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Professional Ethical Analysis PaperByBeatrice RendonBIS 345 Organizational Ethics8/9/2017 Arizona State University INTRODUCTIONIn this paper, I will explore and discussion 6 separate case studies related to leadership and/or higher education. I have worked in higher education for all 13 years of my professional career, spending the last 10 years working in the public sector at a local community college district. As I am pursing a degree in Organizational Leadership it is my intention for continued growth within higher education. I have been a mid-level manager within my community college district for the last 5 years have truly found my passion in leading people and helping develop individuals to reach their personal and professional goals. The case studies presented below are relevant to the work that I perform either as a people leader or as a government employee in higher education. I will present the method in which I conducted interviews with my two interviewees. Both interviewees that I will be sharing below have also worked in public higher education for many years in leadership capacities. I will share the results each interview and finally a discussion or how each case study and each interviewee relates to ethical theories learned throughout this course.CASE STUDIESCase Study 2 – The Case of the Performance AppraisalBy: Thomas Shanks, S.J.URL: became chief financial officer and a member of the Executive Committee of a medium-sized and moderately successful family-owned contracting business six months ago. The first nonfamily member to hold such a position and to be included in the Executive Committee, he took the job despite a lunch-time remark by the company's CEO that some members of the family were concerned about Frank's "fit with the company culture." But the CEO (who is married to the daughter of the founder of the company) said he was willing to "take a chance" on Frank.Soon after Frank started, the company decided for the first time to "right-size" (a euphemism for downsize) to respond to rapid changes in its business. Frank, who had been through this before when he was a senior manager in his previous company, agreed this was good for the long-term health of the 20-year-old company. He decided not to worry that family members seemed more concerned about their own short-term financial interests.Besides, the CEO was relying on Frank to help him determine how to downsize in an ethical manner; the CEO said he trusted Frank more on this than he did the head of his personnel department, who had "been around a little too long."On Frank's recommendation, the company decided to make its lay-off decisions based on the annual performance appraisal scores of the employees. Each department manager would submit a list of employees ranked by the average score of their last three appraisals.If the employee had been with the company less than three years, if the score for two employees was identical, or if there was some extraordinary circumstance, the manager would note it and make a decision about where to rank the person. At some point, Frank and the Executive Committee would draw a line, and those below the line would be laid off.As Frank was reviewing the evaluations, he was puzzled to find three departments in which the employee at the bottom of the list had "N/A" where the evaluation score should have been written. When he asked the managers to explain, they told him these employees had been with the company almost since the beginning. When performance appraisals had been instituted six years earlier, the CEO agreed to the longtime employees' request that they keep receiving informal evaluations "as they always had."The managers told Frank they'd questioned this decision, and the CEO had told them it wasn't their problem.When Frank raised this issue with the CEO, he responded, "Oh, I know. I haven't really evaluated them in a long time, but it's time for them to retire anyway. They just aren't performing the way they used to. The company's been very good to them. They've got plenty of retirement stored away, not to mention the severance you've convinced me to offer. They're making pretty good money, so cutting them should let us lower the line a little and save jobs for some of the younger people--you know, young kids with families just starting out. And don't worry about a lawsuit. No way they'd do that.""Do they know they're not performing well?" Frank asked."I don't know," the CEO responded. "They should. Everybody else in the company does."As they walked to the door, the CEO put his arm around Frank's shoulder. "By the way," he said, "you should know that you've won over the Executive Committee. They think you are a terrific fit with this company. I'm glad you talked with me today about these three employees. You got it right: This is a company that cares for its employees--as long as it can and as long as they're producing. Always has, always will."Frank left the CEO's office with the vague feeling that he had some moral choices to make.Does he have an ethical dilemma? What's the right thing to do? If he disagrees with the CEO, how does he protect his own career and the interests of his own family? What do you think?Commentary: I chose this case study because it relates to performance evaluations and this is a topic presenting itself at my organization right now. For as long as I have been at the district there has been a requirement that all people supervisors complete a performance evaluation for their fulltime board approved employees annually prior to June 30th, 2017. In my 10 years in the district I have only received 3 performance evaluations. Currently we are moving our salary structure to a pay for performance model. This case study exemplifies several of the issues that we are facing in our organization currently. There are old timers in the system that are doing a poor job, but no one is giving them a performance evaluation and letting them know how they are doing. Meanwhile new managers and new employees are conducting performance evaluations according to the employee handbook. Case Study 1 – Turnaround and Transformation: Leadership and Risk at Boston’s Institute of Contemporary ArtBy: Cate ReavisURL: On February 9, 2009, Shepard Fairey, a renowned street artist known for his iconic red, white and blue, “hope”, “change”, and “progress” posters of Barack Obama that were used in the president’s election campaign, was on his way to an opening night party for his “Supply and Demand” exhibition at Boston’s Institute of Contemporary Art when he was arrested on an outstanding warrant outside the front door. Fairey had failed to appear in court three days earlier on a vandalism charge dating back to 2000. While the arrest interrupted the opening night’s festivities—and was a definite downer for the nearly 800 people who were awaiting Fairey’s arrival, some of whom had purchased tickets on Craig’s List for $500—it did nothing to dampen public enthusiasm for Fairey’s exhibit. Between February and the exhibition’s closing in August, 130,000 people attended the show. In some sense, the Fairey incident was great PR for the ICA, an institution that had gone through an enormous transformation under its Director, Jill Medvedow. When Medvedow arrived in 1998, the ICA had no money, few members, no permanent collection, and, on a good year, clocked 25,000 visitors. Operating out of an old police station on Boylston Street, it was hardly a must-see cultural destination in Boston. It was considered less a museum and more an “insider’s art club”. By the time of Fairey’s exhibition, the ICA was, quite literally, in a very different place. In 2006 the museum celebrated the grand opening of its new $51 million building, located on highly coveted waterfront property in South Boston where, over the years, several high-end commercial developers had failed in their building attempts.Medvedow’s ability to bring change to an organization that had no power, involved being disciplined, getting people to believe in an idea, and taking many, many risks. Contemporary Art in BostonUp until the late 1920s, modern art in Boston, and throughout the United States, struggled to be taken seriously. In 1911 the director of Harvard University’s Fogg museum summed up the general feeling about contemporary art at the time: “In having exhibitions of the work of living men we may subject ourselves to various embarrassments.” By the late 1920s, a group of Harvard undergraduates set out to challenge this viewpoint by forming the Harvard Society of Contemporary Art as a place where the work of living men could be viewed. In 1936 the Society became the Boston Museum of Modern Art and in 1948 the museum changed its name to the Institute of Contemporary Art. For more than 50 years, the ICA was the only place in Boston dedicated to contemporary art.Unlike other styles of art, contemporary art, which included visual exhibitions, music, film, video and performance created by living artists, had never caught on in Boston like it had in other cities, most notably New York and San Francisco. According to Medvedow, there were a number of theories behind this:When you look at the ecology of what makes a vibrant contemporary art scene, you need to have several different components that all interact with one another. There need to be art schools and a strong artist community where work is created and ideas are exchanged. You need collectors, galleries and institutions that acquire, present, sell, and display that work. Historically, Boston lacked many of these components, never sustaining a critical mass of contemporary art activity and, as a result, these gaps prevented the growth of a healthy contemporary art environment in Boston.Added to the ecology argument was the fact that there had been little private and public sectorinvestment in the arts in Boston, particularly contemporary. Municipal spending for the arts in Boston was far less than what was spent in four dozen other cities in the United States and, on a broader scale, Massachusetts ranked 50th among the states for per capita philanthropy. As Medvedow remarked, “A lot of Boston’s wealth was built on conserving it and less on creating it.” And then there was the New York factor. As Medvedow noted, “New York’s artistic energy, support, scale and audience for the arts of all disciplines, has always been a magnet for Boston’s artist community.”There were members of Boston’s art world that felt the absence of a strong contemporary artcommunity was a big drawback for Boston. As William Rawn, a Boston architect and long time ICA board member, explained, “Artists provide a very different way of looking at the world. They ask questions that are different from the norm and in Boston, a city that honors academics and inventors, this is particularly admired.” Furthermore, through their work, contemporary artists reflected what was currently happening in society and as Vin Cipolla, who served on the ICA board for 16 years and as its chairman from 1997-2005, noted: “It’s the role of an institution like the ICA to provide a safe place where a diversity of perspectives can be expressed to a wide audience.”This was something Medvedow believed at her core.Jill MedvedowDescribed as “pathologically optimistic,” Jill Medvedow’s commitment to civic causes began when she was young. Raised in New Haven, Connecticut, by parents who were political and social activists, Medvedow admitted that campaigning was something she was exposed to in utero. “My parents taught me how to be a good citizen,” she said. “My mother was deeply engaged in volunteering for civic and charitable causes and my father was a prominent elected official. I grew up thinking I was part of the city’s political fabric.” Through her upbringing, she “learned about the basic mechanics of organizing and how to move an agenda,” skill sets that would serve her well in her professional life.Trained as an art historian, Medvedow arrived in Boston in 1986 from Seattle where she had founded a nonprofit contemporary arts center. In 1991 she became the first full-time contemporary curator at the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, bringing in numerous performing and visual artists from around the world. When she left the Gardner in 1996, Medvedow was determined that her next career move would involve bringing art to a broader public. “I was trying to figure out how to build a bridge between contemporary art and an audience that didn’t have a great affection for it,” she explained. “I came up with the idea of framing public art projects through the history and landscape of Boston, which Bostonians typically have a lot of affection for.” Within a year, she founded Vita Brevis, an organization devoted to producing temporary public art pieces. With the first Vita Brevis project nearcompletion, Medvedow found herself being courted to become the ICA’s next director.According to Rawn, who headed the search committee for the ICA’s new director, it wasMedvedow’s character as much as her curatorial background that made her such an attractivecandidate: The minute you met Jill you immediately noticed that she is centered. She is not wowed by trends. In language, in dress, she is not the least bit pretentious. She doesn’t try to be someone or something she isn’t. She is not out to prove anything to anybody. She has a strong intellectual base for her opinions on art. This part of her persona was reflected in her vision for the ICA, which was something that really struck us. She was passionate that the ICA needed to be relevant, very public and non-elitist, and that in order for it to succeed, it had to be better at outreach whether it was with school children, local politicians, donors, or members.A further selling point for the search committee was that because Medvedow was an outsider in the world of museum directors, she didn’t come with old rivalries or attachments.Striving to be MarginalWhen Medvedow took the reigns in March 1998, the ICA, with a yearly attendance of 25,000 (anaverage of 68 people a day) and a paltry budget just shy of $1 million, was in the midst of a severe identity crisis. The museum was housed in a converted police station and stable on Boylston Street, a building it had purchased from the city of Boston in the early 1990s with $328,000 in donations from trustees and overseers. (The Boylston address was the 10th location the museum had had since its founding.) The quirky space was largely defined by an enormous staircase that cut down through the center of the building’s four floors, creating enormous space contraints for exhibits. Unlike other Boston-area museums which could hang more than 10 shows a year, the ICA was limited to just four, with months of down time in between shows. Partly because of space and largely because of money and lack of interest, the ICA had no permanent collection, an important symbol of status in the museum world, which also helped art institutions create an identity, draw repeat visitors, and build a donor base. Meanwhile, contemporary art could be viewed at a number of museums throughoutBoston, many of which were backed by well-endowed academic institutions including MIT’s ListVisual Arts Center, the Rose Art Museum (Brandeis), Massachusetts College of Art, the Museum of Fine Arts, and Harvard University Art Museums. As Medvedow liked to say at the time, “The ICA was striving to be marginal.”Medvedow’s mandate was to stabilize and reinvent. As Cipolla explained,The ICA was doing some great work but it didn’t really have a point of view. The programming was spotty, the outreach was not very strategic, and the building we were in was a physical manifestation of the inadequacy of the organization. The ICA needed to be a place that, by the nature of its work and outreach, touched multiple facets of the Boston community. In order to become this, we needed somebody driven, entrepreneurial, who would be forceful about change. One of the things that set Jill apart from the other candidates wasn’t that she had spent a lifetime in contemporary art but rather than she understood how to work with audiences. She had the passion to bring content and interactive thinking and approaches to people of all ages across a spectrum of interests, getting the ICA outside of an elite and narrow comfort zone. She wasn’t willing to accept that what the ICA had to offer, or what contemporary artists had to say, was not important for all kinds of people.As part of her hiring agreement, Medvedow was allowed to bring Vita Brevis with her and fold it into the ICA’s programming, a move that proved critical over the following years as the ICA strove to reposition itself. As one journalist noted at the time, “Since the ICA has so much trouble pulling people in, putting art where people will virtually have to trip over it may be a smart move.”Early DaysShortly after her arrival, Medvedow put together a “business planning group” comprised of threeboard members and three outsiders including Sheryl Marshall, who, as a top stockbroker, was aknown business leader in Boston; Nick Littlefield, a lawyer who had served as Senator EdwardKennedy’s Chief of Staff for 10 years; and, Mary Schneider Enriquez, an art historian and critic who had recently moved to Boston from Mexico City. (Marshall and Schneider Enriquez would eventually join the ICA board.) With the help of the business planning group, Medvedow set out to disrupt the unproductive conversations of the existing board about the future of the ICA. As Medvedow recalled, “We looked at a number of questions. What kind of audience did we want? Did we want to stay small and focused or did we want to broaden our offerings? What should be the role of education? We explored questions involving content, specifically if we should become a collecting institution. And finally we looked at whether we could do this work in our current Back Bay location.” It didn’t take long for the group to decide that the ICA needed to grow its audience, expand its educational initiatives, form a task force to look at the idea of collecting, and begin looking for a new space. (On two separate occasions, directors of the ICA who preceded Medvedow explored relocating the museum but were unable to garner board or community support.)Medvedow’s attention then turned to learning about the Boston real estate market. While she didn’t know if or how it would be possible, she was clear that the ICA needed to be located on the water: “Our job is uniquely difficult in that Boston is not a city that embraces contemporary art. Since everything about our work is unfamiliar, we’re always fighting for an audience. We needed to be located on the water in order to attract people and motivate them to come back time and again. And a waterfront location was also a perfect metaphor for what we do which is to expand horizons.”After many months of knocking on doors to get information on Boston waterfront real estate,Mevedow’s research picked up momentum when the Commissioner of Parks and Recreation, Justine Liff, referred her to Ed Sidman, one of Boston’s big real estate developers and a major philanthropist. Sidman suggested they meet in the lobby of his firm’s building as opposed to his office, a request which sent an immediate negative signal to Medvedow. But she succeeded in flipping the switch:After listening to my pitch, he was ready to send me off with a name of the next person I should talk to when I said to him, ‘You know, I swim in your pool at the Leventhal-Sidman Jewish Community Center in Newton.’ And he says, ‘Oh really.’ And I say, ‘Yes, and I frequently go to the openings in the center’s gallery.’ The next thing you know he’s saying, ‘Let’s go to my office.’ So now we’re in his office and I’ve honed in on his passion which is how to get members of a JCC to engage in Jewish continuity and not just athletics. We ended up having a deep, intense conversation. The next thing I know, he has given me a couple good names to pursue for waterfront real estate. And for the next couple of years, I meet with him regularly to advise himon his project.Following up on Sidman’s recommendations, Medvedow eventually landed a meeting with theBoston 2000 committee. Put together by Mayor Thomas Menino to plan millenial activities forBoston, one of the committee’s responsibilities was deciding who or what should be designated the .75 acre parcel, also known as Parcel J, on Boston’s Fan Pier.Little did she know, the committee would end up being Medvedow’s last stop in her real estatesearch.Fan Pier’s Parcel JDescribed as “a wasteland of parking lots,” Parcel J was just a tiny sliver of the 21 acre, 3-million square foot, nine-block industrial area owned by the Pritzker family, which was slated to be part of the largest waterfront development in Boston’s history. The proposed plan was to populate the space with 800 residential units, 1,000 hotel rooms, 150,000 square feet of civic and cultural space, parks and open space, and an extension of a walkway along Boston Harbor. In a deal with the city of Boston, which enabled them to expand the size of their proposed hotels, the Pritzkers agreed to donate Parcel J to a cultural site.Medvedow met with the Boston 2000 committee in the spring of 1999. It was a Thursday. Impressed with her ideas for a future ICA on the waterfront, the committee suggested she present to the Boston 2000 subcommittee on Parcel J. Much to her disbelief, Medvedow found herself committing to giving a formal, “this-is-what-we-have-in-mind” presentation the next Tuesday. As she recalled, “The decision to go after the parcel was a big leap of faith. It was very hard to imagine we could make the case given how weak we were.”Scraping together $5,000, Medvedow hired an architect who drew a mock-up of a future ICA perched on Parcel J. In giving the architect directives, Medvedow was concerned with one detail: that the structure fit on the land that was available. Along with the mock-up, Medvedow and a couple ICA staff members spent the weekend before the presentation making boards of eight museums — ranging in size and cost from the Milwaukee Art Museum to Minneapolis’ Weisman Art Museum to the Getty in Los Angeles — that had been built in different cities since the early 1990s. Their idea was to stress the point that these museums had catapulted civic life and economic development in their respective cities and had played an important role in urban rebirth.Medvedow arrived on the designated Tuesday to present and found to her surprise that the ICA was one of three finalists who were presenting. One of the other finalists, a collaboration involving the Wang Center, Boston Ballet and Boston Lyric Opera, proposed a three-stage complex, described as a cross between Sydney’s Opera House and New York’s Lincoln Center. The $100 million complex would include a 2,400-seat opera and ballet house, a 500-700-seat playhouse, and a floating stage that could accommodate an audience of 1,000. Due to its size, the complex was expected to exceed the allotted space and would require some additional land that had been set aside by the Pritzkers for an office tower. The other finalist was a relatively unknown Boston-area entrepreneur who wanted to develop a $40 million Fan Pier Performing Arts and Film Center that would include a 700-seat recital hall and 125-seat partially open-air theater.In her pitch, Medvedow stressed that the new ICA would be “a public destination and thearchitectural heartbeat of the city.” Funded by a $40 million capital campaign, the four-storybuilding would occupy 60,000 square feet and would include a 400-seat theater, and a roof sculpture garden. It would hold up to 2,000 visitors. Medvedow left the presentation thinking that the museum had a slim shot, at best, of winning Parcel J, but she was increasingly convinced that the waterfront was the right location for a new ICA. The committee’s final decision would be announced in November.Drumming up SupportIn the intervening six months, Medvedow got busy educating the public, particularly local politicians, residents and area artists, on the ICA’s plans for a new home on Fan Pier. To help her sell the idea, Medvedow approached Gloria Larson, who at the time was a partner at one of Boston’s premier law firms who specialized in real estate development and government. At the time, Larson was chairman of the board of the Convention Center Authority and was in the middle of her own campaign to get a new convention center built in South Boston. As Larson explained, “I joined the ICA ‘campaign’ as both a lawyer and an advocate. I felt like Jill and I were traveling down the same path together.”In planning the campaign’s strategy, Larson recalled: “We asked ourselves, ‘Who do we need totouch who normally won’t get touched in a process like this? Who would normally never supportbuilding an ICA on South Boston’s waterfront?’” After a bit of reflection, Larson decided to visit a couple of South Boston’s key political leaders. Larson took Medvedow to meet James Kelly, who at the time was the city council’s president, state senator Stephen Lynch, and state representative Jack Hart, all of whom she knew from her law practice and her work on the convention center. The purpose of the meeting was to educate them on the ICA’s development plans and to hear their concerns.After introductions, Kelly began the conversation by saying, “You can’t tell us you’re going to build a contemporary art museum next to Southie.” Medvedow responded by saying, “Let me tell you about it. Let me tell you about the programs we have and how I want to bring kids from South Boston in, and how the world of art is an opportunity to expand their horizons in ways that I know you would support.” Hearing her out, Kelly’s concerns turned to the infamous Robert Mapplethorpe exhibit. Shown at the ICA in the early 1990s, the exhibit caused great controversy for its sexually explicit photographs. “You have to promise me you will never do a show like that again,” Kelly stated. Medvedow retorted with: “You know I can’t make that promise. That would be like me asking you to promise that you’ll never do anything controversial again. But how about I promise you that if I’m going to do anything like that, I will give you notice so that you won’t be caught by surprise.” Kelly quickly responded with, “Well if you ever do anything like that I will organize a picket.” “Well if you organize a picket,” Medvedow said, “I’ll bring you coffee, because that kind of attention is exactly what we need to build an audience for the ICA in Boston.” It was at this point in the exchange that Kelly turned to Larson and said, “Larson, I like your friend Jill.”In November 1999 the Boston 2000 committee announced that the ICA had won the Parcel Jcompetition. Medvedow believed one of the main reasons the ICA was chosen was because themock-up demonstrated that from a space perspective, the museum would be a perfect fit. In addition, the ICA had successfully proven its financial viability to the committee by identifying $12 million— of which $6 million would come from the sale of its Boylston building—of the estimated $40 million needed for the project. Larson believed that Medvedow’s ability to assess her audience before sharing her vision was key to sealing the deal. “She had a way of presenting to large and small audiences the concept of a new ICA so that it became something they could own too. She was able to tell the story in ways that each audience could hear.”Of course, there were many skeptics of the committee’s decision and the ICA’s plan. Some thought that locating the ICA away from other cultural attractions was a mistake. After all, it had not been able to attract visitors when it was located in the heart of Boston’s tourist district. Then there was the whole issue of money, something the ICA had little of and had no history of raising. While the land was free, the building and operational costs would more than test the museum’s fundraising capabilities. As Paul Buttenwieser, ICA board member and Boston philanthropist, put it, “The key question is whether the wider community of philanthropic and arts supporters will see this as a credible project they want to be involved with.”But then there were those who were quietly cheering for the ICA. As one Boston Globe journalistpointed out, “While informed observers think it unlikely the ICA will realize its goals, an unusualnumber hold out hope that it will. In a city better known for its enthusiasm for sports, politics and revenge than for boosterism, optimists and cynics admire the organization for attempting to defy the formidable odds against building something innovative in Boston.”15And then there was the ICA’s biggest cheerleader. As Larson noted, “Jill believed in the visionherself. She had no doubt that it could be done.”Now What?After winning the right to build on Parcel J, one of Medvedow’s first orders of business was to hire adirector of development, a position that had not previously existed at the ICA. A consultantMedvedow had hired to help develop a fundraising and endowment strategy suggested she talk to the MFA’s marketing director Paul Bessire. This same consultant, however, warned Medvedow that Bessire would never leave the MFA for the ICA. She wanted to talk to him nevertheless.Meeting over a drink, Medvedow and Bessire connected immediately after discovering they lived in the same neighborhood and their kids went to the same school. When the conversation turned to the purpose of their meeting Medvedow was blunt: “Why,” she asked, “would you rather stay at the MFA than be a part of making something totally new that could reshape how the city of Boston thinks about contemporary art?”By spring 2000, Bessire was the ICA’s new Director of External Relations. Shortly after his arrival the ICA launched a $50 million “Campaign for the New ICA” — which eventually grew to $62 million — on the back of $6 million that had been committed by two ICA trustees. As Bessire explained, launching a campaign with far less than 50% of funds already raised was a very unconventional strategy, but it was one that made sense for an organization that wanted to send a message to the community: “The strategy was to demonstrate that there was a commitment on the part of the board and the institution to make this project happen and a good fundraising strategy always begins with the family.”In concert with developing a fundraising strategy and finding and hiring the right talent to oversee it, Medvedow was eager to bring in new blood—which was to say business leaders with clout16 —to the ICA’s 35-member board, and ease out those whose vision was not aligned with where she was taking the museum. Success in winning the rights to the land coupled with Medvedow’s vision of investing in Boston’s future as opposed to its past, Bessire noted, had put the ICA in a very different light in the eyes of potential board members. By early 2001, there were 13 new members, the majority of whom came from the private equity, venture capital, and financial services sector. (See Exhibit 1 for list of those who joined the ICA board between 1998 and 2001.)Although Medvedow’s to-do list after winning the rights to build on Parcel J was populated withtasks relating to the museum’s future home, she never lost site of the importance of not only keeping the ICA up and running—and this included bringing in high-profile artists like Cornelia Parker, Olafur Eliasson, and Ellen Gallagher, and sponsoring public art projects such as Art on the Emerald Necklace that received national recognition—but publicly repositioning the ICA by building excitement for its future and demonstrating the legitimate need for a new building. As Rawn noted, “I cite this as one of the most notable elements of Jill’s leadership. Too often you see institutions plunge ahead on a new capital investment and they really let the existing institution wither and put themselves at risk for not succeeding in the new place.”One of the most notable ways Medvedow involved the public in the future ICA was in the selection of architects.Selecting an ArchitectThe ICA began its architect search with a couple of basic criteria. As Cipolla explained in early 2001, “We want an architect with a deep understanding of the civic. This is not just a building, not just an interior showcase. It has a civic role. A lot depends on what happens outside the four walls.” In addition, Medvedow noted that the museum was looking for an individual or a firm that had not completed a prominent building in the United States: “The ICA has a long tradition of supporting the work of emerging artists.”The ICA traveled down a fairly unconventional path when it came to the actual selection process.Instead of following the typical competition approach whereby a select number of firms would be paid an agreed upon sum of money to come up with a specific proposal, Medvedow decided on a different course of action. She explained:One of our board members who was an architect said to me, ‘Be careful about competitions because you get what you pay for. In order to have a healthy competition, you will need to offer up significant funds so that architects will invest the time it will take to come up with smart, well thought through proposals.’ So, we decided not to do a competition because we were certain we didn’t have the money. And given that we’re in the business of reviewing artists’ work over time we felt that we could judge the work of architects ourselves.With that decision made, Medvedow put together an Architect Selection Committee. Headed by Nick Pritzker, the committee included Medvedow, Cipolla, Henrique de Campos Meirelles, President of Fleet Global Banking, Barbara Lee, Vice Chair of the Board of Trustees and philanthropist, and Ellen Poss, Vice Chair of the Board of Trustees and philanthropist. Medvedow decided not to include any architects in the group, as she didn’t want the committee to be driven by any one architectural agenda.The committee’s first assignment was to establish goals and criteria, which would help guide the ICA through the selection process. To help the committee, which had no baseline knowledge ofarchitecture, Medvedow hired an architectural historian from Harvard University to lead a seminar on contemporary architecture for the group. The historian helped the committee establish goals and criteria (Exhibit 2), and drew up a list of 30 architectural firms for consideration.Using the list of goals and criteria as a guide, the committee scaled down the list of 30 firms to twelve and ultimately to four. The chosen four included Studio Granda from Iceland, Boston-based Office d’A, Peter Zumthor of Switerland, and Diller + Scofidio from New York. Medvedow traveled to meet the four firms and each was invited to Boston to present their work to the committee.Medvedow recognized that in order for the ICA to matter to a wider audience, more people had to be involved in the dialogue on the ICA’s building plans. On March 24, 2001, the ICA hosted “Building A Vision: Four Architects’ Views”, a public presentation at the Copley Theater where the final four firms were asked to present. Medvedow laid down one rule for the presenters: because the purpose of the presentation was to enable the firms to show their work and discuss their philosophies towards contemporary art, they were not to present their ideas for building a new ICA. She explained her reasoning: “The minute there’s an image out there of what architect X could create I feared that I would have to manage a multitude of stakeholders who were wedded to architect X’s proposal. But what if we didn’t choose that proposal or what if we chose it and it substantially changed during the design process? I didn’t want to be caught in that kind of public negativity.”The presentations drew an impressive crowd. “People were literally waiting in line to get in,”Medvedow recalled. “There was not an unfilled seat in the theater. This level of transparency inmuseum planning had never happened before in Boston. There was enormous enthusiasm behind our out-of-the-box, if not downright off-the-wall project, and the public was thrilled that we wanted to share our ideas. In addition there was great excitement over what might happen down on the waterfront.” While not responsible for the ultimate decision, attendees were queried on their thoughts through a survey with questions that included: What did you like about the work presented? What do you think are some of the most important design opportunities provided by the waterfront site? Do you find any of the architects’ design philosophies to be particularly responsive to the institutional mission of the ICA?Of the four presenters, Peter Zumthor and Diller + Scofidio stood out as much for their work as for their general philosophy towards architecture.Diller + ScofidioWinners of the MacArthur Foundation “genius” grant in 1999—marking the first time architects had been awarded the grant—the husband and wife team of Richard Scofidio and Elizabeth Diller was known for integrating media and architecture. As Diller stated during their presentation, “Architecture and new technologies need not be adversaries. The union can actually be quite fertile.”Diller + Scofidio’s resume was quite deep when it came to the work they had done on the inside of museum walls. They had worked with many visual and performing artists and had completednumerous art installations. Their most well known indoor architectural work was the renovation of the Brasserie restaurant located in the Seagram building in New York. As Diller explained, one of their goals in redesigning the space was to find ways to connect the restaurant, which was below ground and without natural light, back to the street. They accomplished this by getting a blurred video snapshot of every person as they came through the revolving door. The image was displayed above the bar, with every new entrance image pushing the previous 15 to the right. (See Exhibit 3.)When it came to building, however, their resume was quite thin; in fact they had never built abuilding in the United States. Their most renowned work was the Blur Building, a media pavilion built for the 2002 Swiss Expo in Neuchatal, which was less a building and more a suspended platform enveloped by a man-made cloud of fog. (See Exhibit 4.) Blur, which was a temporary structure where no one lived or worked, showcased Diller + Scofidio’s belief that “architecture must always question material and spatial conventions.”Peter ZumthorOf the four finalists, Peter Zumthor was the best known and the most experienced architect, with the art museum in Bregenz, Austria (Kunsthaus Bregenz) and the thermal baths (Therme Vals) in Switzerland being two of his most famous works. (See Exhibits 5 and 6.) As one journalist wrote, “Although [Zumthor] cultivates the disarming role of simple artisan-architect, he is responsible for some of the most radical buildings of our time. His sophisticated, demanding, exquisite structures of rigidly reductive minimalism, in which every detail has enormous aesthetic and emotional power, create their own world of Zen-like, concentrated beauty – an immutable perfectionism that probably scares off as many clients as it attracts.”Zumthor was not known for a particular style, but, as one observer noted, a number of themes were interwoven throughout much of his work: celebration of place, engagement of all the human senses, deep understanding of space, light and materiality. For Zumthor, architecture “[had] it’s own realm. It has a special physical relationship with life. I do not think of it primarily as either a message or a symbol, but as an envelope and background for life which goes on in and around it…”While his work was renowned, so was his need to control. “I like to control the buildings I do,” he admitted to the crowd gathered in the Copley Theater. During his presentation Zumthor recounted his frustration towards a project he was awarded in Berlin that was never complete: “This was eight damned years ago and for eight years these people wanted me to make compromises and compromises,” he explained showing great frustration, and giving members of the Architect Selection Committee, some pause.DecisionIn April 2001, the ICA announced that Diller + Scofidio had been chosen to build the new building. Liz Diller believed they were tapped because of their belief that there needed to be a partnership between the new building and the art it would house: “From the beginning we said neither would play a supporting role for the other.” From Medvedow’s perspective, while the choice of Diller + Scofidio was motivated largely by their “sheer brilliance,” there was another important reason: “Because they didn’t have a lot of experience they had as much to gain as we did, and consequently as much to lose as we did. So we all had as much at stake to make it work.”By the time the ICA broke ground in September 2004, half of the $62 million had been committed, the majority coming from the ICA’s board of trustees and corporate donors. Once again, the ICA was relying on an unconventional and risky development strategy. As Bessire explained, “Development people always say the minute you break ground, people assume it’s a done deal and will be reluctant to give money. We broke ground and people started believing in us.”Stumbling BlocksThe ICA faced several major challenges in its effort to erect a new home on Fan Pier. As Medvedow explained, building a new waterfront property in Boston was an “arduous” task when it came to obtaining all the required state and city approvals. In fact the ICA had to get dozens of approvals, worth millions of dollars in legal fees, between the time it was granted the land and when it opened its doors in 2006. As Medvedow noted, the ICA’s ability to navigate these waters was surprising to many: “A lot of people thought that even though we had gotten the land, the process of getting all the approvals would end up killing us. We learned quickly who we needed to talk to and convince to grant us the approvals we needed.”Just months away from breaking ground on the building, the Pritzker family’s development plans for the 21 acre lot surrounding the ICA were aborted. The family announced in late 2003 that it would be putting the land up for sale. Honoring the commitments they made to the city of Boston, the Pritzkers let it be known publicly that the new buyer would have to agree to the building commitments they made to the city of Boston, including setting aside the .75 acre parcel for the ICA. The Pritzker’s decision was a big disappointment for the ICA. As Medvedow noted, “We lost a partner that recognized the ICA as an asset.”Finally, in April 2006, just five months before the new building was scheduled to open, the ICA faced another major change. Macomber, a 100-year old construction firm that was considered one of Boston’s leading builders, had fallen months behind schedule and was dealing with the legal aftermath of a recent accident on one of its construction sites which claimed three lives. The ICA responded by bringing in another firm to complete the work. In August, Medvedow announced that because of construction delays the ICA would have to delay its September opening. In explaining the postponement, Medvedow told The Boston Globe, “Our building is beautiful, it’s close to completion, and it works. But you only get one chance to make a first impression. When we open, we are going to hit the ground running. In the long life of this building, this is a very insignificant and brief hiccup.”On December 10, 2006, the new ICA opened to more than 8,000 visitors. (See Exhibit 7.)If They Build It, Will They Come?The ICA’s ability to oversee the construction of a new building on Boston’s waterfront by anarchitecture firm that had never built a building in the United States, raise over $75 million—surpassing the capital campaign goal of $62 million—and welcome over 280,000 visitors in its first year—well over the 200,000 that was needed to break even—was, in most people’s minds,miraculous. The question posed by one museum director a year before the new ICA opened its doors, “Do you really think there are five times the market for the ICA’s program than there is right now and that the only reason they’re not getting them now is building size?”26 had been answered “yes”.But sustaining the attendance level would be the main challenge going forward. New museumstended to attract huge crowds in their first year of operation only to see attendance taper off. San Francisco’s Museum of Modern Art, which opened its new building in 1995 saw its attendance soar from 250,000 to 800,000 in its first year, and then come back down to 600,000 in its second year. The Peabody Essex Museum in Massachusetts more than doubled its attendance in year one only to see it decline in year two. As that museum’s deputy director stated, “The first year [attendance] doesn’t matter. It’s everybody looking at it because it’s there. The ‘lookyloos,’ I like to call them.”But in the case of the ICA, the ‘lookyloos’ seemed to be holding their gaze. In 2008 and 2009, the ICA had a combined attendance record of well over 450,mentary: I selected this case study because although it is long it has a lot to do with leadership. Medvedow took an organization that had little funding poor infrastructure, no funding and turned it around. It was about getting people to believe in the idea that she had and I feel like that is a lot of what I do in my current role. I was given a department that was significantly understaffed and zero funding, but I had to turn it around by selling my vision. I know that Medvedow has a lot to teach others when it comes to leadership and I enjoyed reading about her success.Case Study 3 – Ethics of US Student Loan DebtBy: Victoria TseURL: Americans owe nearly $1.3 trillion in student loan debt spread out among 43 million borrowers, putting it only second behind mortgage debt as the highest level of consumer debt. To illustrate the magnitude of the student loan debt crisis, consider the following. The average Class of 2016 graduate owes $37,172 in student loan debt, up six percent from the previous year (Student Loan Hero). That intimidating figure continues to rise with each graduating class incurring more debt than the preceding class. According to the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, one in four student loan borrowers are either in delinquency or default on their loans (Market Watch).Delinquency and Default“The current national rate of ‘serious delinquencies’ for student loans — defined as 90 days or more overdue — is about 11 percent, nearly double where it was in 2003” (CNBC). Don Schlagenhauf and Lowell Ricketts of the St. Louis Fed’s Center for Household Financial Stability comment on the alarming rate of serious delinquencies noting the aforementioned “11 percent” is a generous and understated estimate considering “that many student loans are in deferment, grace periods or forebearance” (CNBC). The rate of serious delinquencies suggests the ability of young borrowers to pay back their education loans is diminishing. As of January 1, 2016, 43% of borrowers were behind in paying loans or received permission to postpone repayment due to economic hardship.About $56 billion in student debt is a result of 1 in 6 borrowers defaulting on their loans, meaning these loans have been left unpaid for at least a year. Another 3 million borrowers who owe $66 billion of debt were at least a month behind in payments. “Meantime, another three million owing almost $110 billion were in ‘forbearance’ or ‘deferment’, meaning they had received permission to temporarily halt payments due to a financial emergency, such as unemployment” (WSJ). When a loan is delinquent for 270 days, it goes into default and the borrower must pay the entire unpaid balance including any and all accrued collection fees immediately (FedLoan). Consequences of defaulting involve damage to credit rating, garnishment of wages, and withheld tax refunds. A rise in delinquency rates imply that young borrowers will be economically disadvantaged, relative to previous generations, as their capacity to save and access to credit continues to be undermined by crippling interest rates.I. Ethical Issues Raised by Factors Driving Student Loan DebtTuition InflationKey factors drive student loan debt nationally, making it an almost universal American experience. To start, government grants and aid have failed to keep pace with rising tuition costs. There is an uneven growth between college tuition and the amount of financial aid made available to students. Pell Grants now cover less than one third the cost of attending a four-year public school compared to the 1980s when it covered more than half the cost. In 2015, the New York Federal Reserve Bank conducted research in which they found that the “flood of easy federal money into higher education” predictably led to higher tuition and fees and “for every dollar of subsidized loans, tuition went up by 65 cents” (). This is known as the “pass-through effect” which is prevalent in expensive private institutions where universities that serve a larger population of average students continuously raise tuition to “absorb as much of the new federal money as they can” ().According to Sheila Bair, a former Chairperson of the FDIC, “one of the biggest causes of the student debt crisis is that Americans haven’t seen a raise in years” (MarketWatch). In other words, while real wages are declining, the need for a college degree continues to increase, resulting in “more and more young people applying to college with fewer families able to pay for it” (MarketWatch). The chart below demonstrates the stark disproportion between median annual earnings of young people and the average student loan balance. For-Profit College ScamsPredatory LendingFor-profit colleges play a large role in the student loan debt crisis considering they account for 42% of postsecondary education enrollment growth in the past decade according to the National Bureau of Economic Research. “The amount of debt owed by those attending for-profit colleges has grown from $39 billion in 2000 to $229 billion in 2014—which is more attributable to the increases in the rate of borrowing at those schools than to increases in enrollment” (The Atlantic). For-profit colleges have come under scrutiny of lawmakers and consumer advocates for inflating job placement and graduation rates to lure vulnerable students, usually adults with families who neither have the time nor money to attend a traditional university, into enrolling and taking out hefty loans. In 2015, Corinthian Colleges, responsible for Everest Institute, Wyotech, and Heald College, faced a $530 million lawsuit filed by the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) for predatory lending, trapping students into private loans referred to as “Genesis Loans”, with interest rates as high as 15%. The CFPB also alleged Corinthian set tuition and fees for their bachelor’s degree programs at a whopping range of $60,000-$75,000, to force students to retrieve loans from a program in which Corinthian reaped a portion of that lender’s fees. Since the lawsuit, Corinthian Colleges has sold or closed most of its schools, leaving a large portion of students who attended any of their institutions to inquire about their eligibility for loan forgiveness.Higher Risk of DefaultsThe additional downside to for-profit colleges is the higher rate at which their students tend to default compared to students who attend traditional four-year universities. The default rate of for-profit students is nearly three times as high as for students who attend traditional colleges. A closer examination of this difference in default tendencies reveals that the type of attendees for-profit colleges attract have lower incomes and are at a higher risk of poverty, not to mention the struggle these graduates face when seeking employment with their for-profit degrees. Studies run by the National Bureau of Economic Research suggest “applicants with business bachelor’s degrees from large online for-profit institutions are about 22 percent less likely to hear back from employers than applicants with similar degrees from nonselective public schools” (US News).With false promises and skewed data used in the recruitment process, for-profit colleges advertise themselves as a second chance for older students to pursue a degree. The demographic of for-profit colleges tend to be older than the traditional student and these students have lower incomes. Furthermore, as the demographic of for-profit schools are older and thus considered to be more financially independent, it means they are qualified to borrow more money, putting these individuals at an even higher risk of defaulting on their loans. Tuition and fees at for-profit colleges average $15,130 compared to fees at two-year public colleges ($3,264) and four-year public universities for in-state students ($8,893).Financial IlliteracyFinancial illiteracy seems to be more universal than one would think given that when surveyed, borrowers claim they took on student loans without getting a true sense of whether they would be able to repay their loans with their degrees. Such a response given by young debtors is an unsurprising reflection of the lack of finance education available to graduating high school seniors who, when applying for financial aid through FAFSA prior to their entrance as college freshman, may not understand the gravity of owing thousands of dollars in loans after they graduate from college. Carlo Salerno, an economist who has consulted for a private student-lending industry, indicates the government does not impose credit checks on borrowers and taking out a loan does not require cosigners as with most other loans. The government may have good intentions when making it easier for students to borrow money to pay for a postsecondary education, but easy doesn’t necessarily suggest ethical. Insofar as the government truly believes making it easier for students to borrow money is not risking other aspects of the economy should defaults occur, then its laxness would not qualify as being ethically wrong.Prioritization of Payments Other than Student LoansThe average monthly student loan payment for borrowers between the ages 20 and 30 is $351, while the median monthly student loan payment is $203. There are other bills college graduates are prioritizing over their unpaid student loans such as car loans, mortgages, rent, and monthly utilities, which are all equally as pressing, if not more urgent than making a payment on a degree that is failing to help land a well-paying job. This prioritization is justified given that failure to pay an auto loan might result in the repossession of a car or failure to meet monthly rent and utilities poses the threat of homelessness. While those bills imply imminent consequences if left unpaid or ignored, the same cannot be said for student loans. Although having bad credit is not any more desirable than not having a place to live, borrowers operate under the economic logic that the former has less immediate consequences than the latter. Therefore, when only able to afford to pay one bill, borrowers prioritize the one that will at least provide shelter.Student Debt in the Context of RaceAfrican American students are more likely to take out loans for college and tend to borrow more than their Caucasian counterparts, chiefly because minorities have fewer resources to draw from, a wealth disparity influenced by racial bias. Findings from research conducted by Demos, a think tank, reveal that “at 80 percent, the vast majority of Black graduates take on debt, compared to 63 percent of White graduates” (Diverse Education). This finding is justified in that minority families were the most adversely affected in terms of household wealth following the Great Recession, further illuminating the racial disparities inherent in our flawed social system. Even more revealing are the statistics from the Center for Social Development at Brown School of Social Work in which it was reported “at the undergraduate level, enrolled black students have, on average, $1,808 more in student loan debt than their white peers do [and] by the time these two groups graduate with their bachelor’s degrees, the gap widens to $3,427.” Author of the new book, “The Debt Divide,” policy analyst Mark Huelsman notes that the debt-financed system is “pushing students of color and low-income students even farther down the ladder…and saddling them with additional disadvantages as they enter the workforce.”II. Policy Recommendations, Congressional Efforts, and Obama’s Student Loan Forgiveness PoliciesIn 2012, President Obama passed the first of his legislations, known as the PAYE, or Pay As You Earn Repayment Plan, to alleviate student loan debt. Progressive as it is, the PAYE has restrictions in that the program only applies to federal student loans disbursed on or after October 1 of 2007 and to students who do not have a remaining balance on a Direct Loan when they received the loan after October 1, 2007 (studentdebtrelief.us). As of 2014, President Obama signed executive orders to expand the PAYE program to make it available to more federal student loan borrowers. The plan caps monthly payments at 10 percent of a borrower’s disposable income and forgives the balance after 20 years of payments. In 2015, borrowers who took out loans before October 2007 or stopped borrowing by October 2011 were eligible for the new and extended plan. Refinance Student Debt and Lower Interest RatesIn 2014, Massachusetts Senator Elizabeth Warren and her fellow Senate colleagues received endorsements in support of the Bank on Students Emergency Loan Refinancing Act, which was introduced on May 6. The act allows those with outstanding student loan debt to refinance at lower interest rates offered to new borrowers. “Many borrowers with outstanding student loans have interest rates of nearly 7 percent or higher for undergraduate loans, while students who took out loans in the 2013-2014 school year pay a rate of 3.86 percent under the Bipartisan Student Loan Certainty Act passed by Congress in 2013” (warren.). The idea behind the legislation is to give students the same low interest rates offered to current borrowers. The act would allow more than 25 million debtors to refinance their student loans to current lower interest rates of less than 4 percent. The efforts to reform student loan debts put forth by Warren and fellow Democrats have been blocked by the GOP, with Republicans justifying their opposition that the bill would raise taxes for the wealthy under the “Buffet Rule”– “a minimum 30 percent income tax payment from people who earn between $1 million and $2 million” (The Hill).‘Debt-Free’ CollegeAnother Democratic variation of Senator Warren’s refinance plan is the idea of ‘debt-free’ college, which attacks tuition fees more directly to alleviate student debt, and was endorsed by both Senator Bernie Sanders and Hillary Clinton in the recent presidential election. Clinton’s ambitious plan entails offering free tuition at public colleges to middle-class and low-income families who meet the $125,000 or less income bracket. The plan will first start with families at the $85,000 threshold and will eventually include families who make up to $125,000 in 2021.Policy RecommendationsImprove Financial Literacy and Increase Funding for Federal Work Study ProgramsAs mentioned earlier, financial illiteracy is a contributing factor to the student loan debt crisis. Young adults applying to college their senior year of high school have little to no formal or basic education on taking out loans for school and do not understand the economic or social implications of student debt after graduation. When loan education is given, if it is given at all, it is usually presented at a time in the student’s college career when it is already too late for the student to reduce the amount in the loans she has borrowed. If college tuition cannot be free as proposed by Clinton or loans refinanced as advocated by Warren, policymakers should consider extending federal work study programs to reach more students to reduce their needs of taking out enormous amounts of loans. The eligibility for work-study is determined by a student’s EFC, or Estimated Family Contribution, as indicated on his or her FAFSA. In order to be eligible, a student must demonstrate outstanding financial need and the cutoff point is relatively low, therefore excluding middle-income families from the aid and leaving them with loans as an only option.Implied Economic Consequences of Student DebtThe $1.3 trillion in student loan debt may be crippling Americans and preventing them from making big purchases, like houses and cars, which contribute to economic growth. Unless we adopt new policies or make strides towards reforming policies that perpetuate the crisis, we can expect to see an upward trend in student loan debt. Evidently, the statistics of growing student loan debt suggest that the cost of attending college is becoming an increasingly stressful burden for a huge portion of Americans seeking higher education. The debt-for-diploma system has dangerously become the new status quo and places unyielding limitations on economic and social mobility for working-class youth, and especially impacts young people of mentary: I selected this case study because it is something that I work with daily. A new department we started within my division is focused on helping students to resolve their delinquent loans. We connect students with their lenders and beyond that we help student’s to really understand the reality of the student loans that they took out. When I was young in my career I started out in the for-profit industry. Both of the colleges that I worked at are now closed as a result of their predatory lending practices and their misleading consumer information related to job placement. It is tough to see student’s getting into debt that they will not be able to afford to repay. It is hard to look a young teen in the eye and tell them education is a must even if it puts the under mountains of debt. This is an ethical dilemma that I deal with daily in my current role. Sometimes higher education isn’t the answer when a student doesn’t have the money to fund their education and is looking to student loans to solve their financial problems.Case Study 4 – Reginald Murphy College Case Study: Gender Equity IssuesBy: Brent D. Ruben and Susan JurowURL: BackgroundReginald Murphy College (RMC), located in the foothills of the Rocky Mountains, enrolls 16, 000 undergraduate and graduate students and employs just over 4,000 faculty and staff.??At thiscompetitive institution, renowned for a beautiful campus and exceptional facilities, the curriculum emphasizes the liberal arts.?? The college also offers a number of professional programs.???Among the distinctive features of RMC is the particular emphasis on creating a congenial andcollaborative learning environment.??The college explicitly recognizes the institution’scommitment to collaboration, collegiality and respect in its slogan “Reginald Murphy College…Where collaboration, collegiality and respect for others are core values.”??The slogan is postedon the RMC website and in prominent locations in many buildings.??Consistent with these values, welcoming activities for students—and for faculty and staff—areextensive.??The college has a number of residential learning communities where collaborativelearning is emphasized.??Within student affairs and campus life, the RMC ideals are also aconscious focus of attention.Faculty “collegiality” is a familiar concept in describing ideals of faculty life, and “collaboration”is often mentioned in position descriptions for staff.??Moreover, service to the RMC collegecommunity is a highly valued and recognized component of appointment and promotionreviews for all employees.Your ChallengeYou serve as vice president of administration and finance.??Five associate vice presidents reportdirectly to you and serve as members of your senior leadership team—Rich Jerow, Toni Brown,Jane Martinez, Marvin Rice, and Gerry Watson.??Each associate vice president has from two tofour directors reporting to them.???You’ve worked at RMC for 26 years, and you’ve never seriously considered leaving.??You enjoyyour job and the people you work with.??Your leadership team, particularly, is a source of greatpride and pleasure for you.??You’ve worked to build a strong and collaborative team and havetried to encourage social bonding as well as collaborative work relationships among membersof the group.??Creating a welcoming and respectful environment for all staff has always been a personal andprofessional goal for you, and you take pride in having achieved that climate in youradministrative area.??You make an effort to be explicit about your commitment to theinstitution’s core values, are confident that your views on this topic are well known to the fiveassociate vice presidents and others in the division, and have a personal commitment to“walking the talk.”??Last week, one of the direct reports and a long‐time friend, Gerry Watson, came to you to shareparts of a conversation he had had over coffee with a highly regarded senior director whoreports to a member the leadership team.??Gerry tells you that the individual is a female andhas worked in the division for less than five years, a profile which could describe a number ofemployees.??He says he’ll refer to her by the fictitious name, “Jane” to honor her request forconfidentiality.???Gerry explains that during the course of the conversation, Jane asked about the seriousness ofthe commitment to diversity issues especially as it relates to women within the Administrationand Finance area.???Jane’s perception is that women in the Administration and Finance division are generally nottreated in the same way as men in hiring and promotion decisions, or with regard toprofessional development, and she made reference to the departure of several women withgreat potential for more advanced positions elsewhere.??She explained that she also saw numerous gender inequities and insensitivities in day‐to‐daywork practices such as a preoccupation with sports in the workplace.??She referred to frequentconversations about the outcomes of sporting events, common use of sports analogies inmeetings, the annual divisional softball game, and occasional afternoon golf outings, all ofwhich are primarily “men’s events.”??She also noted the fact that informal meetings are oftenscheduled before the beginning of the work day at times when women with families typicallyfind it difficult to attend.???Jane also thinks that men speak considerably more and for longer periods of time in meetingsthan women, and she believes this is because men are more likely to be asked for their opinionsand more likely to have their perspectives and suggestions taken seriously by senior leaders.??Additionally, she commented on the nonverbal communication during meetings, sharing herobservation that men, regardless of their roles, are far more likely to position themselves at thehead of conference tables or in other positions of prominence in meetings.The director’s view is that the marginalization of women she described is probably notintentional or conscious, but it’s troublesome nonetheless.??She concluded her comments bynoting how ironic it is that these problems would be prevalent at RMC and in this division giventhe ideals and philosophies of the institution and its leaders.??For women, she said, “therhetoric and reality simply don’t seem to match.”Knowing your feelings about the importance of these topics, Gerry felt you would want him toshare Jane’s concerns with you.??You are stunned by what you hear.??You ask Gerry for his takeon the situation.??He indicated that he hadn’t really thought previously about the issues thedirector had shared with him, but that she seemed very genuine and thoughtful in hercomments.??She obviously was frustrated, but seemed to be sharing her views more asobservations on the contradictions she observed in the division than out of anger or personalresentment.You thank him for the bringing these issues to your attention, and indicate that you need togive these concerns some mentary: I selected this case study because diversity and women in leadership roles is something that is a consistent in my work life. As I continued to grow in the organization I realized that the number of women in the room were decreasing. As I have reached a higher-level position I have noticed more prominently then ever before how differently women in leadership are treated. Jane in the story has experience what every woman in leadership has experienced. Men are often part of the “old boys club” and have work related conversations in setting where women just are not welcomed. I have heard my boss tell me that a senior VP invited him out for drinks to discuss a job opportunity but he turned her down as he was afraid of the image that would project of him (a married man) having drinks after work with a women. I was so angry at the audacity that he would think like this as he prides himself on being a champion for women in leadership roles. Often times I sit in meetings and listen to women promote an excellent idea, but it doesn’t get any traction till a male counterpart restates the idea as if it were their own. Also, women in leadership are often held to different standards. A woman who is assertive is viewed negatively, where as a man behaving the same way is viewed as a strong leader. Case Study 5 – Wells Fargo Fake Accounts ScandalBy: Harley ComrieURL: Republicans in Congress and Donald Trump want to roll back Dodd-Frank regulations to help banks become more profitable, and remove ‘burdensome’ regulations. These politicians apparently forget that so-called ‘light touch regulation’ was a reason for the Great Financial Crisis (GFC) of 2008, the effects of which haunt us still and carried President Trump to power. It is helpful to remember even after the GFC, bank scandals recur with dismal regularity and that regulations form the thin red line protecting consumers from the greed of financial institutions.The following is a description and an evaluation of the continuing multi-faceted scandal featuring Wells Fargo & Company. Revelations about the behavior of bank employees and executives are ongoing.Parties InvolvedThe main parties involved in the scandal are listed below.Wells Fargo & Company. A United States based international banking and financial services institution. In 2016 Forbes magazine and Bloomberg magazine respectively listed Wells Fargo as the 7th largest public company internationally and the 2nd largest bank internationally.John Stumpf, Former CEO of Wells Fargo. A self-professed small town American, John Stumpf was the CEO of Wells Fargo since 2007. He stepped down as CEO following extended press coverage of the fake account scandal. His yearly salary as CEO was US $19 million in 2015.Tim Sloan, Current CEO & President of Wells Fargo. Before the scandal Tim Sloan was the chief operating officer and president of Wells Fargo. Following the scandal he replaced John Stumpf as CEO and kept the position of president. His yearly salary as COO and president was US $11 million in 2015.Carrie Tolsedt, Former Head of Retail Operations for Wells Fargo. Nicknamed “the watchmaker” by colleagues for her excessive attention to detail, Carrie left Wells Fargo following the scandal. Her yearly salary as head of retail operations was US $9 million in 2015.Customers of Wells Fargo. Customers were exploited, often without their knowledge or consent.Employees of Wells Fargo. Many employees were victims of this scandal and many were complicit.Prudential is a Fortune 500 insurance company. It placed self-service computers in Wells Fargo retail-banking branches to sell life insurance policies.Instruments InvolvedThe main instruments involved in the scandal are listed below.“Eight is great”. A saying that was the foundation for an aggressive cross-selling target scheme advocated by Former CEO John Stumpf in the Wells Fargo retail-banking division. The “eight is great” scheme set the target for accounts per customer at eight. Employees had to reach “eight is great” targets in order to earn commissions and avoid termination.Perverse incentives. Refers to incentives that have unintended and undesirable results. Some economists argue perverse incentives were partially to blame for the recent 2008 financial crisis. Perverse incentives played a large role in the Wells Fargo fake account scandal.U5 forms. Banks record information about former employees on these forms. This information is then shared between banks. This practice was developed in-order to bar fraudulent employees from the banking industry. Negative feedback on a U5 form ensures a former employee will have difficulty regaining employment in banking.Forced arbitration. Under forced arbitration a customer can only submit disputes to a binding arbitration process. Customers in this process have waived their right to sue, to participate in a class action lawsuit, or to appeal the outcome of arbitration. Forced arbitration is often biased in favor of corporations.Clawback provision. These stipulations are usually in executive employment contracts. They allow companies to reduce or cancel bonuses as a punitive measure against former and current employees. Bonuses subject to clawback are usually unvested stock awards.EventsThe first indication of rampant unethical practices at Wells Fargo emerged from a 2013 report by the Los Angeles Times. The report stated Wells Fargo had an unhealthy “pressure-cooker” sales culture. Several regulatory bodies opened investigations into Wells Fargo following the article.Californian and federal regulators took three additional years to take action against Wells Fargo. On September 8, 2016 they finally fined the bank $185 million US. Investigators discovered the “pressure-cooker” sales culture led Wells Fargo employees to create of over 2 million accounts without customer consent. The “pressure-cooker” sales culture was a result of CEO John Stumpf’s “eight is great” sales targets. Accounts fraudulently created by employees included credit cards, checking accounts, saving accounts, mortgages, and loans. Wells Fargo profited $5 million dollars from fraudulent accounts during the 5 years the practice was widespread.“Eight is great” targets were set to an unattainable level. Whilst the target for average number of accounts per customer at Wells Fargo was 8, the actual number of accounts per customer was 5.9 in 2011 and 6.1 in 2015. Four years of “eight is great” targets and widespread fraudulent behavior had only increased the average by 0.2. This unrealistic goal made it extremely difficult for employees to meet their targets, which resulted in fraudulent behavior. Perverse incentives arising from “eight is great” targets played a significant role in the scandal.Wells Fargo retail-banking employees revealed they often faced abuse if they did not meet their “eight is great” targets. Employees reported incidences of managers yelling in their faces and feeling an “unbearable” pressure to achieve sales targets. Managers even threatened underperforming employees they would “…end up working for McDonalds”. Employees terminated for not reaching targets reported facing retaliatory U5 forms that effectively barred them from employment in the banking industry.Wells Fargo has admitted fault for a well-documented attitude of seemingly willful ignorance towards fraud committed by employees dating back to 2011. Employees were ignored or retaliated against when reporting fraudulent behavior to confidential ethics lines or upper management.In a particularly egregious case a former employee claimed his store manager targeted him after he reported fraudulent behavior by other employees to a state manager. The store manager forced him to retract his statement, then framed him for fraud. The termination reason on his U5 form was listed as fraud, which barred him from employment at other banks.During the period of “eight is great” Wells Fargo was one of the most profitable banks in the US, and executives were awarded large bonuses. John Stumpf profited 200 million dollars solely from the increase in Wells Fargo’s stock price over those years.OutcomeResignations and ClawbacksUpon internal investigation into fraudulent accounts Wells Fargo dismissed 5300 retail-banking employees. These dismissals came after the bank was fined by the regulatory agencies. The scale and timing of the dismissals suggests Well Fargo executives had systematically mismanaged incidences of fraud.Following the dismissals John Stumpf was called to testify in front of the US House of Representatives Financial Services Committee on the 20th of September 2016. Senator Elizabeth Warren sternly stated to Stumpf that he should resign, return his profits and be criminally investigated.Almost a month afterwards on the 12th of October 2016 John Stumpf resigned and was succeeded by Tim Sloan, COO and President of Wells Fargo. Stumpf was subject to a clawback provision and forfeited $41 million of unvested stock awards due to his role in the scandal.Carrie Tolsedt, the executive responsible for the retail-banking division faced a similar punishment. She had already left the retail-banking division role in July but had continued with the company. When she resigned she received a $124.6 million dollar payout and forfeited $19 million of unvested stock awards in a clawback. The practice of giving executives large payouts when dismissed is commonly referred to as a soft landing.Unvested stock awards are paid to executives based on performance. The total value would only be paid to executives if the company enjoyed robust future performance. Realistically the punitive figures released to the public are much lower, and the inflated figures have given us a false sense of justice.Wells Fargo tries to lessen its punishment and payoutsWells Fargo’s public response to the scandal was to admit fault and embark on an extensive advertising campaign. Privately the bank is attempting to minimize costs and avoid responsibility. The cost of the scandal is relatively low for Wells Fargo, with legal fees estimates of $700 million.Wells Fargo stopped individual and class action lawsuits against them by enforcing forced arbitration clauses. When opening new accounts at Wells Fargo, customers consent to forced arbitration. Victims of the fraudulent accounts scandal have stated they could not have given consent to forced arbitration as they never gave consent to opening the accounts. Judges have ruled against that argument in favor of Wells Fargo and forced arbitration. US Senator Sherrod Brown has introduced a bill to the senate, which would override forced arbitration cases for Wells Fargo customers. It has not yet passed into law. The bill did not pass, but was reintroduced by Rep. Brad Sherman (D) in March 2017. The bill is still not likely to pass in the Republican controlled Congress.Prudential suspends Wells Fargo selling its insurance productsA group of Prudential’s former employees filed a wrongful termination suit in November 2016 claiming they were dismissed for escalating concerns about fraudulent conduct at Wells Fargo. Upon investigation, the former employees claim Wells Fargo employees were also creating unauthorized life insurance policies. The fraudulent policies were often created on behalf of minorities, especially those who were non-native English speakers. Wells Fargo retail-banking employees are not licensed to sell insurance. Yet these same employees were assigned sales targets for insurance policies. Prudential responded to the lawsuit going public by suspending Wells Fargo’s ability to sell Prudential’s life insurance products.Racist practices at the bank extended to denying student loans to young immigrants, according to a lawsuit filed by plaintiff and young immigrant student Mitzie Perez in March 2017.The Department of Justice and the California attorney general started criminal investigations into Wells Fargo executives in November 2016. Two Californian Wells Fargo executives have subsequently departed from the bank in March 2017. Four lower-level executives were fired in weeks prior, and high-level executives including Tim Sloan had their wages cut by $32 million in total. The bank stated the pay was intended to ensure the “accountability of the company’s leadership for the issues arising from the community bank’s sales practices”.The outcome of numerous cases against Wells Fargo and the total sum of consequences they face from the scandal is yet to be determined.Ethics AnalysisPerverse IncentivesExecutive Compensation & Clawback ProvisionsExecutive compensation schemes are designed to avoid conflicts of interest between executives and shareholders. This is achieved via partially remunerating executives with company stock. Perverse incentives arise from these compensation schemes, as stock ownership encourages executives to aim for short-term growth and engage in risky behavior. This focus can endanger the long-term health of a company. Clawback provisions are added to executive employment contracts to discourage excessive risk-taking. Unfortunately in regards to Wells Fargo, clawback provisions proved to be weak and ineffectual.Executives are economically rational actors. The perverse incentive structure of “eight is great” would not have become company policy if executives believed clawback provisions represented a considerable risk to their compensation. This same logic follows for demonstrably willful ignorance regarding the high incidence of fraud in the company. John Stumpf profited $200 million from stock awards during the scandal. He was penalized only $41 million as remedy for “eight is great”. It is clear from these numbers that clawback provisions at Wells Fargo lacked the severity required to effectively punish executives.Professors Lucian Arye Bebchuk and Jesse M. Fried of Harvard and Berkley respectively, studied the role of executive compensation schemes in encouraging dishonest behavior by executives. In their 2005 study titled “Executive compensation at Fannie Mae: a case study of perverse incentives, nonperformance pay” they found empirical evidence of executive compensation encouraging executives at Fannie Mae to fraudulently misreport company earnings. Following the discovery of this fraudulent activity, executives at Fannie Mae left the bank with large severance packages. Carrie Tolsedt enjoyed a similar ‘soft landing’ arrangement with Wells Fargo. Clawback provisions were adopted at Wells Fargo to avoid encouraging fraudulent behavior such as that encountered at Fannie Mae. Evidently clawback provisions need reform as similar behavior occurred at Wells Fargo despite their use. More severe action is required.Employees & “Eight is Great”The “eight is great” targets were designed to be unattainable for a vast majority of employees. Staff who were least capable of reaching their targets faced abuse, termination, and U5 forms. Confidential ethics lines and complaint processes were corrupted, as they did not help executives and management reach their goals. The employees who committed fraud failed to act ethically, however it cannot be understated they were immersed in an unethical working environment. Executives and management allowed numerous unethical practices to occur as they demanded higher productivity from employees. The Wells Fargo fake account scandal exemplifies how consequences of perverse incentives spread through a company from high to lower level employees.Customers & ShareholdersCustomers and shareholders of Wells Fargo were the main victims of perverse incentives. Minorities were targeted and fraudulently sold insurance policies. Customers who are attempting to seek justice are unfairly blocked by forced arbitration. Punitive clawbacks were reported at an inflated rate in an attempt to quell public outrage. Fines directed at public companies such as Wells Fargo are simply passed onto stockholders and consumers. While customers were charged $5 million for the accounts, the real cost to them is unknown. Bad credit, overdrawn accounts and flow on effects from fees would have certainly destroyed many lives. The most vulnerable Americans suffered the most from this scandal.Ethical ConsiderationsDeontological ethics states that agents have a duty to act in accordance to a moral principle. For executives the moral rule was to uphold the interests of shareholders, employees and other stakeholders by avoiding excessively risky behavior. Wells Fargo executives failed to fulfill this duty. As people do not always adhere to deontological ethics, the agent-principal dynamic is inherently flawed. Hence, executive compensation schemes aim to align the interests of executives and shareholders via stock bonuses. Unfortunately this solution created its own perverse incentives, which were not effectively mitigated by clawback provisions. The top-down spread of perverse incentives led to pervasive of unethical practices throughout the organization, from executives to employees.Unethical practices by executives and employees at Wells Fargo included:Setting unattainable targetsAbusing employeesCreating fraudulent accountsFraudulent insurance sellingIgnoring reports of fraudTargeting minoritiesForced arbitrationExploitation of U5 formsRecommendationsSeven Pillars Institute discussed the lack of ethical and economic justification for current rates of executive compensation in the case study on the subject. We have further established in this case study we cannot always expect ethical behavior from executives or employees. If people are incentivized to act fraudulently we can expect fraud. To effectively deal with the issue of fraudulent activity we need to address executive bonuses, as perverse incentives spread from the top-down. Reducing the incentive for executives to allow and contribute towards fraudulent activity can be achieved via harsher clawback provisions, enforcement of criminal and fiscal penalties for executives, deferred compensation or removal of stock incentives completely.Executives are powerful and financially motivated; we cannot expect reform of executive compensation to occur quickly. In a capitalist society wages equal labor power, not labour worth. Often the level to which executives exploit employees matches the exploitability of employees. From 1994 to 2002 union membership in the finance, insurance and real estate industries fell from 2.7% to 2.0%. In the retail sector it fell from 5.4% to 4.1%. Both of these industries are significantly lower than the nationwide average in 2002 of 11.9%. The nationwide average in 1955 was 27%.Unions provide legal representation for employees who face abuse by management and unfair U5 forms. Strong union membership would reduce the ability of executives to pass the burden of perverse incentives onto employees. This would not fix the issue of perverse incentives, but would protect otherwise easily exploited employees.In the case of Wells Fargo, almost all significant progressive actions to bolster the rights of consumers have been undertaken by Democrats. Yet, regulation of banking and protection of the public and employees must be advocated as bipartisan values and fought for by those who wish to avoid recurrence of similar bank frauds in the mentary: I selected this article because it is an issue that effects the banking industry, but similar practices are also happening in higher education. The pressures that were put on the Wells Fargo employees are similar to the pressure that many of the admissions counselors in the for profit higher education industry face. The actions by Wells Fargo set unattainable targets for their bankers to reach so they resorted to less then ethical approaches to meeting their standards. With the for-profit colleges around the U.S. admissions representatives are forced to hit numbers that just aren’t possible. They pressure student’s into taking on enormous amounts of student loan debt that will not benefit them at all, as the education they are receiving will not translate into a good job. Recently a study of ITT showed that nursing students had never seen the inside of a hospital but were burdened with tons of debt. The admissions representatives had sold them on this degree plan as it meant hitting their numbers for the month. Admissions agents that don’t hit their numbers often face termination which was similar in the conditions presented by Wells Fargo. Even more unnerving the regulations that were put in place to protect students are at risk of being removed by the Trump administration. Case Study 6 – Necessity and Minimum WageBy: John AthertonURL: Compare someone’s choice to buy a luxurious decoration with the purchase of a prescription that staves off death. While one of these choices is an aesthetic preference the other is a necessity of survival. The distinction between these choices separates economic ‘wants’ and ‘needs’. A dependence on survival needs forces human behaviour through naturally imposed duress, compromising our freedom of choice. A moral right to freedom or existence argues for the removal of this duress in favour of a default state, where survivalist compulsion is made irrelevant.A perfect default state would be a system where our freedom to choose a necessity is raised until it resembles our freedom to choose a luxury. To achieve this ideal, the mitigation of natural duress through a guarantee of survival is considered in the practical model of a minimum wage. At present, despite any choice we make, we cannot exist without the necessities. The ability to meet the costs of food, water and shelter are a start in delaying the repercussions of our natural shackles [1]. If we did not need these to survive, but regard them as optional, then our choice to buy them could certainly be considered more freely made. How does the conflict between compulsion to satisfy the needs of survival and freedom of choice factor into the economics of the minimum wage?Self SufficiencyThe 2006 self sufficiency standard used in The United States of America contains the major categories of housing, child care, food, transportation and healthcare [2]. We call the cost of these provisions the ‘cost of living’, though this amount varies both locally and abroad. Internationally, different nations use different standards; Canada, for example, assumes education is provided freely by the state to Canadian residents. Education assists all models, including those considered later in this article, and there is a valid case for it to be included as a need, though for this analysis current measurements and their respective assumptions are used. The cost of living in different counties also varies while within the same county the cost of having children is the final point of difference. Two examples from a standard researched in 2006 are listed below.The Self-Sufficiency Standard for Selected Family Types* Harrisburg-Carlisle, PA MSA, 2006 Dauphin County Monthly Expenses and Shares of Total BudgetsMinimum Wage Table 1Table 1: 2006, University of Washington for PathWaysPA [2].The Self-Sufficiency Standard for Seattle-Bellevue*, WA HMFA, 2006 King County – Bellevue, Juanita, Kirkland and RedmondMinimum Wage Table 2Table 2: 2006, Washington University for the Workforce Development Council of Seattle-King County [3].* The Standard is calculated by adding expenses and taxes and subtracting tax credits. Taxes include federal and state income taxes (including state tax credits except state IETC and CTC) and payroll taxes.** The hourly wage is calculated by dividing the monthly wage by 176 hours (8 hours per day times 22 days per month).*** The hourly wage for families with two adults represents the hourly wage that each adult would need to earn, while the monthly and annual wages represent both parents’ wages combined.Taking the moral imperative of an inherent right to a default state, (a right to exist), into account where do these figures leave us? The beginning of this analysis resides in discussing merely the cost of living of a single adult verses the current minimum wage of $7.25; though the variation in cost of living figures makes this difficult. Given the difference between local self sufficiency wages we can first say the minimum wage should definitely be higher than the lowest living wage. If one said so relating to The United States as a whole then it would only be feasible for minimum wage workers to live in the cheapest county of the entire nation, a mildly impractical notion given the distribution of minimum wage jobs throughout the country. If we took the lowest self sufficiency wage from a state we would find ourselves with a reduced version of the same problem. There is presently no pervasive survey connecting minimum wage job locations to the cheapest nearby residencies so we will have to approximate.Taking the United States’ GDP per capita, the International Monetary Fund, World Bank and Central Intelligence Agency would all quote a figure between $54,000-$55,000, though a great deal of income is unseen by the average American due to the extreme nature of wealth inequality making the $28,889 per capita income figure quoted by the United States Census Bureau paint a more realistic picture with regards to the scope of the minimum wage worker [4, 5, 6, 7].If we made the approximation that a minimum wage worker should, if making purely survival based purchases (leaving no money for luxury or lifestyle), be able to live in neighbourhoods along people earning $28,889 or less, how effective would this be as a measure?Even attempting to base a minimum wage off approximations of the survival wage in this manner is inadequate. In Bellevue, Juanita, Kirkland and Redmond – King County, Washington State, for example, where the survival wage for an adult individual is on the higher side at $41,767, it might seem unreasonable to say that it should be expected that a minimum wage worker should not be able to afford to live there [7]. That is, however, until you also consider that King County is by far the most populated county in Washington with over 2 million people (almost 30% of the state’s population).Furthermore, though the survival wage drops to almost $8 for the 652,000 residents of Seattle, it is $9.49 in Renton, and higher still for all remaining fractions of King County up until the $10.30 hourly wage seen in Table 2 [3]. In Pennsylvania, residents of Dauphin County earn $30,491 per capita with a survival standard of $17,392 whilst back in Kitsap County, Washington, per capita income is a higher $32,340 while the annual survival wage is the lowest value of any recorded county in the state at a staggeringly low $13,807; requiring an hourly wage of $6.54 [2, 3, 7].The conclusion of these widely varying survival and income figures is given all these counties employ minimum wage workers, if we do not want higher unemployment or increased transport costs the minimum wage must be above the survival wage in a given area for employment to truly be viable from the perspective of the employee. In analysing these differences one might also ponder the ethical positions posed by varying minimum wages and its varying effect on local employment, though this article will focus on the nation as a whole.One national poverty model used by The Financial Times (US), calls three member households earning near or less than $31,402 a year “in or near to poverty”, with this affliction affecting one fifth of the American population [8]. Using the assumptions of the model above, if a single adult in these households worked, he would have to earn $14.87 an hour, or if two members worked full time then they would have to earn $7.43 an hour each. This poverty line is still a more conservative estimate than the local realities of Dauphin and King County, where a single adult living alone without any children at all would have to earn $8.23 and $8.06-$10.30 respectively. By all these standards a full time worker earning minimum wage may well be living in poverty.Spending and ProfitabilityEmployment is the next key issue when it comes to the minimum wage; specifically regarding what is practical for employers. Regardless of a wage based on the cost of living, if the value of a person’s employment is lower than their wage then their employer would incur a loss for hiring them. If this occurs a rational employer would not hire them in the first place, making the minimum wage’s equivocation with a survival wage irrelevant to those left unemployed. From a consequentialist standpoint, where practical feasibility is favoured over intangible principled motivation, employer incentives must be met for a minimum wage increase to be permissible. By extension, doing so must be economically advantageous for it to be affirmed. Consider these principled motivations followed by a more pragmatic, consequentialist approach in analysing the minimum wage.If productivity exceeds income then employment is profitable. Additionally, if one supports the right of an individual to the ‘sweat of their brow’, or justice, then a wage nearing productivity and hence a minimum wage nearing minimum productivity would be supported morally, as a practical implementation of meritocracy. Furthermore, with relation to the moral concept of egalitarian redistribution, a moral argument independent of a right to existence can also be made. The first of these arguments is met in any system, with or without intervention, where the minimum wage is set near the productivity wage. The second is met where a minimum wage, (or similar scheme), is set higher than the cost of living such that a person might not merely survive but also develop. Finally, the imperative to be free of the coercion of the natural order requires a minimum wage, (or similar scheme), that is, at the very least, equal to the cost of living.All three of these positions also overlap a position of Deontological Capitalism. From the employer’s standpoint a person should not be viewed as a resource or means, affirming their right to their own labour as stated by the first moral position. The facilitation for personal growth proposed by the second aligns with the portion of the Categorical Imperative where one is both subject and sovereign, as a world in which all workers were entrenched in the circumstances of the minimum wage worker would be vastly inferior [9]. The third of these positions finds comports with Kantian Ethics also, where someone’s survival may be seen as their responsibility as an independent rational agent. If a minimum wage is set above the cost of living, but not above the productivity wage, then all these positions are in agreement.In contrast to this, however, a consequentialist might argue that the viability of any proposition is the most important consideration. A utilitarian, by extension, also favours an argument for redistribution given diminishing returns on happiness from wealth – provided practical viability is demonstrated [10]. Beyond a level of inequality required as incentive, if income distribution had no effect on spending habits, alongside an increase in happiness, then a utilitarian would affirm it [11]. Often, however, more equitable systems see improved economic conditions, affirming even a consequentialist position without happiness as a criterion. What are the practical benefits of an increased minimum wage?The reason for this relates to spending behaviour. Someone whose wage equals survival wage, for example, cannot afford to save. His spending is continuously circulated throughout the economy, its effect in turn amplified by the multipliers of the sectors it is engaged in. If these sectors spend more, such as on wages, then their multiplier is also increased [12]. This increased rate of capital circulation promotes economic growth. A change in income of a set amount also has an increased effect on consumer behaviour for lower income earners, and hence promotes higher consumer confidence and spending behaviour [13].There are further studies on the effects of minimum wage increases too, with a study from the CEPR noting that even if prices increase from a wage hike then the net effect recorded is still positive [14]. This means it may be the case that the cyclical effect noted earlier could compensate for a wage increase above current productivity, effectively increasing productivity provided the wage increase is minimal. Beyond the general wage figures discussed later in this article minor increases, if supported by specific case studies, indicates the minimum wage can be marginally higher.With regard to competition and unemployment, negative effects to employment were not found in a study of two neighbouring states where one increased its minimum wage, but where the increased minimum wage was still below the productivity wage [15]. The most obvious positive effect of all this to a utilitarian, however, is not just the increase to happiness from wealth redistribution, but also the reduction of the suffering of poverty [16].Returning to the potential conflict between the survival and productivity wages we find a similar consideration. In all places where the productivity wage exceeds ‘cost of living’ employment is profitable. In determining a viable minimum wage we should be aware that moderation is required. What is the viable minimum wage?The Cost of Living and ProductivityWith the viable wage near or below productivity, while hopefully exceeding the cost of living, we need to find the productivity wage for minimum wage workers. Though specific figures are difficult to quantify we can judge the rate of growth in wages against the growth in productivity. The following graph was made using data from the economic policy institute, noting the value of the minimum wage against productivity when we factor out inflation.Minimum Wage Graph1Graph 1: Productivity and Minimum Wage (Economic Policy Institute [17])These figures suggest that if the minimum wage kept pace with productivity it would soon reach $20, well exceeding the $15 hourly minimum wage some people are suggesting. Furthermore, these results, along with general results about average worker compensation, (which also have lost pace with productivity to a huge extent since the 1970s much like the minimum wage [18]), were noted in an article by the Economic Policy Institute discussing a $12 minimum wage, (by 2020, or $10.58 in 2014$), noting how it would only be just above the $9.54, (in 2014$), minimum wage from 1968 before the decline in the wage’s real value due to inflation [17].Though a $12 minimum wage would account for inflation, given the increase of productivity, minimum wage workers are performing a far more productive service today, so their minimum wage should not be merely indexed, but increased to account for the fact that they are more productive today. According to this graph, their productivity wage in 2014 was $18.42 [17]. Setting this as a minimum wage, or just the $15 minimum wage some politicians are suggesting, should account for the difference in living costs while keeping minimum wage work profitable. An $18.42 wage would go further morally, though an increase to the minimum wage would certainly be advised.Wage stagnation in general also entails further consequentialist harms from lowered general spending behaviour mentioned earlier, decreasing confidence, increasing inequity, increasing reliance on debt and instability [19]. Present levels of inequality have been linked to greatly more financially difficult college years, making it more difficult for people to increase human capital through education, thereby slowing economic growth [12, 19].All of this, however, is assuming the data are accurate. There is also some criticism that should be considered in evaluating this data. The first is that the data for productivity relate to the whole economy, rather than just minimum wage work. Although the minimum wage seemed to keep pace with productivity until 1968 we cannot assume it continued to increase as quickly. One way to gauge the productivity increase of minimum wage work more accurately is to use percentage growth figures released by the Bureau of Labor Statistics in specific industries, and analyse sectors with more minimum wage workers such as the ‘Fast Food Industry’, (Accommodation and Food Services – Limited Service Restaurants). This approach was used by the Heritage Foundation in criticism of a minimum wage rise.In doing so it noted that the percentage growth in wages seemed similar to the percentage growth in productivity, though there is a huge fault in this method. That flaw is that these percentage growth figures only date back in the Labor Department’s records to 1987, while the source of the disparity dates to 1968 [20, 21]. After 1968 productivity began to rise far more quickly than wages. In the graph using figures from the Economic Policy Institute the real value of the minimum wage actually declined.This means if we use percentage change figures from 1987 they will fail to reflect the initial disparity. For example in 1987 a 20% increase to the minimum wage would be an estimated $1.34 (2014$), while a 20% increase to productivity would be an estimated increase of $2.47 (2014$). Although this method is preferable, as figures for specific industries are only available from 1987, this method cannot be used without reference to an initial disparity estimated by the negative redistribution of wealth in the general economy.Using this approach, wages in the ‘Accommodation and Food Services – Limited Service Restaurants’ sector would be 13.5% up from the $12.35 1987 productivity wage, placing it at around $14 as opposed to the approximately $8 minimum wage suggested by the article’s mathematics [22]. This $14 figure, however, is still an important tool for the specific consideration of this industry, though it too comes with its reduced generalisations and the enhanced potential for distortion from both historic and current tipping practices.An additional disagreement with the validity of the graph is also raised by critics regarding how it accounts for inflation. On this account we have data back to 1968. The inflation figures given can be seen in the graph below. Minimum Wage Graph2Graph 2: Heritage Foundation calculations using Labor Department Figures [22].There are three main methods of accounting for inflation. The Institute of Economic Policy used the Implicit Price Deflator (IPD) for productivity and the Consumer Price Index (CPI) for wages. By all three measures the real value of the minimum wage, ($7.25), has dropped, though by different amounts. Remember also that the real value should not just be constant, but increase with respect to workplace productivity and so be notably higher than any of these three figures making this more than a matter of a $0.14 difference if we take the most pessimistic projection for a minimum wage supporter.Regardless, The Institute of Economic Policy did use the two methods which made the divide between productivity and wages appear the largest. If we were to use the same deflation method then the productivity wage is 22% lower, making deflation calculation an important factor. What is the difference between the CPI and the IPD?Put simply the IPD relates to the economy overall while the CPI relates to a ‘basket of goods’ and is more a reflection of the part of the economy a minimum wage worker would likely make purchases in than the economy as a whole [12, 23]. Some measures of the IPD also exclude certain activity a minimum wage worker is likely to be affected by, such as transfer payments, (welfare), and household to household payments [24]. Effectively, both measures are designed for different things, with the CPI relating more to individuals while the IPD relates more to the economy generally. It is due to this difference that the Economic Policy Institute, (and other governments taking the same approach), would defend their method as most applicable to the measures of productivity and wages specifically while critics would claim the same measure should be used regardless to perform a fair test.Knowing that the $18.42 wage would easily cover an individual’s cost of living and hence align rights based and consequentialist moral interests, is the same possible if you use the same deflator? In 2014$ it would be approximately $14.40, (taking the scaled deflator difference assuming productivity kept pace with average productivity growth) [25]. In expensive cities like San Francisco $18.42 would be insufficient for single parent families and $14.40 would be insufficient altogether, though both figures would allow single adult workers in Jersey City, Washington D.C., Phoenix, Denver, Tacoma, Philadelphia, Indianapolis, Hartford and Charleston to now afford the self-sufficiency standard [3]. Even this significantly reduced figure would still cover the cost of living in many counties, sustaining survival, profits and growth; though there are alternatives to the minimum wage, some of which argue profits aren’t enough motivation.Alternatives to the Minimum WageBesides the minimum wage there are two common counter-models, the Income Earned Tax Credit, (also referred to as negative tax), and the complete abolition of any government intervention. An Income Earned Tax Credit is effectively a means tested and bureaucratically implemented payment from the government to anyone making below a certain wage, so the economy is taxed and a payment given to those earning the lowest income earners. Though it may involve the inefficiencies and costs of bureaucracy, the means testing capability becomes more important if you want to specifically target certain family structures, providing the argumentative basis for the similar programs of the Child Care Tax Credit and the Child Tax Credit, (also listed in Tables 1 & 2).The Income Earned Tax Credit (IETC), in its current form, is considered by some studies to be ineffective without a significant increase in size [26]. This same study also makes note of the greater capacity for fraud opened by such a program. Of the information in Tables 1 and 2 none of the listed family structures would receive an Income Earned Tax Credit, though, a ‘one adult, one infant family’ in Dauphin County, Pennsylvania, would receive a payment of $34 from the program every month, covering 1% of the cost of living [2]. Practically, although we have cases of states as well as countries with higher minimum wages, we do not have the same range of information relating to the Income Earned Tax Credit making discussion around it speculative.David Stockman, a proponent of the IETC, notes that minimum wage workers should also see machinery as competition to their employment. It is not enough for them to be profitable but for them to be more profitable than mechanical replacement [27]. Though the long term effects of this are inconclusive, the general trend of mechanical replacement does provide an analogy [28]. In a way, the IETC is the welfare equivalent of raising the minimum wage along greater restrictions on technological replacement, so a comparison could also be made between such a proposition and the IETC as it stands for those wanting to consider this further.Beyond a comparison of the minimum wage and IETC, however, this discussion also raises general questions about technological growth. Technology is a major driver of economic growth, with machines ideally replacing the most primitive tasks while the human population becomes more productive through educational specialisation. If education is not sufficiently supported, however, a number of people might find themselves unskilled and unemployed. Historically, the former has been the most prevalent in the long term while the latter is the case in the short pared to increasing the IETC or minimum wage which both, either independently or combined, fulfils the moral right to a default state of choice, the position of laissez faire economics does not necessarily do so.Laissez faire supporters claim the market equilibrium is the best measure of employment; however, this is based on free choice and high competition. With 4 million jobs available for 9 million unemployed, (discounting discouraged workers), the market may appear more evenly balanced than it actually is [29, 30, 31]. While anyone without disability can perform the mostly unskilled labour of minimum wage work, many of those 4 million jobs require technical skills a minimum wage worker may have financial difficulty obtaining [32, 33]. A sizable surplus in unemployed, unskilled labour and the lower bargaining power this creates, amidst the choice compromising coercion of necessity, are the main arguments against a laissez faire approach’s assumption of near-perfect competition.In a typical supply-demand scenario the gradient of a curve relates to elasticity, (an elasticity of labour supply from employees and an elasticity of labour demand from employers respectively). Generally, elasticity is increased by every alternative choice an individual has. Elasticity, therefore, acts as a practical measure for choice in the market and hence, in the context of the aforementioned notion of meritocratic fairness, reflects both a practical and ethical reality. If workers are under the threat of poverty, they are more pressured into finding a job and their elasticity is decreased. Low labour supply elasticity means that if wages were cut by a given amount then the number of people who continue seeking employment decline by a far smaller margin. Given the surplus of people seeking employment, companies hardly have to compete with one another for unskilled workers as they might have to in technical fields [34]. In addition, there is little perception of competition for the most elite of the unskilled employees.Although the best and brightest of software engineers might see exceptional offers due to their even more limited number, there is no such opportunity for the savant cashier, mitigating pressures from internal competition or an efficiency wage motive towards increasing minimum wage worker pay naturally. Combining these factors with an inelastic labour supply, many companies might prefer to lower their employees’ pay in spite of a relatively trivial decrease in the number of unskilled workers who would seek employment with them. The implication of this is imperfect competition, placing doubt upon simplified supply-demand model analysis [35, 36].Elasticity also exists for employers; with technological alternatives to workers acting as an extra choice for employers. Therefore, reductions to their access to technological replacement either through direct regulation or indirectly through the IETC could be seen as a decrease to the long term elasticity of labour demand. Elasticity is often regarded as positive, as it permits natural market forces of change to change behaviour to more efficient practices for both the employer and employee. To this end, a consequentialist may view free choice in a marketplace positively beyond its perception either as a right or as distributive justice. It should also be noted that although most critics of meritocracy condemn its propensity for inequality and reliance on the natural state in the case of the minimum wage, its interests align with the egalitarian against survivalist compulsion.Beyond technological replacement, under deregulation, offshore jobs could also pose a similar threat though national interests in this matter aren’t necessarily a moral priority [37]. Supporters of deregulation might also make the claim that despite any regulation multinational migration is a phenomenon too powerful to be combated, with regulation only worsening the phenomenon.Of the three alternatives minimum wage advocates should aim to set a wage near where a hypothetically ideal equilibrium would place it if there was high elasticity or a lack of survival pressure allowing for exploitation. With this minimum wage nearing the productivity wage and conveniently exceeding the living wage, the moral obligation to remove the survivalist restriction to choice as well as the consequentialist consideration of the aggregate economy will both be satisfied.The IETC would counteract the pressure of necessity in a more indirect manner, also potentially steepening employee elasticity alongside an already steep elasticity for employees. While if advocates for this model are right it will also fulfil our initial moral dilemmas, less practical studies exist on the IETC than the minimum wage; though there is little mutually exclusive territory between the two. Finally, laissez faire positions generally neglect the practical manifestation of these moral hurdles and their effect on imperfect competition. Although the laissez faire model is more ineffective in the unskilled labour market, advocates still claim it is preferable to government intervention.VerdictThere is sound reason to consider an increase to the minimum wage. With productivity estimates exceeding the living wage despite its variation, not only is a rights or justice based analysis satisfied by such a policy but so too is the position of a consequentialist concerned for the aggregate economy.Specifically for the cases of Dauphin County and the whole of King County, a suggested $12 minimum wage would cover the costs of an individual while a $15 minimum wage would also cover costs for most two income households and some single income households while the productivity wage projection of $18.42 would cover costs for more, but still not all, remaining single income families. Even if we accept some critics’ claims about the Economic Policy Institute’s deflation methods, a productivity wage of $14.40 is supported, with these productivity wages marking the highest minimum wages which remain profitable for employers.Alongside the proposition of a minimum wage increase are alternative arguments suggested for the IETC and deregulation, (with consideration of an increase in education holding no direct conflict to any of these). In analysing these models, some theorise profitability is not enough, raising further avenues for moral mentary: I selected this case study because it is focused on the minimum wage. As a people leader in an organization I am responsible for managing a personnel budget. This budget is a fixed number and with the proposed change in a minimum wage this budget will not change which means that I am faced with a decision on how to staff my office. In my entry level positions, I have placed jobs at the minimum wage due to the nature of the work. As I have transitioned roles and the entry level jobs that I offer have changed I have also adjusted the pay to be above the minimum wage. This case study discusses the different viewpoints and the several reasons given to increase the minimum wage from the national $8.00 per hour. As a people leader, I have one view point of this and as a person I have a different view point. This article presented an interesting case for me to look at from both perspectives. METHODI elected to interview two individuals in leadership roles in the higher education field both in financial aid. My first interview was with Britney Corbitt, she has been employed with the Maricopa Community College District for 9 years and has just recently accepted her first ever leadership role last month. Her perspective of leadership from both a professional staff level and a leadership level will give me a good perspective of the ethics that one is faced with during the transition period. My second interview was with Shelly Lang, she has been employed with the Maricopa District for 4 years but has been in various leadership capacities throughout her career both in the public and private sector. I elected to ask both individuals the same set of questions in order to be able to draw a distinction in how ethical perception may change between a new leader and a veteran leader. Questions:Can you share with me your experience in higher education and in leadership roles?Working at Maricopa can you say that you have had training on how to handle ethical situations as a leader?As a woman in leadership what types of ethical dilemmas do you feel that you face?As a minority in leadership do you face different ethical dilemmas then those who are not a minority?Does your organization have a code of conduct? Does your department have a code of conduct? Have you ever felt that leadership has put you in an ethically compromising situation?Who do you believe you are responsible to? (College, Students, Self, Governing Board, Federal Government)As a people leader responsible for hiring what is your take on changing the national minimum wage. What types of ethical dilemmas do you face when deciding how many positions to hire and how much to pay them. How do you feel about the national student loan debt crisis in America?What do you believe your role is in helping students understand their financial aid package and the implications of student loans?Do you believe that leadership in your organization behaves in an ethical fashion? Why or why not?How do you inspire others to see your vision?RESULTSInterview 1: Interview #1 was conducted with Britney Corbitt, she is a brand-new people leader within the Maricopa District with over 9 years of experience I the financial aid field.Can you share with me your experience in higher education and in leadership roles? My experience has been somewhat trying as I often struggle with others being intimidated by my intelligence and forward-thinking mindset. I have encountered a lot of push back and retaliation just for being outspoken. I often have wondered if it was due to my race or my gender. At one school, I believe it was the former and in other instances I think the latter played a part. I am not particularly sensitive to this because I do not look at others this way, so this is more so my perception in looking back. Others having similar ideas and taking similar actions were not treated the same way and when I think of it they were usually either male or Caucasian or both. I believe that I have been the victim of the flawed perception of the "angry black woman". Although I am mild mannered, I fear ever showing any emotion because I do not want that label. I recently moved in to a management position. I feel like I am considered with slightly better regard, but haven't been in the position long enough to fully give an evaluation.?Working at Maricopa can you say that you have had training on how to handle ethical situations as a leader?No, I cannot say that I have had any training or adequate training in the area of ethics. We have a set of classes that are mandatory for supervisors however there a not any courses with a focus on ethics. This in my opinion this is reflected in the Maricopa culture. I do believe that Maricopa would benefit from a formal training program for all employees on how to handle ethical situations as in our industry we are presented with ethical situations on almost a daily basis. If it were up to you what type of ethical training would you be interested in seeing?I think that often in our industry we are presented with ethical situations related to students. For management, we are presented with situations related to Human Resources and how to handle the balance between our staff and our leadership roles. It would be nice to see some type of case study type training and even some type of sensitivity or diversity training. Recently I heard about an organization that sent all leadership through a diversity training that focused on biases. Most of the time the issues that I face have to do with my diversity and others not understanding the biases they have against me or others. As a woman in leadership what types of ethical dilemmas do you feel that you face?I struggle with wanting to give preferential treatment to other women as I know they are routinely paid less and not represented in management as often. For me it has been an upward battle to get into the leadership role that I am currently in. I find myself leaning towards other women and I know that this is unethical but it is hard not to want to make it easier for the women that are coming behind me. I often find myself offering opportunities for training or growth first to the minority women in my division before considering men. As a minority in leadership do you face different ethical dilemmas then those who are not a minority?Yes, and Yes, however, the org code of conduct is routinely ignored or exception are made. Our district has a policy that prevents discrimination based on race, gender and so on and so on, but I see every day that minorities and women are not held to the same standard that others are held to. I see that minorities are not considered for the same job opportunities that others are considered for. When qualifications are the same the nonminority gets the job. I constantly struggle with speaking up to leadership because I fear what type of retaliation that I would have to deal with. Additionally, I struggle with how to advise and guide those young minorities coming into the district looking to me for help and guidance. Do I tell them what the world is supposed to look like and what they should encounter or do I tell them the reality of what is happening and risk demoralizing them and making our organization look bad? Does your organization have a code of conduct? Does your department have a code of conduct? I know there are basic codes of conduct that MCCCD has that is shared with me when I was 1st hired. After that, nothing really comes up until there is an issue that arises. It is left to us to reach out to human resources to determine how to handle any situation. Often, they are as clueless as we are and are making up something on the fly. When asked where we can locate the resources they used we are often left hanging. When it comes to a district wide policy we are left to our own devises and this leads to radically different environments throughout the district as each department and each unit develops their own policies. Our department does have code of conduct but just like above, it does not come up again until an issue arises. We keep a copy of the codes in a shared training folder for quick reference. As leadership when we recognize issues are coming up or we know that we are entering a sensitive time we will review the code of conduct with the staff. Have you ever felt that leadership has put you in an ethically compromising situation?I honestly can say that I feel like leadership puts me in an ethically compromising situation all the time. Most recently our organization is undergoing a reclassification of all the staff in the district. The leadership and the human resources leadership have consistently given us information and demanded that we not share our information with the professional staff who are asking questions. As a leader, how am I supposed to look my staff in the eye and tell them I know nothing when I know that leadership is conspiring to pull the rug out from under them. I fell like I am placed in a position where I am required to lie or be dishonest with the staff. As a people leader, I understood that there would be a certain part of my job where I wouldn’t be able to be completely transparent, but I never realized that I would be required to lie to those who look to me for guidance and leadership. Who do you believe you are responsible to? (College, Students, Self, Governing Board, Federal Government)I am responsible to all those listed. Which is why I am constantly struggling to find solutions that can accommodate and appease as many entities as possible. Generally, my considerations go the Federal government first as they control the funding that makes my job possible. Next my consideration goes to the students because without students then our organization would not be able to operate. I then consider myself as I need to be operating at 100% in order to be able to offer any top of positive response to the others. Next, I give my consideration to the college that I am working at. Often, I find that the college is at odds with the other colleges within the district and with the district office as whole. Finally, I give my consideration to the governing board as they are often out of touch with what goes on in the front lines. As a people leader responsible for hiring what is your take on changing the national minimum wage. What types of ethical dilemmas do you face when deciding how many positions to hire and how much to pay them. I am torn about the minimum wage being raised because it still does not provide a livable wage anyway. And those who have worked for years to get raises and move up the position they have did not get raises. I feel as though consumer products will and have become more expensive. So rather than raising up people from the bottom they will continue to be in the same socio-economic spot because their bills will go up as well thus they may still be using the same percentage of their income. Meanwhile, those who were paid a little more are now also subjected to the higher rates without the benefit of pay raises thus a higher percentage of their income is being used. In my opinion, minimum wage jobs were created for teenagers who do not need to support themselves. If you don't like how much you are paid you should do something about it. Go to school, learn a trade, get an internship. Move up and on so the entry level positions are left for the less skilled workers, so they can learn and then move up and on as well. Instead there are complacent, unmotivated people who want more pay for unskilled labor that anyone can do. Ethical dilemma would be worrying about the bottom line when it comes to budget considerations versus wanting to pay staff appropriately for the work they perform.How do you feel about the national student loan debt crisis in America?I honestly am beginning to feel as though it's a way to control people. The feds have stepped in and increased regulations on K-12 however have done nothing to address the rising tuition costs for students in higher ed. The Pell only increase by about $13 or so per year, which is ridiculous when you look at how much tuition goes up every year. The loan debt crisis is out of control. The feds need to do something about the loan servicers inefficiencies such as poor customer service and misinformation or lack of information. Why are the servicers not penalized for high default rates like the schools? It cannot just be laid at the feet of the institution. Financial literacy should be required curriculum in K-12, so our students are better educated upon entering college where we should continue this education. This I believe would result in less borrowing or lower graduation debt amounts and higher number of people repaying their student loans.What do you believe your role is in helping students understand their financial aid package and the implications of student loans?In my current role, I do not have contact with students regularly, but previously, I whole-heartedly believed it was my responsibility to tell any student I met that was borrowing loans about the process of repayment. I'd always warn of over borrowing, tried to steer them away from unsubsidized or loans all together, gave them other avenues for money such as scholarships and FWS. I was also always sure to ensure them the servicer was there to help so they should always stay in contact for payment options. And I'd warn them of the pitfalls of defaulting on the loan. When I had a captive audience, I took advantage of this by giving them any pertinent information about financial aid and school. I even would remind them about maximum time frame and making sure to see academic advising so they graduated on time, which can also decrease loan debt.Do you believe that leadership in your organization behaves in an ethical fashion? Why or why not?No, because the practice of nepotism is widely used and accepted even though we have policies in place to prevent it. I have witnessed and been told about some egregious activity that was just swept under the rug. For example, those found guilty of sexual harassment are routinely reassigned rather than being fired. The same goes for other major violations. This is not practiced in an equal fashion making the practice even more ethically unsound. There are many cases of retaliation when it comes to filing grievances. And so many instances of unethical behavior that goes unaddressed simply because the policy does not address that behavior as a punishable offense. How do you inspire others to see your vision?I hold their eye open and turn their head until they see my vision. But seriously, I try to show them the value in what I am doing. Show the value for those I want to participate/ I am leading as well as the value for the target population (in most cases, students). And show value for the organization. When people understand the why, they are more receptive the how and so on. Also, many people are all about what's in it for me, so showing that value helps get people get on board. Interview #2: Interview #2 is with Shelly Lang, she has been a people leader within the Maricopa District for 4 years. Additionally, Shelly has experience in other institutions outside of the Maricopa District.Can you share with me your experience in higher education and in leadership roles?My experience in Higher education in a leadership role is that there are a whole lot of intricate parts that make up every decision being made. Nothing in this role seems to be straight forward. I didn’t realize before coming into Maricopa that as a leader there were so many moving parts to navigate. In my positions, outside of the Maricopa district leadership had a lot more autonomy to make decisions and put things into practice. I feel like here there is so much red tape that I can’t breathe without asking permission at times. Though frustrating at times, it feels worth it, knowing that you are helping others better themselves.Working at Maricopa can you say that you have had training on how to handle ethical situations as a leader?I can say that all my ethical training was done on the job as things came up. I had little training form a required test online. I feel like I was never formally trained to handle situations. I only hear and learn about things when something happened in the office and management feels the need at that point to share information. Last time I saw something unethical happen, no one (including management) knew who to go to or what the chain of command was. As a woman in leadership what types of ethical dilemmas do you feel that you face?Ethical dilemmas I feel I face are being treated or handled differently. For example, if a man is to make a bold decision and raises his voice, people listen and view that man as being smart, courageous, and just being assertive. However, when I follow the same steps in my bold decisions, voice raising or assertiveness, I get brushed off as emotional and letting my feelings get the best of me. Often, I must monitor my emotions in order to try and ensure that men do not perceive me as being emotional. Sadly, the harshest criticism I face comes from other women in the leadership arena. Women view other women more harshly then they view men and I am not exactly sure what the root cause of this is, but in all of my positions in higher education both within and outside of the district this has been the case. I feel like women need to work on empowering their fellow women instead of treating them more critically then they would treat men.As a minority in leadership do you face different ethical dilemmas then those who are not a minority?I feel there is some ethical dilemmas I deal with as a minority in leadership. For example: attending a conference me and a co-worker ran into an old colleague of mine who wanted to introduce me to some of her colleagues. As we walked around people would ignore me, cut me off, or excluded me from the conversations but would not to my (white) co-worker. When I was then introduced people were taken aback by the person I am and title and position I carried. I am a Native American in leadership and often my race is put down as being unintelligent or second class. Does your organization have a code of conduct? Does your department have a code of conduct? Yes, both my organization and department have a code of conduct. For the most part our code of conduct in the department outlines how people are supposed to behave and act as it relates to our daily operations. The code of conduct is specific to outline that employees are expected not to steel time from the district (I.E. don’t spend work time doing personal business on the computers, or browsing social media). The code of conduct also outlines how each employee should behave to other employees in the district. As a leader, it is really my responsibility to enforce the code of conduct in our department. I am not proud of it, but I will say as we get busier with the peak processing times my attention to the code of conduct seems to diminish. I have worked at other organizations where the employee code of conduct is front and center and even posted on the wall in our work space or in our break room. Maricopa takes a more hands-off approach to ethical conduct of their employees. As a matter of fact I don’t know that I have ever been presented with the Maricopa code of conduct, but had to go out to the website to access the information on my own when a situation called for it. Have you ever felt that leadership has put you in an ethically compromising situation?Yes, leadership has put me in an ethically compromising situation and I chose not to compromise my own ethics to satisfy other people. I believe this action made me disliked by some, but I am not here (in this job) to be liked I am here to do an excellent job and that includes being ethical. For me my ethics comes from within not from the standards which my organization tries to set. It is more important for me to be true to myself then it is to follow the code that our flawed organizations try to implement. Who do you believe you are responsible to? (College, Students, Self, Governing Board, Federal Government)I feel I have a responsibility to all parties but I will not ignore ethics to favor or protect one party over another.what if acting ethically for one group puts you at odds with another grouphow do you choose who to favor?I would have to weigh out who is impacted more severely unethical and see if there is a resolution to soften the blow with the other group. I have this situation often and it weighs heavy on me these decisions. If it is the students versus the federal government my mandate is that I uphold the federal regulations. If I fail in my obligations to the federal government I risk the school losing funding and that would affect all students. I try to explain my obligations to the student so that they understand my behavior is not one of choice, but one of duty. As a people leader responsible for hiring what is your take on changing the national minimum wage. What types of ethical dilemmas do you face when deciding how many positions to hire and how much to pay them. This is a hard question for me and I have strong feelings on it. When I was coming up I took a job at Pizza Hut, it was a minimum wage job and I wasn’t trying to support a family off my income. To be honest I agree that you can’t support a family off the income of a minimum wage job. I don’t believe that minimum wage jobs were created for people to support their families off. I think a minimum wage job is your entry into the job market, it gives you the skills you need to progress through to the next level. If you enter the job force as a minimum wage worker and 5 years later you have not increased your skills to allow you to advance to the next level then you are doing something wrong and you should not be rewarded for your lack or effort or initiative. I worked my butt off and eventually became a manager at the Pizza Hut, after that I used my skills that I learned as a manager to get an even better job outside of the service industry. Eventually after working hard receiving my education and expanding my experience I could get into the excellent role that I am in. I think that people need to stop being complacent and get off their behinds and earn the salary that they want to earn, not the salary that they think the deserve. Jobs are out there for those who work hard and apply themselves. In my current position, I pay my entry level jobs above the minimum wage, but they are expected to do so much more beyond the entry level work a minimum wage job would require. My increase in pay means that I hold these people more accountable and I am not unwilling to fire them if they are not performing. How do you feel about the national student loan debt crisis in America?The student loan debt is an epidemic that needs better regulation and control. Student loan debt is now the 2nd highest consumer debt category behind home mortgage debt. In my role, I have seen firsthand how easy it is for students to borrow student loans and never receive the education and understanding of what they are signing up for. Students are entering college with debt and leaving college with even higher debt. Controlling the student loan debt epidemic needs to be an all hand on deck approach from schools and federal loan servicer. What do you believe your role is in helping students understand their financial aid package and the implications of student loans?I believe that to have students understand their financial aid package and understand the gravity of student loans is to proactively engage with them throughout the financial aid and student loan process. My role is to offer useful resources, classes and events to reduce their debt and give them financial well-being while in college.Do you believe that leadership in your organization behaves in an ethical fashion? Why or why not?It is really hit or miss with leaders behaving in an ethical fashion. I feel like people get too comfortable with their position and the security that comes with it in a government job. That it is easier to act unethically and not have much consequence. I have seen a wide variety of unethical behaviors go on in our organization without punishment or repercussion. It is hard as a leader to tell you staff to behave a certain way when they see others acting in a way that contradicts what you told them without punishment. In some divisions leadership is better at holding people accountable then in others. It really is hit or miss within our organization and in order for us to move to the next level this is something that we will need to work towards. To complicate the matter further it is now about changing a culture that used to condone unethical behavior, sometimes it is so deeply engrained in the culture it is almost impossible to change without firing people. How do you inspire others to see your vision?I really try to maintain a positive attitude and to be persistent with my action to show others that I will put in the work to my vision into fruition. I also raise others up and support their vision which then for the most part is returned to me in way of their support. I find that when I work hard to support my staff, they work hard to support me. It is a give and take relationship and I try and lead by example. When people see that you are willing to walk the walk they are more willing to walk with you. DISCUSSION“Isn’t ethical behavior more than simply following the right rules and getting the right results? Doesn’t someone also need to do the right things and get the right results because one is the right sort of person? In short, isn’t a person’s character critical in evaluating his or her actions?” (Donaldson, Werhane, & D., 2008). The two-people interviewed above are excellent examples of people that abide by a virtue theory of ethics. The virtue theory basically states that doing the right thing in and of itself is not enough, you must do the right thing because it is the right thing to do and because that is what you believe in. “According to Aristotle, the development of virtue requires the cultivation of good habits, and this turn leads him or her to emphasize the importance of good upbringing and a good education.” (Donaldson, Werhane, & D., 2008). Shelly and Britney both outline several instances where the organization they work for let them down in the realm of ethics, but they do not allow that to deter them from being the good people that they are. In our organization, we consistently face an ethical dilemma when we work with student’s seeking out student loans to pay for their education. The three of us currently work at a community college where we only change $86 per credit hour for tuition. Often the amount of Pell Grant the student receives is sufficient to cover the cost of their tuition, books and some supplies. We see student’s come into our office and request to borrow $10,500 in student loans per academic year, because some where along the line someone told them it was a good idea to take out the student loans to supplement their income. These students are often earning minimum wage as they are right out of college and do not know what they want to do with their lives. We are put in a position where as professionals we are to give them their loans and not question the actions as they are adults and the decision to take out a student loan is theirs and theirs alone. As professionals both Shelly and Britney have conveyed that is their responsibility to inform the student’s as much as possible about the realities of loan borrowing and student loan default. Most students don’t consider what default will look like to them as they are eager to start school and are not forward thinking. Their thoughts are just on getting in school and not considering what will happen down the road. These student’s often find themselves in a situation where they need to drop out of college and haven’t yet completed their degree so they are still working the minimum wage job. As Atherton’s case study demonstrates living on a minimum wage job is not feasible in our current society and being burdened with $20,000 in student loan debt does nothing to help benefit the student. When asked, what do you believe your role is in helping students understand their financial aid package and the implications of student loans? Britney answered, “My role is to offer useful resources, classes and events to reduce their debt and give them financial well-being while in college.” (Corbitt, 2017). Shelly answered, “My role is to offer useful resources, classes and events to reduce their debt and give them financial well-being while in college.” (Lang, 2017). Neither of these actions is required as part of their role or even as part of the federal regulations that govern the administration of federal student aid. They take this action because it is the right thing to do and that is more important to them then getting done with helping the student quicker. In some institutions, predatory lending is common for the colleges to manipulate student’s into taking loans to meet their enrollment numbers. “The CFPB also alleged Corinthian set tuition and fees for their bachelor’s degree programs at a whopping range of $60,000-$75,000, to force students to retrieve loans from a program in which Corinthian reaped a portion of that lender’s fees.” (Tse, 2017). The fact that colleges were manipulating their tuition cost to force students to take additional loans is not ethical, but it also has implications beyond just that single person. If a student defaults on their loan the federal government backs the loan which means our tax dollars are being wasted to fund unethical institutions. Both Shelly and Britney recognized that it wasn’t just the right thing to do, but it was their responsibility to council students away from student loans. This falls in line with doing the right thing because it is the right thing to do which is in line with their practice of the virtue theory of ethics.Another aspect of ethics that I found prevalent in Shelly’s and Britney’s interview was truth telling. The organization they both work for is not at the fore front of ethical behavior and leaves a lot to the discretion of the managers or the division heads when it comes to ethical behavior. In this type of an organization often ethical principles are not followed like the example Britney presented where someone guilty of sexual harassment was simply moved to another department. Managers could really force their employees to work in unfavorable conditions, but Shelly and Britney both chose to inspire their staff like Medvedow inspired those to follow her vision when working with Boston’s Institute of Contemporary Art. Both Shelly and Britney utilize a style of leadership which requires them to behave in a way that they would expect others to behave. They both in their own way set the example for ethical and professional behavior for their staff. One thing that both value is putting their staff first and telling the truth even when they are put in a situation that can lead a person to dishonesty. “Without truth social intercourse and conversation become valueless.” (Donaldson, Werhane, & D., 2008). In response to question #8 Shelly states: “Yes, leadership has put me in an ethically compromising situation and I chose not to compromise my own ethics to satisfy other people. I believe this action made me disliked by some, but I am not here (in this job) to be liked I am here to do an excellent job and that includes being ethical. For me my ethics comes from within not from the standards which my organization tries to set. It is more important for me to be true to myself then it is to follow the code that our flawed organizations try to implement.”Here idea that being true to herself means that she must tell the truth. Without being honest to herself there would be no value in continuing to operate as a manager or a leader to others, because she isn’t being her authentic self. I have learned that being ethical may not always be the popular thing to do. As with each of the case studies that I selected, there is often pressured to behave in a way that puts your ethics on the back burner to put the organization first. The mindset seems to be “Not every untruth is a lie; it is a lie only if I have expressly given the other to understand that I am willing to acquaint him with my thought. Every lie is objectionable and contemptible in that we purposely let people thing that we are telling them our thoughts and do not do so.” (Donaldson, Werhane, & D., 2008). The thought that both Shelly and Britney have encountered in their roles is that leadership expects them to with hold the truth from their subordinates and they don’t consider it a lie or misleading because the supervisor never had the real intention of being open and honest about everything from the beginning. In the end ethics is a matter of perception, each business and organization and person can do with more training. From our student loan industry to institutions of higher education no one in immune to unethical behavior. As a current leader and a future leader, I can see that providing people with more training on what ethics are and how to behave ethically in a variety of situations will better serve my organization and our stakeholders. The case studies selected demonstrate what I believe a good leader should be and ethical issues that hit close to home as they relate to areas I chose to practice in. I think that making the right decision should be more then doing it because it looks good, but doing it because it is the right things to do. Both Britney and Shelly give a great example of the virtue theory in practice in the roles that I wish to be in. (Donaldson, Werhane, & D., 2008). REFERENCESShanks, T. (1997, July 1). The Case of the Performance Appraisal. Retrieved August 01, 2017, from Reavis, C. (2010). Turnaround and Transformation: Leadership and Risk at Boston's Institute of Contemporary Art. Retrieved August 1, 2017, from Tse, V. (2017, February 13). Ethics of US Student Loan Debt. Retrieved August 01, 2017, from Ruben, B. D., & Jurow, S. (2012). Gender Equity Issues. Retrieved August 01, 2017, from Comrie, H. (2017, March 15). Wells Fargo Fake Accounts Scandal. Retrieved August 01, 2017, from , J. (2016, June 16). Necessity and Minimum Wage. Retrieved August 01, 2017, from Corbitt, B. (2017, August 2). Professional Ethical Analysis Paper Interview #1 [Personal interview].Lang, S. (2017, August 2). Professional Ethical Analysis Paper Interview #2 [Personal interview].Donaldson, T., Werhane, P. H., & D., V. Z. (2008). Ethical Issues in Business A Philosophical Approach (8th ed.). Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall. ................
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