Alumni Magazine - Spring 2008 - (Page 68) >>>INTERVIEW Salbu became the management dean and Stephen P. Zelnak chairholder in July 2006. He formerly served as associate dean for graduate programs at the McCombs School of Business at the University of Texas, which he joined in 1990. He was named its Bobbie and Coulter R. Sublett centennial endowed professor in 2000. He also served as director of the McCombs School Business Ethics Program and editor in chief of the American Business Law Journal. A former editorial board member of Business Ethics Quarterly, Salbu has published extensively in the areas of business ethics and law. His articles have appeared in such journals as Business Ethics Quarterly, Chicago Journal of International Law, Columbia Business Law Review, Harvard Journal of Law and Technology, Northwestern Journal of International Law and Business, University of Pennsylvania Journal of International Business Law and Yale Journal on Regulation. A native of New York, Salbu holds a bachelor’s degree (psychology) from Hofstra University, a master’s degree from Dartmouth College (liberal studies), a law degree from the College of William and Mary and master’s and doctoral degrees from the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania (organization and strategy). ple and can’t be altered by means-ends assessments. Others are consequentialist and they embrace the ends as a legitimate justification of the means. I personally believe that there are some fundamental areas that should be non-negotiable — for example, equal opportunity of employment. To me, this is a basic right, and denying that right cannot be justified by the ends. But once you get beyond fundamental rights and values, we all routinely make utilitarian ethical decisions by trying to maximize good outcomes. And this is a legitimate model for making ethical decisions, provided you don’t violate fundamental principles that you hold sacrosanct. Critics say you can’t teach ethics in college. If students don’t have their values set by then, it’s too late. How would you respond? As you can guess, I strongly disagree on many levels. Our students are very smart. In all other areas, we credit them with learning what we teach them and applying their education to their work and to their lives generally. Why would ethics be any different? The notion that our values are set by the end of our adolescence is an impoverished idea of human development. Moreover, in business school, students spend a lot of time learning by doing, as when they do case analysis. If we leave ethics out of that analysis, our students are developing patterns of analysis to apply in the real business world that lack a critically important component. “People are shrewd assessors of character. We all recognize who the good people are in our organizations — the people who consistently exhibit character and integrity.” In our society, many people do not accept absolutes: a definite right and wrong. Do ethics have absolutes? I teach that there are fundamental areas of ethics that do not vary across cultures. Aspirational values such as honesty, integrity and fair dealing, for example, transcend cultures. We should expect these qualities from ourselves and have a right to expect them from others, regardless of the context in which we are functioning. You sometimes hear the argument that the ends justify the means. Is that valid? You’ve just asked one of the most basic questions with which moral philosophers still grapple. Some philosophers believe that people have basic duties that are lodged in princi- It is sometimes said that being ethical will help lead to a successful business in the long run. Is that true? It is true. People are shrewd assessors of character. We all recognize who the good people are in our organizations — the people who consistently exhibit character and integrity. Likewise, people quickly get to know who the lemons are, and reputations develop accordingly. People who lack character are avoided — by peers, by collaborators, by suppliers and by customers. Opportunities abound for persons with reputations for character, and they shrivel for persons with bad reputations. That said, we are human, and persons of character will be tempted to cut corners, and sometimes isolated lapses are tempting because they can provide substantial profit or gain. These are the cases when you do the right thing solely because it is the right thing and not with expectation that you will be enriched. Does ethical behavior necessarily start at the top? Yes. Pretty much all businesses talk the talk. Most people know the correct line to espouse as their value set. But members of organizations quickly distinguish between the party line and actual behavior on the part of leaders. If the leaders of organizations cut ethical corners, the tone is set and it quickly permeates the organization. Leaders must not only proclaim, they 68 Georgia Tech Alumni Magazine • Spring 2008
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