61 Words

November 26, 2010 — Starr Tincup

You ever notice you only hear “it’s just business …” immediately before or after somebody gets screwed?  That phrase, which captures all the baseness of our mortal spirit, is usually preceded or followed by some salt-in-the-wound kicker like “it’s nothing personal, Dude …” or “I wish it didn’t have to be like this.”

I’ve heard it enough (and said it enough) to know it’s not true.  It’s never just business.  It’s always personal.

But for some reason, most of us (the best and worst of us) act like business is some game.  We step on the playing field each morning and play with subconscious purpose – like we learned the rules so completely in our youth they no longer require remembering.  We don’t process a game strategy – we intuitively execute a move, and the people around us respond within the boundaries of the game.

The game of business encourages people to believe, say and do things we would never do in “real life.”  To treat people like we never would in our neighborhoods.  To lie to colleagues, employees and customers like we never would to our friends or children.

Who made these rules and why do we follow them?  Why are so many willing to lie, cheat and steal at work (in ways both big and small) without remorse?  Is it some epidemic of business sociopathy?  I don’t think so.  In her book The Sociopath Next Door, Martha Stout calls sociopaths “the ice people.”  But she admits that perhaps only 4% of “ordinary people” are actually sociopaths.  I’ve personally been exposed to a far greater percentage of ordinary people who may be dishonest at work with no remorse at all – but fret for weeks over the day they forgot to feed the dog, or water the dog, or let the dog out, or … These people are not sociopaths (sociopaths don’t care about dogs).

It’s just that people seem to play a different game at work.  We have a different set of rules.  A different value system?

It’s probably more like Philip Zimbardo writes in his book “The Lucifer Effect, Understanding How Good People Turn Evil.”  Philip Zimbardo created the Stanford Prison Experiment (I’ll cover the SPE in detail later).  Zimbardo writes, “Dehumanization is one of the central processes in the transformation of ordinary normal people into indifferent or even wanton perpetrators of evil.”  He describes dehumanization as caused by “a set of dynamic psychological processes … that can induce good people to do evil, among them deindividuation, obedience to authority, passivity in the face of threats, self-justification and rationalization.”

So, is business dehumanizing to the point that we transform into wanton perpetrators of evil (in the secular sense)?  Or from a less dramatic perspective, does business cause (or simply allow) us to behave in ways we would not at home?  And is this wrong?  Or is it necessary?

In a pure Machiavellian sense, the “neutral acceptance or even positive encouragement of the immorality of powerful men” is grist for the mill of business.  After all, the primary purpose of business is to make money for the owners, right?  One can’t maximize profits if one starts thinking of John as a person (devoted husband, father of three, enjoys the History Channel and collects baseball cards) instead of a lathe with specifications and a total-cost-of-ownership (in other words, an asset or a tool).

But real life has a way of catching up with business (and catching up with each of us in proportion to the way we played the game).  Some learn early enough that business is not a game at all.  That the elevator is not a tunnel from the locker room disgorging us upon a playing field where dramatic psychic battles are staged for symbolic victories and defeats.  And when the game is over we all return home; not as players but as our “real selves.” Some learn early enough …

Others end up like J. Clifford Baxter.

“Carol.  I am so sorry for this.  I feel I just can’t go on.  I have always tried to do the right thing but where there was once great pride now it’s gone.  I love you and the children so much.  I just can’t be any good to you or myself.  The pain is overwhelming.  Please try to forgive me.  Cliff.”

61 words.

This is the sum of one man’s reflection upon his career – upon his life.  These are the words of someone who realized too late that business and life are not two separate things.  These are the number of steps in one man’s descent to darkness.

Business is personal.  Business can destroy lives or bolster them.  It can feed people or take their homes.  It can be the field of our finest hour or the alley of our most shameful act.  But, all-in-all, business is people.  Therefore it is inherently personal.

My goal is to measure future business decisions by my personal values rather than the rules ascribed to the game of business.  My theory is that when doing so, not only will my business flourish, but the people in my business (including myself) will be happier.  The goal of this blog is to write about business decisions and challenges that we all face on a regular basis, and to propose solutions rooted in common sense and simple goodness rather than business acumen and a “neutral acceptance” of greed and apathy.

And what better time to start a blog about every-man business ethics?

Happy Thanksgiving.