But I disagree entirely on the golden rule. I hear about people all the time who justify some action with, "Well, it isn't illegal". Because with a legal code as complex as the one in the US, it's easy to lose sight of "it's right". Empathy, though, is a foundation of human moral reasoning, and the golden rule points that out.
You can see this in kids all the time. There's the classic "but I didn't break rule X" defense, wherein the kid hacks the rules. E.g., "You said not to touch him." But "How would you feel in that situation?" and "How do you think they feel?" are much harder to hack. Even if the transgressor is able to self-fool, the flaws are much more obvious to third parties. The apparent lack of content of the golden rule is a benefit; the simplicity leaves less room to hide.
I dono. Every time I've gotten fucked in business... I mean, really fucked, it was by a person who was a really nice person. A really empathetic person.
I don't think "nice" and "empathetic" has as much to do with 'ethical' as you think. From what I've seen? good businesspeople and good salespeople are absolute masters of self-justification, and they really believe it in their hearts.
To me? this is one of the ugliest parts of becoming a business person. Not only are you doing something terrible to another human, but you are going on like you are doing them a favor while you are doing it.
Human emotions are weird things. None of them conform to anything like a logical system.
That strikes me as sociopathy, not actual kindness. Or at the very least, such an education in bullshit that they literally can no longer tell right from wrong.
People like that are rarely constrained by rules, either, because they can justify that just as well.
Also, I believe that ethics is mainly an elaboration of our moral sense, which appears to be biologically rooted. For more, I recommend the work of de Waal, and his TED talk is a great place to start: http://www.ted.com/talks/frans_de_waal_do_animals_have_moral...
>That strikes me as sociopathy, not actual kindness. Or at the very least, such an education in bullshit that they literally can no longer tell right from wrong.
No, it's more subtle than that.
Let's go back to my example of what makes business ethics so difficult. You have two groups with mutually opposing interests; your shareholders and your customers/suppliers. You have some responsibility to both groups, right? If you just gut feel it, well, I mean, that's one way to go about it, sure, and if you are far enough from the line, that's okay. But if you are pushing the line, as pg advocates? Gut feeling it is probably a bad idea.
For example, more than once, I've almost gone out of business. Many years ago I hit serious financial issues. I told all my VPS customers, and went through a lot of effort to find my co-lo customers a new home.
This was absolutely the right thing to do for my customers, but it also destroyed the company, when I could have made it
(I ended up re-launching the company very shortly thereafter, using money from my contracting gigs. In fact, I think I had a few customers stick with me the whole time.)
Now, if I had shareholders at the time, I mean, who were not me? From the perspective of the shareholders, I was not acting in their interest. I should have concealed the possibly impending shutdown, and just worked hard to prevent the impending shutdown from occurring. I am pretty sure that if there was money on the line and there were owners who weren't me, I would have gotten sued for acting in what I think was the most ethical manner.
Do you see what I'm getting at? If we remove the ridiculous cases of stuffing cash into your underpants and running, a reasonable person can argue both sides of most business ethics questions. Your gut can argue both sides, too.
You make it sound like a situation being ambiguous is bad. I disagree. I think that's exactly the time for discussion, negotiation, collaboration, and reflection. All of which are aided by things like the Golden Rule.
Note that I'm not talking about gut feel. What I'm contrasting is using carefully elaborated, hard and fast rules vs applying simpler guidelines, like the Golden Rule. If the hard-and-fast rules you pick are the US legal system, for example, then the answer is simple: fuck the customers. Bankruptcy protects you. You can dodge all of the complexity.
But if you say, "Hey, how would I want to be treated if I were in their situation?" you have to think about the customers and the shareholders. Unlike rules, guidelines, principles, and heuristics all force you to engage with the complexity. Fairly arguing both sides isn't bad; it's exactly what you should be doing.
Two minor points: using retrospective knowledge is a mistake in judging ethical choices. If at the time you thought you were going out of business, then that's the ethical framework. And as far as getting sued by investors, it varies by state, but generally managers have wide latitude to run the business in the fashion they see fit. You have an obligation to keep investors informed, but if they don't like what you're doing, they can replace you.
>You make it sound like a situation being ambiguous is bad. I disagree. I think that's exactly the time for discussion, negotiation, collaboration, and reflection.
The ethical conflicts I've used as examples are "I have information relevant to all parties. If I tell everyone, one party will be damaged. If I tell no one, the other party will be damaged."
Negotiation is... difficult, when you can't reveal what you are negotiating about.
Reflecting on "who do I screw" is incredibly stressful and unpleasant.
The deep problem with successful sociopaths is that they can manipulate others to believe they are being kind. I've seen it a few times. Once you step back it feels obvious and bizarre, but before you can do that you're caught in their web. What code of ethics protects against that?
That's not the job of a code of ethics. Ethics are about your choices and their impact on others.
Ways to protect against sociopaths and narcissists include education (there are good books on both), experience, and adopting standard business practices (e.g., no work without a contract, do due diligence on your business partners, basing trust on successful experience, managing risk exposure).
But I disagree entirely on the golden rule. I hear about people all the time who justify some action with, "Well, it isn't illegal". Because with a legal code as complex as the one in the US, it's easy to lose sight of "it's right". Empathy, though, is a foundation of human moral reasoning, and the golden rule points that out.
You can see this in kids all the time. There's the classic "but I didn't break rule X" defense, wherein the kid hacks the rules. E.g., "You said not to touch him." But "How would you feel in that situation?" and "How do you think they feel?" are much harder to hack. Even if the transgressor is able to self-fool, the flaws are much more obvious to third parties. The apparent lack of content of the golden rule is a benefit; the simplicity leaves less room to hide.