Schedule of the tasks and surrender № 8

Before reading the text answer the following questions using the active vocabulary.

a) Do you know of any companies or business people that are famous for their ethical behaviour?

b) Do you admire them for their ethical standards?

c) Do you choose to buy from them because of this?

Being Ethical

Being ethical can be a clever marketing strategy. Increasingly, consumers are influenced by ‘non-commercial’ factors, such as whether a product harms the environment. Firms such as Ben & Jerry’s, an ice cream maker, and Body Shop International, a cosmetics retailer, have strengthened their brands by publicizing their ethical standards. Cummins Engine, a maker of diesel engines, made its products greener while lobbying for stricter pollution laws. But such ethical self-promotion can be dangerous. Body Shop was publicly forced to change a claim that its products were not tested on animals (some of the ingredients in its cosmetics had been tested on animals by other firms in the past). The error led many consumers to question Body Shop’s ethical standards.

Some think that the best way to persuade managers to think more ethically is to take more account of stakeholders. Laura Nash of Boston University’s Institute for the Study of Economic Culture argues that managers should see their role in terms of ‘covenants’ with employees, customers, suppliers and so on. Such covenants should have a single goal: to ensure that a business creates long-term value in a way that is acceptable to all of these ‘stakeholders’.

A manager would view his business in terms of relationships rather than products; and see profit as a result of other goals rather than an objective in itself. Bur such ideas tend to go against shareholder capitalism. The best answers may be simple ones. Ethics rules should be clear (for instance, should an employee pay bribes where this is accepted business practice?) and they should be regularly tested. Some companies are turning to ‘ethical audits’. In its annual report Ben & Jerry’s carries a ‘social performance report’ on the firm’s ethical, environmental and other failings. Carried out by Paul Hawken, a ‘green entrepreneur, the audit has sometimes frustrated Ben Cohen and Jerry Greenfield, the company’s founders. So far, however, they have always published it. That may be why Ben & Jerry’s reputation remains good where others fade.

Exercise 1. Answer the following questions:

a) What do these companies sell? (Ben & Jerry’s, Body Shop, Cummins)

b) Had Body Shop sold products which had been tested on animals? What was the result of its mistake?

c) Some companies like Ben & Jerry’s are starting to use ‘ethical audits’. What adjective normally comes in front of ‘audit’? What does the audit mentioned here cover? Does it only look at positive things?

d) The audit has sometimes ‘frustrated’ Ben Cohen and Jerry Greenfi eld. Do they always like what they fi nd in the audit? Do they refuse to publish it if they don’t like it?

e) Why do Nash’s ideas ‘go against shareholder capitalism’?

f) Ben & Jerry’s reputation remains good where others fade. This means that other companies’ reputations: improve, stay the same, get worse.

Exercise 2. Write essay

A covenant is a kind of promise or agreement. Laura Nash says managers should see ethics in terms of covenants with stakeholders: employees, customers, suppliers and so on. Who could be included in the phrase ‘and so on’?

Exercise 3. Find in the text the adjectives that describe these things:

a) using ethics as a marketing strategy

b) the factors that influence consumers more and more

c) the standards that Ben & Jerry’s and Body Shop have been publicizing Cummins’ products in relation to others

d) ethical self-promotion

e) pollution laws

Exercise 4. Find verbs in the text to complete these defi nitions:

a) If you inform people about something, you ___ it.

b) If a product damages the environment, it ___ it.

c) If you increase the power of something, you ___ it.

d) If you try to get the government to change the law, you ___ the government.