There lived a woman named Abigail who was in love with a man named Gregory. Gregory lived on the shore of a river. Abigail lived on the opposite shore of the same river. The river that separated the two lovers was teeming with dangerous alligators. Abigail wanted to cross the river to be with Gregory. Unfortunately, the bridge had been washed out by a heavy flood the previous week. So she went to ask Sinbad, a riverboat captain, to take her across. He said he would be glad to if she would consent to go to bed with him prior to the voyage. She promptly refused and went to a friend named Ivan to explain her plight. Ivan did not want to get involved at all in the situation. Abigail felt her only alternative was to accept Sinbad’s terms. Sinbad fulfilled his promise to Abigail and delivered her into the arms of Gregory. When Abigail told Gregory about her amorous escapade in order to cross the river, Gregory cast her aside with disdain. Heartsick and rejected, Abigail turned to Slug with her tale of woe. Slug, feeling compassion for Abigail, sought out Gregory and beat him brutally. Abigail was overjoyed at the sight of Gregory getting his due. As the sun set on the horizon, people heard Abigail laughing at Gregory."
THE EXERCISE: After reading the story, rank the five (5) characters in the story beginning with the one whom you consider as the “most offensive” and end with the one whom you consider the “least objectionable.”
You can leave your comments about this little activity that helps us (among other things) to understand we all think in different ways and we have different perceptions of life, as well as different valid arguments....
Should individuals (directors, employees, shareholders) bear any responsibility for the actions of a corporation? If so, to what degree?
This week i would like to answer this question. It seems a very simple question, although from the legal perspective it is not. Personally, I think that individuals should bear some responsibilities for the actions of the corporation, if it is proved that those actions were carried out based on studies that supported the possible results. However I think that the responsibility of the individuals has to be determined by the law. For example in Colombia, the responsibility of the business partners in the “ltd” companies is regulated by the code of commerce in the article 353, and it says that the responsibility will be limited according with the capital contributions, however, this can be changed and one or more people can have more responsibility. This is very important because it stablishes a limit, and I think it is very coherent. According to the law and the code article 373, the aforementioned it is applied to the “S.A” societies. Nevertheless, the theory and the practice are different. It is said that the responsibility will be limited according to the contributions in the “ltd co.” but the business partners have to assume any responsibility if there is no money in the company. I don’t agree with this, I think it is an accommodation of the law to benefit the subordinates or the other companies that are being affected by the actions of the corporations. In Colombia, we used to have 6 different types of societies: Sociedad limitada, Sociedad Anonima, Empresa unipersonal, sociedad en comandita simple, sociedad en comandita por acciones y sociedad colectiva. The responsibilities were regulated in the code of commerce, and i think that if there were not such modifications in the responsibility of the “sociedad anónima y ltda” the law would work perfectly to determine how individuals should respond for the actions of the corporations. In 2008, a new society was created: S.A.S (sociedad por acciones simplificada). Personally, I think that this society should have a reform, because it says that the partners have any responsibility. I think that people without morals and ethics in business could use this society as a shield to act in a bad way without assuming any responsibility, which is totally wrong. (It is needed to clarify that the shareholder does have responsibility when participates in fraud) The managers and the CEO's are the head of the company, are those who decide what to do and what not to do, are those that decide the course of action of the company, therefore I think that they should be responsible for some of the results (positive or negative results). Why not all the results? Because I think that in big corporations the decisions are taken by many people, and many mistakes can appear without bad intentions, therefore it wouldn’t be fair to make them be totally responsible.
According to the Business Dictionary, corporate culture is:...
"Pervasive, deep, largely subconscious, and tacit code that gives the 'feel' of an organization and determines what is considered right or wrong, important or unimportant, workable or unworkable in it, and how it responds to the unexpected crises, jolts, and sudden change. All new employees must assimilate this code ('learn the ropes') to know the correct way to behave and what to expect from other employees. Organizational culture is the sum total of an organization's past and current assumptions, experiences, philosophy, and values that hold it together, and are expressed in its self-image, inner workings, interactions with the outside world, and future expectations. It is based on shared attitudes, beliefs, customs, express or implied contracts, and written and unwritten rules that the organization develops over time and that have worked well enough to be considered valid. It manifests in:
The ways the organization conducts its business, treats its employees, customers, and the wider community
The extent to which autonomy and freedom is allowed in decision making, developing new ideas, and personal expression
How power and information flow through its hierarchy
The strength of employee commitment towards collective objectives.
Business dictionary. (n.d.). Retrieved 02 09, 2010, from http://www.businessdictionary.com/definition/corporate-culture.html
On the other hand, National identity could be defined in simple words as "the depiction of a country as a whole, encompassing its culture, traditions, language, and politics".
Now, in my personal oppinion, i think that the corporate culture has it roots in the national culture and there fore in the national identity. the people will behave in the organizacion according to what they are used to, what they believe and how they were raised in their homes. The values they have and the moral that guide people is closely related with the national identity or vice versa.
According with the aforementioned, the corporate culture would be very difficult to be changed. I think that if a CEO wants to change the corporate culture, first he/she has to analyze and understand the national identity and the national culture to see why his/her subordinates acts in certain ways. moreover, the CEO has to make subtle changes, he/she can't forget that this change in the corporate culture will "attack" in a certain way how people usually think and how they daily behave.
The age, the world the subordinates have lived in, as well as the age and the world around the top managers, the personal experiences, the national history, and many facts could modify or affect the behavior inside the organization and modify subtly the corporate culture.
The corporate culture would be just a different aspects of our lives, a different invironment inside a country, a nation.. a state.. therefore its culture can't be considered or planned or set too different from the hometown culture.
Damen, L. (1987). Culture Learning: The Fifth Dimension on the Language Classroom. Reading, MA: Addison-Wesley.
"Culture: learned and shared human patterns or models for living; day- to-day living patterns. these patterns and models pervade all aspects of human social interaction. Culture is mankind's primary adaptive mechanism" (p. 367).
Kroeber, A.L., & Kluckhohn, C. (1952). Culture: A critical review of concepts and definitions. Harvard University Peabody Museum of American Archeology and Ethnology Papers 47.
" Culture consists of patterns, explicit and implicit, of and for behavior acquired and transmitted by symbols, constituting the distinctive achievements of human groups, including their embodiments in artifacts; the essential core of culture consists of traditional (i.e. historically derived and selected) ideas and especially their attached values; culture systems may, on the one hand, be considered as products of action, and on the other as conditioning elements of further action."
Banks, J.A., Banks, & McGee, C. A. (1989). Multicultural education. Needham Heights, MA: Allyn & Bacon.
"Most social scientists today view culture as consisting primarily of the symbolic, ideational, and intangible aspects of human societies. The essence of a culture is not its artifacts, tools, or other tangible cultural elements but how the members of the group interpret, use, and perceive them. It is the values, symbols, interpretations, and perspectives that distinguish one people from another in modernized societies; it is not material objects and other tangible aspects of human societies. People within a culture usually interpret the meaning of symbols, artifacts, and behaviors in the same or in similar ways."
For more information and definitions...
(CARLA), T. C. (n.d.). University of Minnesota. Retrieved 02 02, 2010, from http://www.carla.umn.edu/culture/definitions.html
In this link, we can find a very complete definition of what culture is, as well as some specific issues related with culture such as some "theories" and the "layers of culture". I think it is very usefull if we want to understand and differentiate culture from other different terms and expand our knowledge in terms of culture, so we can have more arguments and more intelligent words when we want to talk about it or even define it
