In order to make a company successful and sustainable over time, the interest of the owners  should not be the only factor that matters to the whole company.  In fact, a company should focus on creating values for all the stakeholders, such as employees, employers, customers and environment. This stakeholder theory has become the principle of ethics for business organizations.

On September 21, 2015, As the chief executive of Peanut Corporation of America, Parnell was sentenced to 28 years for selling misbranded food, introducing adulterated food into interstate commerce, fraud, and other crimes related to a salmonella outbreak blamed for killing nine and sickening hundreds. We all know that part of the functional area of business ethics deals with the duties of a company to ensure that products and production processes do not needlessly cause harm to customer’s health.<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Business_ethics> But what  Parnell focused on was only the profit he would personally get from these illegal behaviors, instead of the health protection and any other benefits of customers. “I don’t think he is devil, but he let greed take over his moral.”, said Jeff, whose mother died after she ate the peanut butter from Peanut Corp. of America.  <http://www.cnn.com/2014/09/19/us/peanut-butter-salmonella-trial/> Like Jeff said, Parnell focused on his own benefit so much that he ignored the most basic principle in business, which is business ethics. He  put his individual interest before the benefit of the whole group of customers, which may have brought the profit for a period of time, but has eventually caused the bankruptcy and even the guilty verdict.

In a business organization, the shareholder’s pursuit of individual profit is reasonable and acceptable; however, shareholder is not the only one part involved in the company. Creating the value only for the owners deviates from the principle of business ethics and will not help the company remain successful. What’s more important is to make sure the organization functions will address to needs of all stakeholders. Only when all the stakeholder relationships are managed well, will a company have the stable foundation to achieve some higher goals. This ethical principle, which shows the significance to the pursuit of all stakeholders’ benefits, has been being embodied everywhere in the business world.

<https://ungerboeck.com/blog/tradeshow-stakeholders>

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