Beware of Rationalizations for Unethical Behavior Why Do Good People Sometimes do bad things, in general? In the past, I have blogged about this issue. I have explored, “What Does “Doing good by being good” mean? Simply stated, it highlights the idea that when one acts with kindness and compassion (being good) it will lead to […]
Why Do Good People Compromise Their Ethical Values? Read More »
What the 2024 FTC Data Shows About Fraud Scams I am a devoted fan of the television program American Greed. Many of its segments deal with instances of financial fraud and how it has upended the lives of so many. It also provides good advice on how to set up procedures to catch fraud so
Losses From Fraud Are Uncontrolled, but are they Uncontrollable? Read More »
Examining Microaggressions as a Form of DEI A psychological concept that has become a part of the discussion of diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) is microaggressions. The term gained widespread appeal only twelve years ago, but by 2015 it had been crowned the word of the year by the Global Language Monitor. It is now rife on
What Role Should Microaggressions Play in Discussions About Discrimination? Read More »
Ignoring Quality Controls to Maximize Profits The case of Boeing and its manufacturing deficiencies and production flaws is a tale of what can happen when a company puts profitability over safety. Most readers will be aware of the Boeing airplane crashes between 2018 and 2024 that threatened the very existence of a manufacturing company whose
Regulatory Actions Taken Against Boeing: The Problems with 737 MAX Read More »
How Corporate Culture Drove Decision-Making The story of Boeing is it placed profits ahead of safety and the result has been a series of crashes/mechanical problems that have led to inspections by the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) and litigation by the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). In this blog I will address the culture
Boeing: Putting Profits Ahead of Safety Read More »
Creating an Ethical Framework to Mitigate Risk Today’s blog is an update to one previously posted about ethical risks of AI. I’ve added to it a discussion in the Harvard Business Review (HBR). A brief summary follows. Concerns About Ethical Risks According to the HBR article, for companies that use AI, risk aversion is a top
Ethical Risks of AI in the Workplace Read More »
Is Whistleblowing a Moral Act? Whistleblowers can be seen as heroes, disloyal, or even selfish if, in the latter case, the motivation for blowing the whistle is to gain a financial award, as is available under the Commodities Future Trading Commission (CFTC), Federal False Claims Act, IRS, SEC and the Dodd-Frank Financial Reform Act. Whistleblowers
Considerations in Deciding Whether to Blow the Whistle Read More »
An Example of Hubris, Incompetence, and Greed I always tell my students that the best way to learn about ethics, or the lack thereof, is through a case study. What follows is a mini-case study of the FTX fraud. Last week Sam Bankman-Fried was found guilty of misappropriating and embezzling billions of dollars of his
The Story of FTX and Sam Bankman-Fried Read More »
Ethics in the Age of AI: Addressing Moral Challenges in the Era of Automation I have previously blogged about the problem of creating an ethical framework and processes for AI. AI can improve human decision-making, but it has its limits. The possibility exists that bias in algorithms can create an ethical risk that brings into question the
Ethics & AI: Unanswered Questions Read More »
Do Whistleblower Awards Lead to More Whistleblowing? The ethics of whistleblowing is a tricky matter. Whistle-blowing brings two moral values, fairness and loyalty, into conflict. Doing what is fair or just (e.g., promoting an employee based on talent alone) often conflicts with showing loyalty (e.g., promoting a longstanding but unskilled employee). Taken to its extreme
What Motivates Someone to Blow the Whistle? Read More »