –but hasn’t been told very specifically not to do that – employers may just throw up their hands, rewrite their employee handbooks, and let the employee off with a warning “not to do it again.”

With due respect, I don’t think this approach works very well.  It tends to result in employee handbooks that look more like telephone directories than documents that the average employee would ever use or even read, and it doesn’t teach employees that ethical behavior is expected as a fundamental part of the company’s culture.  It also allows management to avoid taking tough action against problem employees, and weakens a company’s overall ethical stance. 

There are lots of good reasons for a company to have a code of ethics (more on that in future posts), and to set out its policies in a clear, well-written employee handbook.  But getting down into minutiae misses the point.  I believe that every company has the right to adopt a strong policy that unethical conduct on the part of its employees will not be tolerated, and to enforce that policy as long as the company complies with the law and acts in good faith.  “If it’s not prohibited, it must be permitted” is a bad foundation for a company’s ethical culture.

Topics: Business Ethics, Corporate Governance, ethics | No Comments »

In a recent report to the Senate Judiciary Committee, Inspector General Glenn Fine said that one of former Attorney General Alberto Gonzales’ top advisors violated federal civil service laws by regularly considering political affiliations in screening candidates for career positions at the Department of Justice.  According to Fine, Gonzalez aide Monica Goodling chose candidates whom she perceived to be conservative (and supportive of President Bush) over those she thought were too liberal, with the result that high quality candidates were rejected in favor of less qualified ones.  Fine’s report describes one particularly troubling case where Goodling allegedly rejected a terrorism prosecutor for a job in counter-terrorism at DOJ because his wife was active in local Democratic Party politics; this well-qualified lawyer was passed over in favor of a less experienced (but conservative) candidate.

This story hits close to home because I started my legal career at the Justice Department, working for an Administration whose politics I did not share.  Although I disagreed with the political views of the appointees at the top of the agency, I was very proud to be part of “the nation’s law firm,” and I know first-hand what important work DOJ does to protect our country.  Politics may determine policy at the highest levels of government, but for career attorneys working down the hierarchy at Justice, competence is far more important than a particular point of view.

The lawyers at DOJ handle enormous, complex litigation involving millions of dollars and vital questions of law.  They try cases against tremendously skilled opponents from the best law firms in the United States.   If they lose because of inexperience or incompetence, the nation suffers.  The Bush Administration claims that protecting America from terrorism is a top priority; this is not the time to staff DOJ with second-class lawyers simply because they happen to share the President’s political perspective.

Do you think it was ethical for Goodling to play politics at the nation’s expense?  Then again, her appointees are now firmly entrenched in the Justice Department; would it be ethical for those people to lose their jobs simply because they were appointed for the wrong reason?  Has your candidate commented on the Inspector General’s report, and does he have a plan to address the situation?  What would he do, and are you okay with that?  You decide. 

Topics: Presidential Campaign, Social Ethics, ethics | 2 Comments »

One of the services I provide to clients is writing contracts and engagement letters for them to use when they start new business relationships.  Depending on what my client expects to be doing, the documents can get pretty complicated, spelling out the scope of work, the obligations of the other person, how and when my client will be paid, what work is due when, and so forth.  When I deliver the finished product, my clients sometimes give a sigh for the “good old days when business was done on a handshake.”

With due respect, I’m not sure those “good old days” were especially good from a business ethics standpoint.

I’ve never been in favor of taking a combative stance with clients and customers; to me, if you can’t work with someone from a position of mutual trust and respect, you really shouldn’t work with them at all, even if there’s a lot of money on the table.  At the same time, even the best-intentioned people can have misunderstandings and failures to communicate, and “handshake deals” offer lots of opportunities for both.  Without a written summary of what’s going to happen, it’s very easy for two people to talk right past each other, not discovering the differences in their expectations until something goes wrong.

A well-written contract or engagement letter protects both parties to a business transaction, spelling out what’s going to happen when and how so that no one gets unpleasantly surprised.  The goal isn’t necessarily to spell out every possible contingency, because unforeseen events have a funny way of happening regardless of how careful you are.  But in my opinion, a contract or engagement letter is a great tool to use to make sure that you and your client or customer have essentially the same understanding of how a business transaction is going to proceed.  Good communications support good ethics – contracts and engagements letters can be great communications tools.

Topics: Business Ethics, Risk Management, business communications, customer relations, ethics | No Comments »

Recently, a friend asked why so many of my blog posts focus on various aspects of apologies.  “It seems so narrow,” she said.  “Are apologies really all that important?”

You bet they are.

As a practicing attorney, I’ve had over twenty years’ experience dealing with other people’s problems.  (Let’s face it – regardless of how much they like me as a person, my clients usually call because they’re in some kind of trouble, not just to socialize.)   Frequently, clients call because something’s gone wrong or they’ve made a mistake in their businesses, and they’re afraid they may lose a job, a client or a customer, or even be sued.   Depending on the circumstances, we often agree that their best course of action is not to hunker down and get defensive, but to admit the mistake and apologize.

We live in an imperfect world, and things go wrong every day.  Going to court is an expensive, time-consuming and emotionally exhausting way to solve problems, and I rarely recommend it to anyone who asks me for advice.  In my experience, it’s usually far better for everyone involved if a mistake can be rectified outside of the courthouse with an effective apology.  That’s why I wrote my new book, The Art of the Apology.   My goal is to teach people how to apologize better, so they can mend professional and personal relationships more often and go to court less.

For more information about The Art of the Apology, go to www.artoftheapology.com.

Topics: Apologies, Business Ethics, Risk Management, business communications, customer relations, ethics | 1 Comment »

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