EBM 502 Discussion 5

FramingaLifeStory_AnExercise.pdf

Home >Computer Science homework help >EBM 502 Discussion 5

UVA-OB-1105 Giving Voice to Values

Rev. Jul. 22, 2016

This field-based case was prepared by Mary Gentile, Professor of Practice. Names and other situational details have been disguised. It w as written as a basis for class discussion rather than to illustrate effective or ineffective handling of an administrative situation. Copyright © 2010 by Mary Gentile. All rights reserved. To order free copies, send an e-mail to sales@dardenbusinesspublishing.com . No part of this publication may be altered without permission.

Framing a Life Story: An Exercise1

Sometimes the hardest part of voicing our values is, ironically, accepting the image of ourselves that such efforts trigger.

Of course, this may seem counterintuitive. We may think that the version of our life story we would squirm over is the one where we fail to act on our values. After all, isn’t that the heart of the so-called Wall Street Journal test of ethics: that is, the assertion that we should never do anything we would feel uncomfortable seeing on the front page of the Wall Street Journal (or the New York Times, or telling our parents, or…)?

And to a certain degree, the assumption on which this test is based is valid. That is, if we consider whether our actions are defensible to the wider public—or if we think of someone whose respect we value and consider how they would react—we will find a helpful “check and balance” for our decision making. It’s a way of proactively creating a social context from which we may derive constructive “social proof” for our best

instincts.2

There are a couple of limitations to this test, however. First, no one who takes actions that violate their values really expects to get caught or to have their decision reported in the paper: remember what research tells

us about our tendency toward “overoptimism.”3 But secondly, and more to the point here, despite our proactive efforts to create a positive social context outside the workplace for identifying the right thing to do, we are still strongly drawn to acceptance from the folks on whom we rely for our position, or with whom we spend the most time, or to whom we must defend our choice: that is, our workplace colleagues and supervisors.

And this acceptance—the perspectives that we hear or assume are prevalent from our professional colleagues—can have a very powerful impact on how we view our own decision to voice our values. Ironically, we may fear that a decision to voice our values—and therefore, not pursue an unethical but tempting course of action—will tag us as “naïve” or “unwilling to make the difficult calls” or “not committed to the firm” or “not driven to succeed.” Sometimes it is precisely our act of values-based courage that can be labeled negatively by our peers and even raise doubts within ourselves. Even when we have created a positive context for defining our values, we may still find it difficult to act if we don’t have a story to tell about our choices with which we are

comfortable.4

1 This material is part of the Giving Voice to Values (GVV) curriculum. The Yale School of Management was the founding partner, along with the

Aspen Institute, which also served as the incubator for GVV. From 2009 to 2015, GVV was hosted and supported by Babson College. 2 Robert Prentice, “Teaching Ethics, Heuristics, and Biases,” Journal of Business Ethics Education 1, no. 1 (2004): 57–74; and Mary Gentile, “Scripts and

Skills Teaching Note,” Giving Voice to Values. 3 Robert Prentice, “Teaching Ethics, Heuristics, and Biases,” Journal of Business Ethics Education 1, no. 1 (2004): 57–74; and Mary Gentile, “Scripts and

Skills Teaching Note,” Giving Voice to Values. 4 See Mary Gentile, “Naïveté or Boldness? (B)” and “A Personal Struggle with the Definition of Success,” for Giving Voice to Values case illustrations

of this phenomenon: www.GivingVoiceToValues.org.

DardenBusinessPublishing:292916 P

le as

e do

n ot

c op

y or

r ed

is tr

ib ut

e. C

on ta

ct p

er m

is si

on s@

da rd

en bu

si ne

ss pu

bl is

hi ng

.c om

f or

q ue

st io

ns o

r ad

di ti

on al

p er

m is

si on

s. T

hi s

do cu

m en

t is

a ut

ho ri

ze d

fo r

us e

on ly

b y

S an

dr a

M oh

ab ir

-M cK

in le

y at

S tr

at fo

rd U

ni ve

rs it

Page 1 of 2

mailto:sales@dardenbusinesspublishing.com

http://www.givingvoicetovalues.org/

Page 2 UVA-OB-1105

Therefore, it may be useful to find a way to frame this decision to voice our values—and a story about who we are—that we can feel comfortable with, not only in the Wall Street Journal or at home, but also in the office.

Assignment

Mary Catherine Bateson, “Composing a Life Story,” in Willing to Learn: Passages of Personal Discovery (Hanover, NH: Steerforth Press, 2004): 66–76.

Think of a time when you have acted on your values but were still uncomfortable with the way that your peers (or you) viewed that choice. What is the story they (or you) were telling about your decision? Why were you uncomfortable with that story? How might you reframe that story, perhaps using Bateson’s ideas about “change” and/or “continuity”? (I.e., what are you keeping consistent within your life and career, and/or what do you want to change or transform?)

Discussion Questions

 Why do you think that the decision to act on one’s values is sometimes labeled as “naïve”?

 Why do you think that the individual who decides to act on his/her values is sometimes labeled as “unwilling to make the difficult calls” or “not committed to the firm”?

 Why do you think that the individual who decides to act on his/her values is sometimes labeled as “not driven to succeed”?

 Can you identify alternate stories or “frames” to use to change these labels, at least for yourself or for the case actor him/herself?