Ducks in a Row: Rules, Laws and Judgment
by Miki Saxon
Enron is back in the news because Jeff Skilling’s appeal is currently in front of the Supreme Court (his sentence may be reduced or overturned on a technicality).
Arthur I. Cyr, Clausen Distinguished Professor at Carthage College, offers an interesting commentary on Skilling, the Enron debacle and Arthur Andersen.
Leadership personality is telling in any organization. Skilling from early days as a McKinsey consultant was notorious for an exceptionally aggressive, grasping style. Business author and former colleague Tom Peters described him as apparently able to “out-argue God.”
The damage that attitude causes knows no bounds and holds true wherever it is found.
Enron, stock option backdating and finally the derivatives of the financial meltdown are all from the same seeds.
In hindsight, Enron’s death was symptomatic of growing global problems. In an age of great prosperity and exceptionally cheap credit, people fairly easily could put greed before good judgment.
Greed before good judgment says a lot, but not quite all.
Even when greed isn’t the driving force there is ideology—an inflexible force that proponents claim eliminates the need for any judgment at all.
Good management, however, requires flexible, insightful human strengths. Regulation and law enforcement only provide context.
Cyr’s final comment sums up the true solution as well as the why rules and even laws don’t work.
Image credit: Svadilfari on flickr
