The Elon MBA community, including current students, faculty, alumni and members of the Board of Advisors, hosted a forum Nov. 12 titled "Our Summer of Discontent." Details...
Participants saw survey results and listened to several presentations about ethics in business before breaking out into individual discussion groups.
David Noer, the Frank Holt Professor of Business Leadership, presented the results of a recent survey of nearly 100 people with ties to the Elon MBA program, including faculty members, current students and graduates of the program who hold management positions in business.
Among the survey’s findings:
- 74 percent said the recent business scandals had not caused them to reconsider a management career
- 84 percent said business education at the MBA level has a role in preparing students to deal with ethical issues
- 64 percent felt strongly that punishing high profile business leaders with fines or jail time is an effective deterrent to breaking the law.
Peter Tourtellot, chair of the Chicago-based Turnaround Management Association and a member of the Love School of Business Advisory Board, delivered the keynote address. He told the audience MBA programs at “big-name universities” may have contributed to the recent scandals by failing to balance their focus on results with a focus on ethics.
“Business is not rocket science,” Tourtellot said. “A large dose of business is common sense. Somewhere along the way in this country, we lost that. Business schools bear some responsibility. Not all, maybe not even half, but some.”
Consultants Dan Parks and Barry Phillips led an exercise on ethical decision making before the group split up into four breakout sessions on a variety of topics dealing with ethics.
In addition to providing participants a chance to reflect on their own ethical standards, another goal of the program was to examine how the Love School of Business teaches ethics, and how ethical issues might be more meaningfully incorporated into the curriculum in the future.