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September 26, 2010 |
| How to Lie, Cheat, and Steal | ||
The idea for the name of this lesson comes from a book called "How To Lie With Statistics". The intent of the book was not what you might think. It was to provide examples showing practices to be avoided. The goal here is the same, to prepare you to handle situations where you might be tempted to lie, cheat, or steal.
When faced with such a decision, one man might do whatever is in his immediate best interest. A better man will do whatever serves the best interest of mankind, even when that may not serve his best interest. A Christian man serves God with the knowledge that his God-directed actions will also be in the best interest of mankind.
What we are talking about is ethics - moral principles governing the appropriate conduct for a person or group1. The foundation for ethics, both for Christians and for others, is given in Luke 6.
31Do to others as you would have them do to you
We also recognize the prohibitive form of that verse; don't do to others what you don't want them doing to you.
In this lesson we'll be discussing various situations where there is a tough decision to be made.
I am the manager of an employee who has not been meeting the minimum requirements of his job. After repeated warnings and attempts to make the employee productive, things are no better. I and my manager have agreed that the employee must be terminated and the recommendation is awaiting approval.
The employee has access to systems that are critical to the company and has the ability to damage the company if he wanted. If the recommendation for termination is accepted, he will be walked out the door, which is the company policy anyway.
Today the employee approaches me to say that he has noticed that some of the other managers have looked at him oddly or stopped talking when he entered a room. He asks if something is going on – if maybe there is going to be another performance review or if maybe he will be fired.
How should I answer?
- Why am I in this situation of stumbling around looking for a good answer? I have knowledge that I cannot divulge. I am un-prepared, I should have expected that this question would be a possibility.
I am the salesman for a high tech company that sells network equipment. I will be visiting a customer today who has purchased my company's equipment in the past. I don't have anything especially new to show the customer; I am mostly making the visit to keep in contact.
I've been told that there is a new series of our product coming in a few months that will put our product line ahead of our competitors. But I can't tell our customers about it because they would stop buying our current product line, which would hurt the company.
When I meet the customer I learn that his company is opening a new office soon and he will need to decide what network equipment to buy. But the customer is very interested in the features he has seen in our competitor's products but that will be available only in our new product line. There is a good chance that the new product line will be out by the time the purchase decision is made. But it won't be included in that decision unless the customer knows about it now. The customer says "You must have a new line of products coming out soon … to match your competitors".
How should I answer?
The situation is just a little different from the previous one. The salesman knows well in advance that he has knowledge he can't tell the customer and so he has an answer prepared for the customer's question. Here the problem is that his desire to make the sale is causing him to rationalize and come up with valid sounding reasons to do what he should not do.
The idea behind the rationalizations is that you can do a lesser wrong to achieve a greater good.
My car has some dings that are starting to show rust. I take the car to a body shop and get an estimate for $1000, which will hurt my bank account. I ask if there are cheaper ways to do some of the fixes, or if some can be left until later. He says "I tell you what I'll do. If you pay me cash I'll do it for $800"
Should I take the offer?
A lady has arrived at her destination airport and goes to the car rental office to pick up the car she has reserved. The lady at the desk asks her if she wants to get the insurance and tells her all the things that will happen if she doesn't get the insurance and has an accident. She is very insistent. The customer says she doesn't need insurance because her own vehicle insurance covers rental cars. The lady at the desk asks her who she insures with. On hearing the name of an insurer, she says "we don't deal with them". The customer understands that she has no choice but to buy the insurance.
The lady at the desk likely spoke true words. Car rental companies don't insure vehicles through insurance agencies like the public do. But the customer came to a false belief – that she had to buy the insurance.
If it was the intent of the lady at the desk to instill this false belief, the correct term is deceit. But from the customer's point of view there is no difference between that and a lie; the customer comes to a false belief
An equipment manufacturer creates a product that falls under government regulation. To be certified a large number of tests must be performed and passed. But this new product makes a leap in technology that makes it different from similar previous products. The difference is such that some of the certification tests are designed to test functions that just do not exist in the unit. As a result it isn't possible to perform the tests. Yet regulations require them.
The manufacturer can begin the process of trying to get a change in the regulations but government moves so slowly they could lose their market advantage. The regulation change might happen just in time for their competitor's product to pass without delay and without the expense of fighting for regulatory change. Or they could check the boxes on the form to indicate the tests were performed and passed and "play dumb" if the regulatory agency ever asks about it. They would say "The tests could not be performed on this piece of equipment and we didn't know how to handle it. We know we could not have failed the tests so we checked the boxes".
What is the right thing to do here?
Often the most ethical action is the one that could cost you the most personally – Monster.com ethics test
The unethical actions of lying, cheating, and deceiving are usually the easiest ways to solve a problem, at least for the moment. But sometimes those come back and cause more trouble than the ethical action.
The cost referred to by Monster.com is not necessarily in dollars. It could be lost career advancement, lost friends, or mistreatment by those who would have made the wrong choice.
No matter the cost, we know we have done right. We won't find ourselves shamed when our actions become known. We will also not have brought shame on other Christians by people saying, "So that's how Christians behave." Instead we can take comfort that we have pleased God and lived the life that Jesus lived.
1 Encarta Dictionary, MS Word