Category: Business Ethics

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Business Ethics Entrepreneurship

Social entrepreneur Scott Griffiths


A social entrepreneur is the one who recognizes a social problem and organize resources to achieve a change that is beneficial for the society through innovation. Scott Griffiths is the one. Recently, he was selected as CEO of the Year in the ‘social entrepreneur’ category.

Zipcar has helped change urban life by providing instant affordable mobility in 14 major metropolitan areas, 220 college campuses in the United States, United Kingdom and Canda. He tried to make the business “do well by doing good”. Using fuel efficient cars only, they charge for car sharing services at a cheap price. Through a highly innovative operation system, Zipcar achieves the goal of sustainability by making the most efficient use of resources. Since each Zipcar removes 15 personally owned vehicles from the road, Zipcar helps reduce congestion, ease parking demands and lower a community’s overall carbon footprint. Scott has been CEO since 2003 and has made Zipcar to be the world’s biggest car share company successfully.

Reference:
http://www.voxy.co.nz/business/zipcar-ceo-wins-social-entrepreneur-ceo-year-award/26/70643

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Business Ethics Marketing

Comments on advertisement of Adderall(a prescription phychostimulant)

Reference Source: http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2009/04/27/090427fa_fact_talbot
Adderall
This is a direct-to-customer prescription drug advertisement in the US called “Adderall”. The man with a big thumb up says “can’t pass without it”. Clearly, it mainly targets at the students’ market. With a great brand positioning, it is likely to get into customers’ mind easily. As a result, this psychostimulant has become very popular in the US schools and universities. It can help students concentrate, feel confident, keep themselves awake and achieve academic success.

However, I believe there are always some reasons behind why it is categorized as a “prescription drug” rather than an OTC. And it is irresponsible and unethical for such a prescription drug advertisement to present nothing on side-effects of this prescription drug. It misleads students to purchase it blindly instead of educating them about the drug itself. Customers do need a balanced view. Adderall has a lot of side-effects that can cause health risks. But some students simply take it as candies and don’t even bother to discuss with professional doctors to get prescription. Attracted by Adderall’s advertisement, students trade pills among themselves. Suppose things go wrong, the private illegal sellers will be in big troubles, won’t Adderall face negative publicity consequently?

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Business Ethics

BP accident How do we judge if a business is a good global citizen?

Reference source: http://www.thejakartaglobe.com/analysis/once-lauded-bp-exposes-corporate-citizenship-sham/385622

In this case, BP should be blamed and accountable for its blind pursuit of profit, exploitation of environment and death of workers in US. And of course, BP is now paying for cutting the costs that should not be cut. It loses brand image and customer loyalty that cost it even more to recover.

However, one should not simply judge the ethics of a business by only one or two events. A responsible business does not only work hard to be legal or avoid negative externalities, but also trys to provide employment opportunities, taxes for governments to spend on meaningful projects, operate efficiently to offer world-wide customers cheap products with high quality in a mutually beneficial way. Creating social wealth, improving people’s living quality and happiness are also crucial. Theoretically,  if social benefits exceed social costs associated with the business activities, no matter where they operate, the company is definitely a “good” global citizen, and vice versa. I agree that actions like protecting environment, saving eco-system, and ensuring workers’ safety are perfectly moral. Nevertheless, it’s hard to analyse and quantify the potential externalities like safety risks. Theories sometimes ignore the unpredictable benefits and costs, but time will tell.

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