Marc Le Menestrel

Opportunities for Ethical Business & Conclusions (October 11, 2012)

Marc Le Menestrel — 2011-10-05T12:48:05Z

Groups finish to present their inspiring examples of ethical business as uploaded on the WeDreamBusiness.org website.

In the second part of the class, we discuss what we have learned from the course and how it could be useful for you.

Assignments:

You have two assignments for this last class:

1. Upload your work on WeDreamBusiness.Org

2. Prepare a short summary (300 words, 500 words max) of what you have learned during the course and why it can be useful for you in the future.

Click here for "Guidelines to Groups' Presentations - IMBA at Shanghai Jiao Tong University

Slides for the class

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The Individual, Business and Corruption: The Changmaï Case (October 5, 2012)

Marc Le Menestrel — 2011-10-05T12:44:38Z

Summary

As a newly appointed manager of a production facility in Asia faces a corruption request from an official, he is not very sure about the practices and the consequences of carrying out the bribe. How should he behave in such a situation? Why? We follow this case study with a discussion on corruption, its perception, methods and consequences.

Required reading

• Butler, Charlotte & de Bettignies, Henri-Claude. “The Changmai Corp. (R)”, Insead Case Study N° 4504, 2007.

Optional Reading

• De George, Richard. “Ethics, Corruption, and Doing Business in Asia”, in Asia Pacific Journal of Economics & Business, Vol. 1, No. 1 (1997), pp. 39-52.

• Anand, V., Ashforth, B.E., and Joshi, M. “Business as usual: the acceptance and perpetuation of corruption in organizations”, Academy of Management Executive, 18 (2): 39-53.

Assignment: Propose to yourself one sentence that you would like to have in mind if, one day, you face a business ethical dilemma. Check whether it would help Mc Leod or Hartford and explain why this would help you.

Slides for the class

Reminder:

Before October 5, 2012, 6pm, each participant shall have registered on the website WeDreamBusiness.Org and posted a comment about one of the company that is presented there, expressing why he/she is very inspired by the company or, to the contrary, why he/she is not inspired at all.

Before October 6, 2012, 6pm, each group should send me a document indicating the name of the company you have selected, why you selected it, why it makes you dream and the names of the students involved has to be sent to the professor.

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Financial Crisis and the Role of Money (October 10, 2012)

Marc Le Menestrel — 2011-10-05T12:43:03Z

Summary

The C.E.O. of the Big Bank has to decide about his strategy in the face of an international effort to regulate financial markets. Will he

1) aggressively fight the politics and work on public opinion in order to avoid regulation?

2) wait and see while communicating good intentions?

3) align with the political effort and turn it into an opportunity to meet stakeholders' expectations and re-invent the Big Bank?

During the meeting, the Big Bank is the subject of an international grass-root campaign from activists who fight against financial injustice and for increased accessibility of the poor to financial services. Media and financial analysts are already asking for the Big Bank's reaction

Required reading

Le Menestrel, M. and Rode, J.: “A Day at the Big Bank”, Case-Study, 2008.

Optional reading on this website

Can you teach ethics to The Big Bank

Assignment: This case was written in 2008. Choose a real bank from the financial crisis during 2008 and describe what you perceive of its strategy compared with the 3 strategies presented in the case.

Slides for the class

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Business and Global Environmental Issues: The Oil Industry and Climate Change (October 9, 2012)

Marc Le Menestrel — 2011-10-05T12:41:48Z

Summary

What strategy can a major company design and implement in the face of global environmental issues? In this case-study about oil industry and climate change, we identify different types of strategies and implementation tactics, with a specific emphasis on communication strategies.

We then discuss in details the strategies of three multinational oil corporations in the face of climate change: ExxonMobil, TotalFinaElf and BP Amoco. We emphasize the similarities and the differences among strategies, in particular in the communicational and managerial dimensions.

Required readings

• van den Hove, S., Le Menestrel, M. & de Bettignies, H.-C. (2002): “The oil industry and climate change: strategies and ethical dilemmas.” Climate Policy 2(1): 3-19.

Optional readings

Pedro de Almeida & Pedro D. Silva (2011), Timing and future consequences of the peak of oil production. Futures 43.

Question to prepare: Why are the proposed strategies similar and why they are significantly different?

Slides for the class

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Marketing Practices: The Tobacco Business (October 8, 2012)

Marc Le Menestrel — 2011-10-05T12:39:55Z

Video: “Making a Killing: Philip Morris, Kraft and Global Tobacco Addiction” – Infact.

Summary

The behaviour of tobacco companies is now an archetype of unethical business behaviour. Behind the statistics that half of long-term smokers die from their addiction, we identify and analyze the secret and sophisticated tactics tobacco companies have been implementing to sustain their profit.

Required reading

• Hurt R.D., Robertson C.R.: “Prying Open the Door to the Tobacco Industry's Secrets About Nicotine", The Minnesota Tobacco Trial, JAMA ; October 7, 1998 – Vol. 280, N° 13.

Optional reading

• World Health Organization. Tobacco Company Strategies to Undermine Tobacco Control Activities at the World Health Organization. Geneva: WHO, 2000. Executive Summary, pp. 1-21.

Question to prepare: Apart from the negative health effect of their products, what are the ethical issues raised by the behavior of Tobacco companies?

Slides for the class

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Goals and Success: the Parable of the Sadhu (October 4, 2012)

Marc Le Menestrel — 2011-10-05T12:34:33Z

Video: “The Parable of the Sadhu” – Harvard Business School.

Summary

Through a case study depicting a Wall Street financial analyst facing a dilemma in mountaineering, we discuss whether success lies in the mere attainment of goals.

We then introduce criteria of ethical behaviour. These philosophical perspectives provide us with foundations to propose an open form of ethical rationality that combines considerations based on self-interest with ethical values.

Video to watch in class: TED Talks: Alain de Botton: A kinder, gentler philosophy of success

Required reading

McCoy, Bowen: “The parable of the Sadhu”, in Harvard Business Review, Vol. 75 N°3, May-June 1997, pp. 54-61.

Questions to answer: Inspired by the reading but answering for you personally, is success the mere attainment of your goals?

Optional reading

Le Menestrel, Marc: “Economic Rationality and Ethical Behaviour: ethical business between venality and sacrifice”, in Business Ethics: A European Review, Vol. 11, No. 2 (2002).

Slides for the session

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Business, Ethics and Profit: Economic Approaches (October 3rd, 2012)

Marc Le Menestrel — 2011-10-05T12:32:32Z

Nobel Prize laureate Milton Friedman argues that the sole social responsibility of companies is to maximise profits. Using group work and discussion we identify the foundations of the argument, its practical implications in business situations, its historical context and its current relevance. Building on the work of Nobel Prize laureate Amartya Sen, we then discuss how economic approaches have progressively separated economics from ethics.

Required readings

Friedman, Milton, “The Social Responsibility of Business is to Increase its Profit”, New York Times Magazine (September 13, 1970).

Sen, Amartya. “Moral Codes and Economic Success”, in Brittan, S. & Hamlin, A. (eds) Market Capitalism and Moral Values, Aldershot UK: Edward Elgar, 1993, pp. 23-34.

Question to prepare: After having read Sen's article, re-read Friedman's article and identify whether it (the Friedman's article) pertains to science, ideology or propaganda.
Note that you can use the definitions proposed on slide #19.

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Corporate Social Responsibility: The Bhopal Gas Tragedy (Video, Case Study & Discussion) (October 2nd, 2012)

Marc Le Menestrel — 2011-10-05T12:29:42Z

Video: “A Cloud Over Bhopal”

Summary

The Bhopal tragedy is a landmark in industrial history, for the consequences it had inside and outside the industry. We identify the responsibilities of business and discuss the handling of this responsibility by Union Carbide in the subsequent, and still pending, legal procedures. We then discuss the responsibility of Dow Chemical, now owner of Union Carbide.

Required readings

• Dutta, Sanjib, “The Bhopal Gas Tragedy”, ICFAI Center for Management Research, Hyderabad, India, 2002.

• Dow: “Statement of The Dow Chemical Company Regarding the Bhopal Tragedy”, retrieved May 2004.

• Visit www.bhopal.org

• Visit www.bhopal.net

Question to prepare: Who is responsible for the Bhopal catastrophe? Why?

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Guidelines to Groups' Presentations - IMBA at Shanghai Jiao Tong University

Marc Le Menestrel — 2011-10-05T12:26:03Z

This presentation is part of the “We Dream Business Project”.

WeDreamBusiness.org is a web-based project launched to promote ethical business practices worldwide. It is mainly oriented on students and aims to show that there are already many companies that are both ethical and profitable.

Each group is expected to find an inspiring example of a business that successfully combines the creation of economic values with the respect of ethical values and their study about this business to the to the webpage of the “We Dream Business Project” by following the specified format of the form to upload a project at the wesbite.

To select your company, ask yourselves whether it makes you dream. If it is really inspiring to you, then you are on the right track! This is one of the most important aspect of the group and it requires time and effort for you to really take the time to identify what would really make you dream.

The webpage already contains several projects and students should go over them in order to see concrete examples of what is expected from them (http://www.wedreambusiness.org/). This should also inspire students to find their own topic.

Groups will present their work on October 11 through the uploaded project at the WeDreamBusiness.org webpage.

Each group is expected to have uploaded its project before to avoid last minute problems (There will be no power point preparation!). This presentation will be graded over 30 points (30% of your final grade) and you will receive 10 points for the preparatory document. All members of the group will present and all will receive the same grade for the presentation.

You are expected to hand in a hard copy of the uploaded project to the website at the beginning of the session on October 11 that you will present (1 copy for the whole group).

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Introduction: Why Ethics in Business? (October 1, 2012)

Marc Le Menestrel — 2011-10-05T12:23:59Z

The objectives, methodology, content and organization of the course are presented in detail. A discussion on the role of business in today's society follows.

In the second part of the class, we learn about values, what they are and how they influence rational behavior. We contrast economic and ethical values to structure the classical approaches to rational behavior and propose a meta-framework to better understand their articulation.

Required readings

Chandler, Geoffrey. The global corporation: provider or parasite? Amnesty International UK Business Group.

Banaji, M.R., Bazerman, M. H., & D. Chugh: “How (Un)Ethical Are You?”, Harvard Business Review, December 2003

Questions to prepare (Between 300 and 500 words): Why do you think people talk about ethics nowadays? and in this MBA? What would you like to learn about ethics in business?

Slides for download (.ppt)

Relevant articles on this website:

Grading of Assignments - IMBA at Shanghai Jiao Tong University

Thinking ethics as a grey zone

Ethical risks: Identification, Mitigation, Transformation

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