Redefining Ethics It would be very easy to write endlessly about the revamping of the American and even global foundations of ethics in this crazy mixed-up time we are living through. I am spending some time right now updating the syllabus for my ethics course this fall. I taught the course for the first time this spring and I was surprised by two things. First of all, I was pleasantly surprised by the level of…
Surrendering to CostCo Everyone thinks that CostCo started in Kirkland, Washington, just outside of Seattle back in 1983, just when Howard Schultz was getting his hands on this little coffeehouse startup called Starbucks and starting to rev it up into a global retailing juggernaut. But by virtue of its merger with another big-box retailer named Price Club, CostCo can claim to have started back in 1976 right here in good old San Diego. The behemoth…
On Capitalism I am once again finding myself at Capitalism’s front doorstep as it seems to be assaulting my senses as I prepare the next term’s syllabus for my business ethics course. Technically the course is titled Law, Policy and Ethics and I am being sure to add more connective tissue between the three subjects rather than have this be a philosophy course on the etymology of ethics in business. When I launch my thinking…
Deanship My friend Gary spent many years as a Provost of a number of Universities. The Provost is the chief operating or administrative officer of the university and is basically charged with the running of the business of the university. The President of the university is the top leader of a university, butt his job is far less administrative and far more about the primary mission of fundraising and making bigger picture mission or policy…
Rejection Angst Many of us guys have had a lifetime of experience with rejection and should presumably be somewhat immune to it as we reach our retirement years. Not really. It’s not that I fear rejection or anticipate it and thereby avoid situations where it might arise, but when it finds its way to me, I simply don’t like it. Who would? But I keep thinking that I am past needing external validation, and that…
As the Mist Lifts It’s June on the hilltop and that generally means that every morning starts out looking misty or fog-bound. June gloom and all that. Some mornings it takes a few hours for the mist to lift and some mornings, like today, the mist sort of gradually rolls out towards the Ocean and the hilltop gets clear and sunny before 9am. All that mist accumulates in the night because the evenings and sunsets…
Forgiveness One of my favorite movies that I happened on scanning Netflix tonight is the 2011 movie Warrior with Tom Hardy, Joel Edgerton and Nick Nolte. The reason I am scanning Netflix is because Kim is off rehearsing with her Encore choral group for an early June concert, her first with Encore. Last night we watched three of the four second installments of the AppleTV series called WeCrashed about Adam and Rebekah Neumann, the founders…
“Free” Markets The very first lesson one used to learn in business school back when I went 50 years ago was that there was no such thing as a free lunch. We all sort of know what that is supposed to mean and there have been many euphemisms that have expanded on that notion, most notably in the tech world of social media where it is said that if you cannot find the product, that…
Friday the 13th Today is that magically reoccurring phenomenon of a Friday which falls on the 13th day of the month. This happens once every 212.35 days, so at least once a year. That means we get to think about strange coincidences affecting our lives at lest that often. Today I am finishing up a forced march to grade thirty-three final exams from my Law, Policy & Ethics course that I gave to end the…
The Age of Greed When I think of great movie soliloquies, I can’t help but think about Michael Douglas standing before a board of director’s annual meeting in his attempt to take over the company to slice and dice it into his pocket and into oblivion, and saying to the the crowd, “Greed is Good!” It is one of the most memorable lines from Oliver Stone’s quintessential and defining 1980’s classic, Wall Street. We all…