ethics - Publications - Faculty & Research

25 Oct 2006
Op-Ed

Fixing Executive Options: The Veil of Ignorance

The latest corporate governance crisis is buried in the details of executive compensation contracts. Don't like the timing of the stock option grant you got or the strike price of the contract? No worries! It turns out that this is nothing an eraser can't fix. While... View Details

Keywords: by Mihir Desai & Joshua Margolis

2021
Working Paper

Does Observability Amplify Sensitivity to Moral Frames? Evaluating a Reputation-Based Account of Moral Preferences

By: Valerio Capraro, Jillian J. Jordan and Ben Tappin

A growing body of work suggests that people are sensitive to moral framing in economic games involving prosociality, suggesting that people hold moral preferences for doing the “right thing”. What gives rise to these preferences? Here, we evaluate the explanatory power... View Details

Keywords: Moral Preferences; Moral Frames; Observability; Trustworthiness; Trust Game; Trade-off Game; Moral Sensibility; Reputation; Behavior; Trust

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April 2017
Article

The Responsibilities and Role of Business in Relation to Society: Back to Basics?

By: Nien-he Hsieh

In this address, I outline a back-to-basics approach to specifying the responsibilities and role of business in relation to society. Three “basics” comprise the approach. The first is arguing that basic principles of ordinary morality, such as a duty not to harm,... View Details

Keywords: Business And Society; Corporate Responsibility; Harm; Human Rights; Institutions; Pareto Efficiency; Corporate Social Responsibility and Impact; Moral Sensibility; Society; Rights

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January 2011
Case

Exit Strategy (A)

By: Clayton S. Rose and Justine Kelly Lelchuk

Jeff Brown wondered whether now was the right time to call his boss, and friend, Bernard Tubiana. Brown was a rising star at Deloitte Consulting and three weeks into an important project for Aflac. He was about to receive an offer from Aflac's major competitor,... View Details

Keywords: Decisions; Ethics; Employees; Resignation and Termination; Service Industry

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February 2007 (Revised March 2007)
Module Note

Truman and the Bomb Summary: Balancing Benefits and Harms

By: Sandra J. Sucher

A summary of the major themes discussed in the eleventh class of The Moral Leader (EC curriculum). View Details

Keywords: History; Leadership; Ethics; Decision Choices and Conditions; Government and Politics

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2007
Book

From Higher Aims to Hired Hands: The Social Transformation of American Business Schools and the Unfulfilled Promise of Management as a Profession

By: Rakesh Khurana

Is management a profession? Should it be? Can it be? This major work of social and intellectual history reveals how such questions have driven business education and shaped American management and society for more than a century. The book is also a call for reform.... View Details

Keywords: Social History; Business Education; Moral Sensibility; Profit; Leadership; Managerial Roles; United States

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Profile

Jenny Tison

In fact, one of HBS’ greatest lessons, in Jenny’s estimation, has to do with the importance of structure. “Just because you’re a good person,” she says, “doesn’t preclude you from having to implement an infrastructure of ethical checks... View Details

01 Jun 2002
News

Two Presidents, One Goal: Building on the Club of Chicago

Business Statesman of the Year Dinner, which Mott describes as “the one we want the walls busted out for.” The event honors a member of the business community who “not only personifies success and ethics in business, but who also gives... View Details

Keywords: Amy Burton

Web

Domestic Students | MBA

banking institutions. Harvard University is committed to the highest standard of ethics and conduct, in all areas, including financial aid. Please review the Harvard University Student Loan Code of Conduct (pdf) . Trying to figure out how... View Details

01 Mar 2019
News

The HBS Fund

develop and grow. Putting An HBS Education Within Reach Diamond Richardson (MBA 2019) gets her work ethic from her mother, who earned a college degree while raising two young children. “She taught me that you can do anything if you really... View Details

01 Dec 2016
News

Dear Future Author…

disciplined approach.)” —Peter Pruzan (MBA 1959), professor emeritus, Copenhagen Business School, and author of Research Methodology: The Aims, Practices and Ethics of Science Gabriela Couturier (photo via LinkedIn) Gabriela Couturier... View Details

08 Jul 2008
First Look

First Look: July 8, 2008

Working PapersNo Harm, No Foul: The Outcome Bias in Ethical Judgments (revised) Authors:Francesca Gino, Don A. Moore, and Max H. Bazerman Abstract We present three studies demonstrating that outcome information biases View Details

Keywords: Martha Lagace

14 Nov 2019
Book

Lifting the Lid on Turkey's Hidden Business History

Turkey’s economic development story has always been something of a black box for scholars to understand, perhaps in part because many of the most successful business enterprises there have been in family hands and largely closed to public scrutiny. The authors of a new... View Details

Keywords: by Sean Silverthorne

22 Jul 2016
Working Paper Summaries

Who Pays for White-Collar Crime?

Keywords: by Paul Healy and George Serafeim

17 Apr 2006
Research & Ideas

Resisting the Seductions of Success

In his novel I Come as a Thief, Louis Auchincloss introduces us to Tony Lowder, a lawyer in his early forties. Tony and his wife have two children. He works for the New York office of the Securities and Exchange Commission, but his job is just a resting spot. Tony has... View Details

Keywords: by Joseph L. Badaracco Jr.; Entertainment & Recreation; Information; Publishing

November–December 2022
Article

To See the Way Forward, Look Back

By: Ranjay Gulati

Most business leaders focus on the future much more than on the past, believing that their job is to embrace disruption and innovation, transform their organizations, and explore new frontiers. But decades of research on companies worldwide shows that most successful... View Details

Keywords: Values and Beliefs; Transformation; Mission and Purpose; Leadership

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June 2020
Article

Waiting to Inhale: Reducing Stigma in the Medical Cannabis Industry

By: Kisha Lashley and Timothy G. Pollock

When a new industry category is predicated on a product or activity subject to ‘‘core’’ stigma—meaning its very nature is stigmatized—the actors trying to establish it may struggle to gain the resources they need to survive and grow. To explain the process of reducing... View Details

Keywords: Stigma; Cannabis Industry; Deviance; Public Opinion; Moral Sensibility; Health Care and Treatment

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March 27, 2018
Other Article

Why CEOs Are Taking a Stand

By: Aaron K. Chatterji and Michael W. Toffel

In this podcast, we discuss the emerging phenomenon of CEO activism. We explain how political polarization in the U.S. and employee expectations around company values are pushing corporate leaders to enter into controversial political and social debates. We also hear... View Details

Keywords: Leadership; Social Issues; Values and Beliefs; Communication Strategy

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January 2018
Teaching Note

Still Leading (B1): Hon. Bob McDonald—Profiting from Purpose

By: Rosabeth Moss Kanter and Ai-Ling Jamila Malone

This case is included in the Still Leading series, which is part of an opening series of cases used in the Advanced Leadership Initiative at Harvard University. This case can also be taught as a standalone case as it is rich with many key leadership lessons that fall... View Details

Keywords: Leadership; Personal Development and Career; Values and Beliefs; Transition

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