Un-ethical companies and their future 11

[ST111]

So I'm sure we are all aware of big projects and issues that have risen over the years, highlighting certain companies as unethical.
Classic examples such as Bechtel, Shell, Exxon-Mobil (just off the top off my head, not aiming at O&G companies specifically), however they all consistently state their ethical groundings as world class etc.

Is this going to change? Have these companies learned from their mistakes and genuinely working towards ethical work?

Also is it ethical or un-ethical to work for one of these companies? I would be interested in peoples opinions.

 

[JNieman]

Every organization of humans is prone to human traits which, in contrast to the great things in humanity, also include laziness, selfishness, corruptibility, self-preservation, ignorance, ego, and greed.

The organizations you name are likely no less moral or ethical than any small businesses. They just have a much larger pool of humans from which any of those negative traits might surface. They are also in the business of "big" jobs where the stakes are high and newer (less-proven) technology is being used more often.

I wonder if you would say it's unethical to work on any manned space program after the way NASA Mission Control handled the launch of Challenger? That was a lethal, expensive, disastrous event that was the result of purely human characteristics seeping into judgment calls. It was no different than the Maconda Well / Deepwater Horizon disaster in the Gulf not long ago. Nothing that happened to either organization would disqualify them from possible employment, in my opinion. You have the opportunity to do good wherever you go.

The only ethical dilemma I believe is relevant is whether or not you believe in the mission of the company. I would not expect a hardcore Catholic who is anti-contraception to go be a stalwart asset to Trojan condoms. That is an ethical choice. Similarly, if you are a stalwart environmentalist, I do not believe you would be likely to consider most of the fossil-fuel-burning companies.

I do not believe that the acts of individual people, in any company, would affect my decision to work there - unless their poor actions created a job security risk or a financial instability. Those are not ethical motivations though, but financial and security considerations.

If you're worried about the "safety record" then I would say the very large companies are much safer than small businesses. Small businesses MOSTLY do only what they have to in order to pass an OSHA audit or avoid someone turning them in. In my experience, the common idea of a 'safety foreman' is the guy who hands out safety glasses to new hires, ordering more band-aids, and drives the fork truck slower than everyone else, and is responsible for changing the dates on expired products. Giant commercial companies have policies and staff in place to actively avoid safety lawsuits.

 

[moltenmetal]

That's a mighty big blanket statement, calling huge corporations with tens of thousands of employees "unethical"!

Some things I might consider to be unethical have been done by some major corporations. Does that mean, by definition, the whole corporation is unethical?

When you look at the problem of illegal drugs, who do you blame? The coca or poppy farmers? The cartels? The disadvantaged youth who deal them on the street? Or the people who fuel the whole economics of the illegal drug trade by their insatiable demand? Same with fossil fuels: who do you blame when a well blows out or a tanker runs aground: the people who screwed up drilling the well or piloting the tanker? The people who pumped the product in the tanker from the ground? Or the people consuming the product as fast as it can be produced?

I don't personally like Exxon's stand on global warming, but I certainly understand why it is consistent with their business interest to hold it. I also understand why they do everything (legal) in their power to make that point of view known and to have it spread to as many others as possible, especially to people in power. But the only way I could possibly view Exxon itself as "unethical" on that point, i.e. because this corporation holds a point of view which maximizes their short- term profit while leaving a giant hole for future generations to attempt to fill in, would be to have a totally naïve perspective on what a corporation is, or should be.

A corporation isn't a "person", it's an algorithm. Its goal is to maximize profit and shareholder value for the people who own it. It has no "ethics". It should never, ever, be expected to hold any values other than those which can be defined in legal terms. In fact, if the management of a corporation attempt, as they often do, to spend the corporation's money toward values other than those fundamental to the corporation, the shareholders should be there to question why it is being done.

If you're realistic about what corporations are, and aren't, then you'll understand how important it is to have a democratic government and the rule of law in place everywhere that corporations carry out their business. Where we are in trouble is when the power of corporations intrudes into, and corrupts and undermines, the functioning of government. And we should always expect that if a corporation can do so, it will, in order to do what its algorithm tells it to do to the greatest extent possible.

If what you're asking is the simpler question of whether or not you should work for organizations whose business model offends your view of a) what's good for the world or b) what you think will make a good future for the company and hence permit it to continue to provide you with employment, then that's a dead easy one. When you have the choice, you make the choice. When the choice is between working against your ideals or going hungry, it's a much harder question to answer.

 

[urgross]

Having read classic muckraker publications, such as on the meat industry, and having heard Mitt Romney say "Corporations are people, too, my friend, I'd have to entirely disagree that corporations per se cannot be evil or wicked. If companies, including ones I've worked for and quit, can save money by dumping battery acid in the bay, they will do it. If your purpose if "anything for a buck" it is hard to be considered otherwise, just as people. And far too many companies will do anything, evil or good, for a buck.

 

[ST111]

So if you are working to support this 'algorithm' and by providing the services it required you are supporting it to carry on functioning as it does then this is acceptable. But when you are doing this knowing that the company is operating in countries that have unstable democratic views (e.g. areas of west Africa), and knowing that your company is ready to take advantage of this government, is it now unethical?

 

[KENAT]

Or, you could take it up a level. Is it ethical to live in a country that does things like state mandated torture, assassination....

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[IRstuff]

One should be careful to not confuse a "company" with its owners/employees. Is the Catholic Church an unethical corporation because an admittedly large number of priests molested children and other priests even attempted to cover it up? Do we throw out the baby with the bathwater? Corporations and other large assemblies of people are composed of people, good, bad, or indifferent. No company run by people can be guaranteed to stay unsullied, because people have free will and have the ability to sin mightily, like Bernie Madoff or John DeLorean.

There are organizations that were founded to be unethical, the KKK, the Nazis, and the Crips. People join these organizations knowing full well that they are going to do things prohibited by any plausible code of ethics.

As for companies with charters and plausible codes of ethics, you can only blame people who directed the unethical behavior and those who obeyed. In that regard, "companies" can never fully learn the lesson, because people are weak and subject to temptations. A robotic mechanization of a company charter and code of ethics could never behave unethically, except by errors in programming. This is what distinguishes humans and robots; we don't follow our programming very well, or at all.

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[JNieman]

Do you buy clothing, apparel, electronics, or other consumer items made in sweatshops and in countries with abhorrent labor practices and social conditions?

 

[EmmanuelTop]

Looking from that perspective (exploitation of people), working for e.g. ExxonMobil or Shell is the same as joining Nazi party in 1930's or 1940's. The Nazis look even better in that comparison, because they did things they believed in while Oil giants do these things purely for money.

Yet, nobody was put on trial for crimes against humanity = working for (let alone running) the Supermajors and others.

Dejan IVANOVIC
Process Engineer, MSChE

 

[IRstuff]

A factory, per se, does not necessarily equate to a sweatshop. What distinguishes a sweatshop from a Ford assembly plant are the people who run the factory and the people that enforce the laws. 100 years ago, US factories might have been considered sweatshops as well, 6-day workweeks, employment of children, no vacation, no sick days, etc. What changed were the laws and the people who run the factories and the people who enforce the laws.

While the wages in those sweatshops are low by US standards, they are not low by the standards of the countries they're in. What we do about that is a wholly separate ethical question. Do we go in as social do-gooders and pay them $7.25 an hour while the rest of country has to live on a couple of dollars a day? Would the social upheaval that ensures be considered in the ethics of what we do? 30 years ago, China's factories were almost all considered to be sweatshops; yet, from those horrid beginnings a large middle and upper class has developed to the point where even in China, outsourcing might become an economic necessity.

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[cranky108]

Just as big of a question is, are you unethical if you buy from a company that you believe is unethical?

The same can be said about grease payments, are they unethical? You haven't done anything unlawful, by paying for faster service.

If you don't agree with a companies practices and you believe it is a management problem, then don't purchase there products.

Would you visit diner that had good food but bad service?

 

[zdas04]

I use the word "contract" instead of "algorithm", but it amounts to the same thing, Moltenmetal's statement

A corporation isn't a "person", it's an algorithm. Its goal is to maximize profit and shareholder value for the people who own it. It has no "ethics". It should never, ever, be expected to hold any values other than those which can be defined in legal terms. In fact, if the management of a corporation attempt, as they often do, to spend the corporation's money toward values other than those fundamental to the corporation, the shareholders should be there to question why it is being done.

is spot on. The Citzen's United decision was an absolute travesty. A contract cannot have morals. An algorithm cannot have ethics. People have these traits. If a person bribes a Nigerian official in the name of a company, that person is exhibiting immoral, unethical behavior, not the company. If you fine the company for an action, then you are fining the stock holders of the company (people).

When you are talking about a company the size of Exxon/Mobil or Bechtel, things done in the name of the company can vary widely from location to location. The Halliburton manager in Farmington may say "we cannot take any steps to unduly influence other companies or regulators, our employees may not spend company funds 'entertaining' clients or regulators in any way". The Halliburton manager in Lafayette may say "Your bonus is based on sales" and leave it to the staff to make that happen. which one is moral or ethical? Both. Which operation has a better chance of behaving ethically? Probably Farmington. Which operation has a better chance of surviving the current downturn? I'd bet on Lafayette.

If you go to work for a big company, accept that the company cannot be unethical or immoral and comport yourself in a way that is ethical and consistent with your morality. I had a friend once who found himself in the least ethical department in any company I've ever heard of. He kept his moral compass intact and when the entire department was fired (with one suicide and four indictments), my friend was shown to have not been tainted by the filth and was transferred to a field location where he worked for the company for another 25 years before his retirement. We can't all be a crystal pure as my friend, but damnit we can try.

David Simpson, PE
MuleShoe Engineering

In questions of science, the authority of a thousand is not worth the humble reasoning of a single individual. Galileo Galilei, Italian Physicist

 

[MartinLe]

I agree with Moltenmetal, but I disagree with zdas04:
If a person bribes a Nigerian official in the name of a company, that person is exhibiting immoral, unethical behavior, not the company. If you fine the company for an action, then you are fining the stock holders of the company (people).

Of course, the persons on both sides of the bribe are exhibiting unethical and likely criminal behavior and should be treated accordingly.
But it also makes sense to look into the company. Most cases of bribery that I read about in newspapers in the last years involved a sales rep bribing someone with their companies money, often with funds that at least seemd to be earmarked for that purpose. A company can try by good accounting to make such things impossible. By fining companies (and thus shareholders) for failing to do so, you hopefully push all companies towards not bribing nigerian officials.

So the argument is not a moral one (must punish evil company!) but about creating conditions where activly preventing criminal behavior pays better than turing a blind eye. If a company can't show that they activly prevent corruption, don't hold a share.

 

[IRstuff]

Fines are one of a few means by which a company's management can be incentivized to maintain ethical standards. As many of the posters alluded to, companies often have very noble policies about prohibitions against unethical or illegal behavior. However, humans often do the wrong thing because they're tempted by other things like bonuses, promotions, and the like. This forms the basis of the fundamental conflict for ethical behavior, and is what often tips the balance toward unethical behavior or condoning the same. So, a manager of such an employee might not be personally doing the unethical things, but might turn a blind eye towards that because of the bonus or promotion at stake. Civil and criminal penalties are therefore factors that can hopefully tip the balance back the other way. Fines and penalties often spur renewal and reinvigoration of training and enforcement of ethical behavior within a company.

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[zdas04]

MartinLe,
Reading through your post, I have a hard time picking out the part of my post that you disagree with. I worked for a company that tried to do everything possible to prevent unethical behavior. Everything. No "unaccountable funds" allowed anywhere. All employees attend ethics class every year that end with signing the company's ethics policy. An so forth. Still, there were cases where people overcharged for work (some of which never really happened) and split the overage with a company employee (often to the tune of tens of thousands of dollars). There were cases were a local manager would "purchase" an uncontrolled component (replacement valves can cost many thousands of dollars and don't get an inventory record, and invoices are easy to fake) and use that money to bribe someone. There are many ways to do this, and most large companies have "Loss Prevention" departments (the one in the company I worked for was staffed entirely with former FBI agents) that work hard, but can't catch everything. At the end of the day it is just people acting in what they perceive to be their own best interests. That perception can lead people to unethical behavior that a company does not condone and will prosecute.

Be careful of putting much credence in "what you read in the newspaper", the ethics of that industry is no better than the companies they report on. I know people who worked at Enron, and the "rot" that was so widely reported could actually be tracked to the departments run by a couple of specific individuals. The rest of the company was mostly ignorant of the wrong doing and certainly did not condone it. Many tens of thousands of people were totally innocent and will forever be tainted by the broad brush the media painted the story with.

The corporation is simply a legal document. Every action take in the name of the corporation is taken by human beings acting on their own perceptions of "right" and "wrong".

David Simpson, PE
MuleShoe Engineering

In questions of science, the authority of a thousand is not worth the humble reasoning of a single individual. Galileo Galilei, Italian Physicist

 

[cranky108]

Even with all of that, in some countries it typically takes 6 months to get a phone line installed. And it is common to pay extra, grease payments, to have it installed in less than a month.

Getting a phone line is not wrong, or illegal, but the grease payment to get it installed faster becomes an issue.

Would it not be the same thing to have a news person to write a good article about your company?

So some difficult to explain payments happen. And there is a line, but that line I don't feel is no payments.

On the other hand, has a company sales agent never offered to buy you lunch? That could be seen as a bribe, when the truth is if you could be bribed with lunch, you are too easy.

 

[KENAT]

cranky, unless an official expediting fee run through the relevant organizations books, those 'grease fees' are bribes and illegal under measures in places like the UK & USA (I had my ethics training a few months ago where they labored this point).

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[drawoh]

Looking from that perspective (exploitation of people), working for e.g. ExxonMobil or Shell is the same as joining Nazi party in 1930's or 1940's. The Nazis look even better in that comparison, because they did things they believed in while Oil giants do these things purely for money.
...

In the 1930s, we did not know how bad the Nazis were going to be. There was no embargo against Germany. The Nazis liked to point out that they were not treating their jews any worse that the Americans were treating their negroes. The Indian wars, a precedent cited extensively by the Nazis, were within living memory.

A really good read on this is The Smartest Guys in the Room, by Bethany McLean and Peter Elkind, all about Enron. The book is very different from the documentary. The authors figure that Kenneth Lay and Jeffrey Skilling were bad managers. Skilling comes off in the book as a fairly decent person. They managed to create a predatory corporate culture that made everything else possible, except real profits, of course.

--
JHG

 

[MartinLe]

zdas04,
I understood your post to mean (among other things) that it does not make sense to fine a cooperation, only individuals. This is the statement I disagree with.
Did I misread your post?

You raise the point that even if a company tries hard to crack down on unethical behavior, some will still find workaraounds. No disagreement here.

 

[moltenmetal]

My principal point is that we should EXPECT a corporation to do whatever it can get away with in order to maximize its profit. Expecting otherwise is foolhardy and naïve. And given this expectation, we are also naïve and foolhardy to attribute virtues to corporations- to believe that corporations can "police themselves" for instance, or to imagine Disney gives a rat's ass about the wellbeing of children (not to pick on them in particular, they're just a handy example)... We're similarly foolhardy and naive if we think that government regulation is all "red tape" and taxation is "evil". Yes, there is a balance between free enterprise and public control/oversight. It's easy to be too strict in some areas and too lenient in others, and it needs dynamic balancing by people who are engaged, informed and who care about the public good. We fail entirely when we give up the role of the people, through their democratic institutions and the rule of law, to exercise the control that is necessary to keep corporations from extremes of excess.

The notion that the "ethics of a corporation" (a fundamentally idiotic concept in my view) are the responsibility of the people who work for it, or the sum (or perhaps lowest common denominator) of the people who work for it- and that the solution to corporate greed and malfeasance is to somehow expect people who work for corporations to be better people. An example: giving "sustainability" training to young engineers, in the expectation that they will magically make the world a better place as a result- all the while, having zero influence on the underlying economic factors that drive the way we use resources and energy. All that will do is make the young engineers prematurely cynical- though some might argue that in itself is an important coping strategy if you intend to stay in this profession long term.