A sign of the times? Who knows. But Nitin Nohria is one of the prime faculty movers behind the “MBA Oath,” and he both talks the talk and walks the walk. Click here for more.
Here are two excerpts from an interview with Bloomberg BusinessWeek:
What does it mean to take on this role after the global economic crisis?
Business itself is at an inflection point. Society’s trust in business has certainly been shaken. As a result, some of society’s trust in business education has been shaken as well. My hope at Harvard Business School is to restore that trust in business and business education. What we have to ask ourselves as business leaders and as a school is what can we do to restore this trust that has been lost so widely. I believe this trust can be repaired.What’s the common thread running through the current raft of business scandals?
Not all of this is about ethics. It’s a broader thing. There’s something about the way that we began to run business that made the pursuit of short-term profit maximization more important than creating long-term sustainable businesses.
I guess I’d take slight exception to that last answer. Sacrificing short-term profit maximization in favor of systemic stability and sustainability is an ethical issue. It’s also — and let’s pray business leaders figure this out sometime soon — good for their bottom line.