Business Ethics

One of my professor said in one of his class, “Business Ethics is contradiction in terms; ethics cannot be a business, business cannot be ethical”. Though I do not even remember the course he was teaching, this phrase of his I remember rather clearly.

The professor who taught us business ethics, taught with such a passion, for a long time we used get nightmare when the word ethics was uttered. One of my friend, that time itself, prophesized, “George, I see your future right now.” It is on that day I decided that I may teach anything but never business ethics. “Why to become the source of pain and suffering for students?” was the overarching intention.

I resisted teaching business ethics for long time, the more I resisted more people were convinced that I should concentrate on teaching business ethics. As destiny would have it, during a party, I ended up agreeing to teach the subject. I know that in my right mind I would have never agreed, but when the spirit is high, no longer one control one’s thinking, and end up agreeing to do anything. Thus I became the ethics teacher.

It is so obvious that this is the subject no student bothers even to read (forget about studying), so the important task is proving to students that business ethics is also a subject. I pointed out that most of the CEO talks are on ethics and morals. Students were not impressed rather they were convinced that ethics is only for CEOs, and they will study it once they become CEO.

The only good thing about teaching ethics is that my thinking has become more logical and I am exposed to the nuances of the philosophical mind of great thinkers. And also I am mastering the art of teaching to chairs and benches.