Fox smells his own hole first
That little phrase takes me back to a carefree childhood where my brother and I would create or quote humorous sayings to blame our flatulence on each other. Yes, yes. Boys will be boys. This was one of our favorites: Fox smells his own hole first.
It meant that if someone accused you of a foul odor, they were more than likely the culprit or were planning to bake a similar air-biscuit in the near future. The saying came to mind this week as I read up on the MBA Oath which was created by some 2009 Harvard grads and is now being signed by freshly minted MBAs all over the country, most of them from top ten programs. Here is a snippet of the awesomeness:
A set of shared values is one of the defining features of a profession. Lawyers and doctors have their own codes, but business-school professors tend to embrace Milton Friedman’s claim that the only responsibility of business is to maximize profits. They have told their students that as managers their sole mission should be increasing shareholder valueLOL. As an aspiring HR guy, I can say honestly that if I found out that one of my job candidates had signed this well-intentioned pile of crap they would get booted right out of the hiring pool. Why? Because Eliot Spitzer hired prostitutes. Because Jimmy Swaggart did too. Because Mark Foley was a pervert and Mark Sanford just cheated on his wife.
What do they all have in common? They all vehemently fought against and/or spoke out about the very vices that would eventually bring them down.
It strikes me as odd that people who have worked their whole lives (or had rich parents) to get a starting salary of $150,000-$180,000 would be so adamant about this oath of morality, ethics and responsibility to people other than their shareholders.
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5 comments:
I'm not sure what you are arguing here.
Are you saying that we ought not to have any moral codes at all, since they will inevitably be broken?
Or are you saying that to work for a profit in a free market system is silly, because you believe free markets lead to corruption and greed and ultimately moral demise?
And are you really so willing to discriminate against a job applicant who sighed this manifesto "because Eliot Spitzer hired prostitutes. Because Jimmy Swaggart did too. Because Mark Foley was a pervert and Mark Sanford just cheated on his wife."?
And a couple more questions:
I read the oath - the long version, and I am wondering what specifically about it you object to?
And second, I wonder why the "snippet of the awesomeness" you quoted in your post came not from the oath itself but from an Economist article about it. The way you wrote the post makes it sound like that paragraph is included in the actual oath.
If people read this oath or even try to recall it each day at the start of work it actually will have a positive affect. It was one of the findings in the book Predictably Irrational.
Signing the oath and then going off to make money however will have little affect other than to serve as an excuse for patting yourself on the back for all of your ethical purity.
i need to consult cousel.
Not sure I see the connection between Milton Friedman and governmental prostitutes. I'll keep looking.
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