The ethical company

Guitarist/Philosopher Robert Fripp, himself a victim of various record company shenanigans vis. his royalties and finances in general over the course of almost fifty years on the Front Lines, has this to say about corporate ethics:

Recognisable features of the ethical company involve these attributes:

transparency;
straightforwardness;
accountability;
owning-up;
honesty;
fairness;
common decency;
distributive justice.

Recognisable features of a company whose base is ethically challenged are these:

dissembling;
use of threats;
unkindness to employees;
a widespread use of gagging orders;
an inequitable distribution of company income;

A company which:

would rather conduct its business verbally (particularly with regard to disputed issues) instead of committing its views to writing;
commonly resorts to litigation, or employs the frequent threat of such;
employs gagging clauses as standard policy;
pays its directors highly disproportionate sums in comparison with its employees;
is suspect and should be avoided wherever possible.

It is a sad commentary on current business and public life that this needs to be written or debated.

transparency + straightforwardness = honesty
accountability + owning-up = responsibility
distributive justice + fairness = equity
common decency = goodwill

The Four Pillars of The Ethical Company:
Honesty, Responsibility, Equity, Goodwill

It is my fervent hope that with the apparent death of Reaganism in the recent election, that perhaps government can set a tone more in keeping with the Four Pillars than with a denial of fraternal stewardship-because we are, whether we like it or not, the keepers of our brothers and sisters. A society is only is strong as its weakest link.

Labels: Ethics, Reagan, Robert Fripp

posted by Anonymous @ 10:11 AM