The Humor of Teaching Business Ethics

For about 8 years I have been teaching a course called Business Management at the University of Calgary. This introductory course covers all the basics of business: marketing, accounting, finance, operations, planning, human resources, etc.

One of the topics that I cover near the end of the course is business ethics . For this session I use a round table discussion and have each person present a situation where they had to make a decision that involved ethics – choosing right or wrong. I typically start the discussion by describing a time when our company ordered a new ink jet printer from Dell. We received the printer, all the cords and the discs with the printer drivers. The issue started shortly after receiving the printer when we changed computers and found that we had misplaced the discs. As a result, we couldn’t print. Normally, the printer drivers would be online for download but the printer was so new that this option was not available. I called Dell and they said they would send us replacement discs. We waited a couple of days and to our surprise a rather large box was delivered. Inside was a new printer, the same model as previously sent, and the discs we required. We loaded up the drivers and our original printer worked perfectly.

At this point, I stop telling the story and open up the floor for discussion. As you can guess the ethical situation is what to do with the second printer: keep it or send it back. On one hand, Dell is a huge company and likely won’t miss a tiny ink jet printer. Why shouldn’t we keep it? This assumes that Dell has made a mistake and can’t trace the fact that they sent us two printers. The issue with this option is that Dell may figure this out and then send us a bill for the second printer. We could always use a second printer but we didn’t want to pay for an extra one. On the other hand, we never paid for the second printer. So why should we keep what we haven’t paid for.

The framework that we use in class for analyzing ethical situations is offered by Santa Clara University, The Jesuit University in Silicon Valley. This framework identifies Five Sources of Ethical Standards:

• The Utilitarian Approach
• The Rights Approach
• The Fairness or Justice Approach
• The Common Good Approach
• The Virtue Approach

What I like about their framework is that each approach is integrated into the decision making process:

• Recognize an Ethical Issue
• Get the Facts
• Evaluate Alternative Actions (using each of the approaches listed above)
• Make a Decision and Test It
• Act and Reflect on the Outcome

Ethically, the decision about the printer is simple. Don’t keep what you haven’t paid for. And that is what we did but it took an hour of calling numerous departments at Dell to figure out how. By the way, we had no complaints about Dell’s service, they even paid to have the printer picked up.

However, the lingering question with most ethical situations is “What if I could get away with it?”. As one smiling student said, “If the value is low and the risk is high, then it is easy to make the ethically right decision but if the reward is huge and the risk is low then everything changes.”

An ink jet printer is about $250. And after making calls for an hour I felt that the risk of getting caught was reasonably low. I think we could have kept the printer and not paid for it. The class was about 30-70 on this issue. Some would have kept it and most would have returned it.

But what happens when the stakes are higher?

After discussing my ethical situation, I offer students in the class the opportunity to describe their situations. They use the same format, stopping before the conclusion so that we have time to discuss various options and the ethics involved.

One student described how while working overseas he could have made lots of money by collecting “gifts” from the companies to whom he awarded contracts. He didn’t make any collections but has since wondered if he would have the need for a class studying business and ethics if he had accepted those gifts.

Another student, working in Calgary, found $3,000 in an unmarked envelop by her car in a parking lot. She had no way of knowing who the owner was. What to do?

I jokingly said, “Next” and everyone laughed. I’m not exactly sure but I had the feeling that most of the students would have kept the money. The student, however, told how she had taken the money to the police. The police found the owner within 30 days. The owner was a bakery and they gave the student a reward – a loaf of bread, sliced. Ironically, the student is allergic to wheat!

While working in developing country, another student witnessed an accident where a man was hit by a car late at night. The student went over to the man who was injured and sadly found that the victim was already dead. At that same time another witness came to examine the body and agreed; the person was dead. The second witness, older than the student, quickly looked for a wallet to obtain the person’s identification. During the search the second witness found a stash of cash. What would you do?

The student and the second witness left the scene with $7,000 each. His rational was that the victim was obviously involved in some type of crime by having the cash and by the way he was dressed. The other witness was bigger and older than him, so he wasn’t about to argue. The driver was in hysterics and screaming. When and if the police did arrive they would have had no hesitation claiming the money for themselves. I’m not sure what I would have done but I don’t think I would have “given” the money to the police.

The final situation was the best. The student is well educated and currently works for a non-profit organization in Calgary with an outstanding reputation. She is originally from an African country (I can relate since I was born in Uganda). She has 2 children and impeccable manners. She told of a situation in her country of origin while bidding on a huge construction project for a large telecommunications company. Two other companies were bidding on the project and competition was fierce. She prepared her companies bid delivered it personally. When she arrive at the office to submit her bid the official was not at the desk and the bids for the competing companies were on the desk – bound but not in envelops. What to do?

As a group we laughed because although the information on the competing bids would be tempting to look at, looking was clearly unethical. To our surprise the student threw up her hands and said, “I looked at the bid, ran back to my office, lowered our bid and quickly went back to submit it.” Although we were all shocked we were won over when she explained that the livelihood of many families were at stake. Many people including herself would be unemployed if her company was not awarded the contract.

By the way, I told this last story to a few business colleagues and they agreed – they would have done exactly the same thing. Their rationale was that “reviewing” the competitor’s bids was part of gathering information for “business intelligence”.

In this case, it seems that the stakes were so high that the common good outweighed fairness and personal virtue. What would you do if you were in her situation?