Conan, Leno, and a Business Moral
Nice article in the Washington Post by business columnist Steven Pearlstein, asserting that NBC’s late night troubles are an analog for what’s wrong with American Business. Among his observations: It starts with the mind-set that puts short-term profit over long-term value creation…. Unable to come up with something new and fresh, NBC’s fallback — like […]
Bone at the Top
Occasionally, company leaders just do the darndest things. Things like short-term decisions that wind up wrecking a company’s reputation long-term. Things that must make the company’s efforts to build a culture of ethics internally, just seem to its employees like so much window dressing. These bone-headed decisions set a “tone at the top” you don’t […]
The Tiger Stands Defender
I had the great fun this weekend of attending my college reunions at Princeton. Among the many pleasures there was seeing one of my college friends, a woman known then (and now) for her unflinching social activism. When we were in school, she was the most vocal and active of all students about eliminating the […]
“Shareholder Value” and short-term thinking
Can short-term thinking in a business leader be ethical… at least when the survival of the business is not at stake? Isn’t there something intrinsically wrong about sacrificing the future for the sake of the present? Valuing the long-term over the short-term is at the heart of a lot of messages that company management gives […]