"Nobody ever owns up to being an unethical person," Anderson says. "It's everybody else who's unethical."
Rationalizing ethical slips isn't hard for people who must reconcile competing professional pressures. A prominent healthcare attorney with a major Chicago law firm cites the situation in fee-for-service medicine, where overzealous physicians may rack up legitimate (but unnecessary) charges in the name of conscientiousness.
"Never mind what the client really needs," says the attorney, "doctors and lawyers make those decisions for them. And sometimes those decisions are costly."
Excessive demands from higher-ups can also be a factor. For example, consider the timekeeping wars that go on in the legal world. I spent five years of my career as office manager for a medium-size general corporate law firm, and was responsible for collecting and monitoring attorneys' time sheets there. During my tenure, there was an ongoing push for associates to generate more billable hours, which in turn generated a silent feud among several of the associates.
All the firm's associates worked similarly long hours. However, one associate with some particularly "creative" timekeeping strategies made it look as if he was putting in more hours than his colleagues. One very meticulous, hard-working associate (who put in 10-hour days every single day) resented his colleague's timekeeping strategies, the partners' tacit agreement to look the other way and the subsequent pressure it placed on him to work harder and bill more hours, too.
His personal integrity created a double bind. He didn't feel it was his place to blow the whistle on his colleague, nor did he wish to put in more hours than he already was. He certainly wasn't interested in padding his time sheets. But he worried that the partners would think he wasn't productive enough.
He need not have worried. Working in the same office with him every day, it was impossible not to notice how diligently he worked.
As it turns out, both men became partners in the firm at the same time. Despite the conflict over billable hours, they were competent attorneys who achieved good results for the firm. But one was honest and capable, while the other was devious and manipulative.
It would be comforting to believe that, monetarily speaking, "crime doesn't pay." But it isn't always true. Sometimes, crime can be very lucrative. And just because the two Beech-Nut executives got caught doesn't mean that the next group of corporate thieves will suffer a similar fate. Besides, people who don't get caught don't make the six o'clock news.
The executives weren't even true bad guys (although they did show very poor judgment, for which they paid dearly). Their intention was to keep their company solvent and profitable. In their own minds, they probably genuinely believed that the "financial bottom line" of their company was more important than the law, fair business practices or their own personal reputation. What they needed was a lesson in "Business Ethics 101," with special emphasis on personal integrity and social responsibility.
